Dorms Don't Really Compare
The Quality of Your "Home"
The University of Utah has done a great job expanding housing for students, including some new buildings and some renovations of older buildings. But, there is really no comparing the quality of any of these buildings and dorm rooms with the Utah Renaissance House. Even in the newest buildings you will frequently have concrete floors, vinyl baseboards, and metal or wood industrial fixtures. The dorms are just not in the same ballpark, or league for that matter, with the Utah Renaissance House when it comes to appearance and fixtures. Look at the pictures on this website and walk through the Utah Renaissance House. You will instantly see, feel, and understand the difference.
The Location
Many of the dorms are a surprisingly long way from the center of campus and even farther from most classroom buildings located on the west edge of campus. Located in the prestigious and beautiful Federal Heights neighborhood on the Northwest corner of campus, the Utah Renaissance House is still much closer to most classroom buildings than the dorms. Really, pull up the campus map and measure. It's also much closer to Greek row, off-campus restaurants, and the city center. No getting up early to stand in the cold for the campus shuttle. No scraping snow off car windows, driving, and waiting in the parking lot for hours for a parking space. No walking a mile to get to class or a sorority meeting. It's a perfect location.
Convenience
The Utah Renaissance House offers an easy twelve-month contract for the school year and the following summer. You can stay year after year with no moving everything out for the summer and the storage and issues that involves. The dorms are less-than-eight-month contracts (with breaks that you are sometimes forced to leave on or make special reservations to stay), spread over nine calendar months. This forces students to move in the day before classes start and move out, in total chaos, during or the day after finals. The Utah Renaissance House school year starts two weeks before school starts and ends with plenty of time to stick around and enjoy all that a beautiful Utah summer has to offer. You move in and out at your convenience and settle in long before classes start.
Food and Cooking
At the Utah Renaissance House, you will have two full kitchens with full size stoves, refrigerators, microwaves, sinks, and dishwashers. There are coffee makers that actually grind beans. You will have cupboards full of pans, plates, bowls, and cooking utensils. You decide whether to microwave a frozen burrito or cook a gourmet meal. You have lots of refrigerator space and cabinet space for groceries. In the dorms, you are required to purchase a meal plan for thousands of dollars and are generally limited to eat whatever they choose to serve. Most food service locations close at 8:00 p.m.! You might also have to walk across the street in the snow for a meal or snack. You will also be lucky if you are sharing a "kitchenette" or hot plate and real cooking is nearly impossible in any of the dorms.
Actual Cost & Value
When you actually run the numbers, the Utah Renaissance House is a great value compared to the dorms. In addition to rent, the University charges additional junk fees like the $130 application fee, the $34 LLC Programming fee, and the $66.00 Student Engagement Fee. You must purchase a meal plan on a use-it-or-lose-it basis. You also deal with most food outlets closing at 8:00 p.m. and all of them closing by 10:00 p.m. You can count on an extra food expenses due to that inconvenience. Also, good luck parking your car! The amenities, convenience, and quality of the housing are vastly superior at the Utah Renaissance House. There is no doubt that the Utah Renaissance House provides a much better value. Its often less expensive overall to live in the Utah Renaissance House than to live in the dorms!
Apartments are an Entirely Different Living Experience
The Living Experience - Spending Time Alone
Apartments are great if you like to spend time alone and away from campus. 99.9% of apartments serving the University of Utah require a drive to campus and a daily stressful parking experience, or public transportation. You will be a commuter student. Most apartments will permit one roommate, at most, and allow anyone, student or not, to move in to the other apartments; including the creepy ex-con across the hall. There is no community. The Utah Renaissance House is the opposite of this. The house is yards from campus, next door to the sorority and fraternity houses, and in the middle of the university community. The entire living experience is about a small group of women sharing one of the most exciting experiences of their lifetime, together, helping, enjoying, and supporting one another. It is all about community.
The things you Don't Think About
Finding an apartment is one thing after another, after another. First, you search online and tour apartments. You have to visit because nobody includes pictures of the negatives or sketchy neighborhood they are located in. Then, you navigate the lease, nonrefundable deposits, credit checks, handing over your social security number and bank account numbers to be hacked and sold later, and ridiculous additional junk fees. If you need roommates, you try to get them to commit and hope they mean it. Then, you fill out forms to set up and pay deposits on utilities and for internet service. After that, you shop for and buy a bed, a couch, tables, chairs, a modem and router, window coverings, pans, silverware, a microwave, a coffee maker, towels, a shower curtain, cleaning supplies, toilet paper, decorations, a vacuum, and countless other items; all while knowing that you could be moving, storing, or selling all of this stuff a year later. Then you get to move it all in, set it all up, and hope everything works and keeps working. The Utah Renaissance House is fully furnished and provisioned, is in a great neighborhood, and provides all of the utilities, internet, and stuff.
