Bristol students dealing with some of UK's highest rents, says report
A student housing charity and education think tank says the system of maintenance loans is "broken"
Last updated 26th Oct 2023
Students in Bristol have to deal with higher rent than their peers in almost any other UK city, according to new research from a student housing charity and an education think tank.
Analysis from Unipol and the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) shows nationally annual rent for a student room has risen by almost 15 per cent in the past two years and now takes up most of the average maintenance loan.
Excluding London and Edinburgh which were considered outliers, Bristol has the highest average annual student rent at £9,200.
Students are being forced to take desperate measures such as illegally doubling up in rooms, taking on increasing amounts of paid work or even avoiding university altogether due to costs, said Unipol's assistant chief executive, Victoria Tolmie-Loverseed.
The organisation estimated that, on the basis of the Government forecast for England, the average maintenance loan expected to be taken up by full-time students is £7,590, meaning students who cannot rely on family support or do not have a job, "will have no money left to live off" once they have paid their rent.
The cities in the analysis were Bournemouth, Bristol, Cardiff, Exeter, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Nottingham, Portsmouth and Sheffield - with London and Edinburgh deliberately excluded to give a more balanced view of rents outside these expensive markets.
Exeter was found to be the second most expensive city for students, behind Bristol, with Glasgow in third.
Glasgow had the sharpest jump in rental costs at 20.4 per cent over the past two years, followed by 16.1 per cent in Exeter and 15.5 per cent in Nottingham.
In the survey, 45 per cent of rooms were university-provided, with rents rising by 10 per cent on average across the two-year period.
The other 55 per cent were private sector rooms and those rents rose by almost a fifth (19 per cent), the report stated.
Martin Blakey, Unipol's chief executive, described the student maintenance system as "broken", saying affordability cannot be entirely blamed on housing providers who are "under pressure to cover increasing build and running costs".
Hepi director Nick Hillman said: "The Accommodation Costs Survey has been tracking the real costs of student housing for decades.
"Compared to years gone by, we are now at a crisis point.
"Across most of the UK, the official levels of maintenance support simply do not cover anything like most students' actual living costs.
"In the short term, maintenance support should be increased at least in line with inflation.
"In the medium term, ministers should rebase maintenance support using the evidence they've gathered as part of the Student Income and Expenditure Survey, which is due to be published soon.
"For the longer term, we need measures to encourage the supply of new student housing, which is currently restricted by factors such as higher interest rates and confusion over new regulation."
Supply issues could be further exacerbated by the Renters Reform Bill, the report warned, stating that unless there are amendments it "will cause major turmoil in the market for student houses in England", with students treated as any other tenants rather than accommodation being available to rent in line with the academic cycle.
This potential problem was also highlighted earlier this year by MPs on the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, who said "abolishing fixed-term contracts here could make letting to students considerably less attractive to private landlords".
Among the report's recommendations was a call for more joined-up Government policy with departments working together to "highlight the importance of student accommodation, raise its profile and stimulate change", and for a "resetting" of the student maintenance system.
It stated: "Maintenance support needs to be based on how much it actually costs to be a student living independently and away from home."
Such is the shortage of university accommodation in Bristol, students moving to the city have and continue to be offered rooms in other places including Newport, Cheltenham, Gloucester and Bath.