The Day-to-Day Hassles
Once you move in and have bought all the stuff, the hassle doesn't end. You get to clean the apartment, or live in an apartment that isn't clean. Talk to anyone who has lived with roommates and likes to live in a clean home and you will hear all about this problem. Then, you have to remember to pay utilities or pay late fees. You get to take the garbage out. You get to hang out for hours at the laundromat or deposit endless quarters in an apartment laundry room. You get to deal with broken appliances and clogged drains. If you have roommates, you get to deal with your vision of "clean" verses theirs and the collection of their share of the rent and utilities. There is also the great fun of a roommate not paying rent, moving out mid-semester, partying 24/7, or inviting over a new "friend" who just seems to be in your apartment all the time, smiling, and not paying rent. None of this happens in the Utah Renaissance House. The house is professionally cleaned, has set enforced rules about "friends", has two laundry rooms available 24/7 (no quarters), and all of these other issues and problems are handled by the management.
Renting a House is like Renting an Apartment . . . but Worse
The Stuff
When you rent a house, it's almost always unfurnished and empty. You will be lucky (or maybe unlucky) to get a refrigerator, washer, and dryer. You will almost certainly need beds, couches, TVs, pots and pans, a vacuum, cleaning supplies, lamps, silverware, internet and Wifi equipment, tables, chairs, and a hundred other things to make the house livable. You might even need a lawn mower. You will be spending a lot of time on KSL and at Walmart. You get to move all this stuff in, put it together, deal with it when it breaks, and then store or get ride of it a year later. When you live in the Utah Renaissance House, all the furnishings and stuff is provided and maintained. And since we are buying stuff for the long term, its nice stuff. We don't shop for furniture at Walmart.
Amenities
Yea . . . none. The kind of house students will be renting will be lucky to have enough parking in a dirt or gravel driveway, a barely green patch of lawn, and an old washer and dryer. For any campus amenity available to students, you will have to drive, park, and walk. Then, you get to do it all again when you are done. The Utah Renaissance House has amazing and luxuriously furnished living rooms and study rooms, huge wall mounted televisions, two sets of new washers and dryers, a beautiful pool table, a retro video arcade game with more than 100 games, an EV electric car charger, an amazing game table, a cabinet full of the latest board and table games, a beautiful and private patio, a perfectly manicured yard, tons of parking options, and two stunning private balconies. It's also an eight minute walk from the house to a state-of-the-art student workout facility on campus and even less of a walk for other amenities available on campus.
Running a Household
Most landlords rent a house with one lease and expect the tenants to sign up for and pay utilities, clean the house, mow the lawn, work out bedroom assignment and parking arrangements, and work out rent division and rent collection among themselves. You get to figure out who cleans the bathroom and kitchen, and when. You get to pay utilities and collect rent from your roommates and deal with a roommate who just doesn't have the rent money that month. You get to deal with the 20 year old carpet and that odd smell that just won't go away. In the Utah Renaissance House, its the opposite. You get to choose your room and parking up front. You pay your own rent and don't worry about anyone else paying. Cleaning, utilities, and all maintenance is included. You just focus on getting an education and having fun.
Location
Most homes you can rent are not within walking distance to the University. A mile or two from campus might look close on a map, but the only difference between that and living twenty or thirty miles away, is a few more minutes driving. With most rental homes, you will be a commuter student and will likely spend most of your time away from campus. You will need to take public transportation or drive to campus and deal with parking. Even homes that are near enough to walk do not compare to the Utah Renaissance House location. The Utah Renaissance House is in the perfect location a one minute walk from campus, on the end of Greek Row, with plenty of parking options for friends and study groups.
Security and Safety
If you take the time to listen to podcasts by Landlords who focus on renting homes to students, two things will stand out regarding security. First, they almost never include any security features such as digital locks or security lights. Second, they know the tenants almost never lock the doors in shared houses. In one podcast, the landlord tells the "funny" story of how he gets calls from female tenants asking what to do when they wake up and find a strange man sleeping on their couch. This really happens and it is terrifying. The Utah Renaissance House is in a great neighborhood. Rules bar overnight guests. The house has digital fingerprint self locking locks on all exterior and bedroom doors. The exterior locks all have cameras and there are several security lights with motion sensors and cameras outside of the house. Nobody can guarantee safety or security, but the Utah Renaissance House has great security features.
One Upside - Awesome Parties
There is no denying that if you and a group of friends rent a house, you will be able to throw the best parties . . . at least once. You can send the mass invite, open the door, and really just let people go crazy. It will be epic. People will be sharing stories and pictures of the mayhem that was your living room for at least a couple of days. Of course, there are other advantages to throwing good parties. Along with the occasional police intervention, shocking mess and destruction, neighbor tantrum, eviction notice, and random passed out person in your bed; you can actually live in everyone else's party palace. For people who eat only fast food and can tolerate developing country living conditions, this is great. None of this will happen at the Utah Renaissance House. The Utah Renaissance House is the place you get ready for the party and the clean place you come home to after the party.
