College Pads | Page 31 of 32 | Not Just Apartments and Houses, Your Total Off Campus Resource

IU International Students Guide to Living Off Campus

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As an undergraduate, or graduate, finding housing can be a worrisome task. International students, especially first year international students, have an even more difficult time. Coming to a completely new area, many not speaking or reading English very well, makes things difficult. On top of that, most schools no longer can guarantee that first-year students have a place on campus. Here are some things to consider as an international student when looking for housing:

Don’t put it all on yourself!

If you’re traveling to campus alone, use any resource you can find to find somebody to help you. There are all sorts of resources available to help international students find a place, and find a roommate that will fit well with them. You can check out our roommates section here. Many of these, including our roommates feature, allow students to connect via Facebook so they can learn about someone they’re considering living with before they commit to meet them. Most of all, know that it is always easier to find a good place with help. Don’t be afraid to use it, you won’t regret it.

Don’t Rush

Landlords can sometimes be pushy people. Know that this is actually a pretty big decision for you, and it will affect the next year of your life. You need to find the right pad that fits you. There are all sorts of places to consider, and it all depends on what YOU like. If you want to be surrounded by lots of new people, look for a big complex (like this one – for example). A place like that will allow you to make lots of new friends in a short manner, and will likely have lots of fun amenities. But if you’re more interested in a personal area, try looking for a house or small apartment. You’re likely to get closer to campus with one of these, making walking to class and throughout campus easier. Take your time, consider all options, and talk to landlords multiple times. You want to be sure that you’re dealing with someone who will give you a positive experience over the next year, not the other way around.

Proximity to campus is important!

You’re new to this area. You don’t know where to live and where not to live. There may be neighborhoods or areas to avoid. There may be areas that are sought after highly. Most likely, you’re unaware completely. When you’re searching online for a place to live, know that proximity is important. Sometimes the schools will point you in the direction of a website that displays all rentals in the city. You don’t want that. It will end up being a waste of your time trying to figure out which ones are student rentals and which ones are not. Try your best to learn about the areas of campus ahead of time (see our blog on neighborhoods in Bloomington) so that you make the right decision. Generally speaking, you’re better off looking closer to campus. It’ll make your life easier, that’s for sure.

If you’re an international student, and you’re looking for a place, use these tips to make your search as easy as possible. Take your time, think a lot, use every resource you can. The next time you look, it will only become easier. Need more help? Reach out to us directly for one on one assistance! Email us here or search for available IU apartments now!

Best of luck!

IU Finals Got You Stressed? Tips for Surviving Hoosiers Finals

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With next week being finals week, stress on campus and around IU apartments is at an all time high. Don’t fret – you’re not the only one! The pressure put on college students is immense; pressure from themselves, their families, and their friends to achieve success. As important as finals are to the success of students, they put students in a whole new level of stress. Cramming, staying up all night, downing can after can of Red Bull, finals are tough on the body and mind. The combination of mental and physical stress makes taking these comprehensive examinations MORE difficult, not less difficult. There are some things that students can do to limit this stress though. Here are some ideas:

Go Outside! Play/Exercise

Student Playing Outside Bloomington is a beautiful town to live in. Go outside and enjoy it. Whatever you like to do outside, carve out some time from studying and go do it. Throw the football, go for a run, play Frisbee golf, hike, anything! The beauty of physical activity is that will alter your thoughts from school. It will help take your mind off things for a short period of time. This will reduce your stress, and make it easier for you to remember things when studying. Not to mention it will help you get that beach bod going for the summer!

Cook a Good Meal

College Student Meal It’s very easy to get caught up in the craziness of finals week. Whether its breakfast, lunch, or dinner, try to spend 15-30 minutes preparing a healthy meal for yourself once a day during finals. Not only will the meal help fuel your physical energy and mental capacity, but the short time away from thinking about school can be soothing. Make a meal for your roommates too, if they’re around at the time. It’ll make you feel good about yourself. Confidence is the key to success.

Listen to Music/Sleep

There have been plenty of studies that show that music can relieve stress. Typically, it’s the slower, quieter music that demonstrates the best ability to relieve stress. Use the time when you’re walking from building to building, or walking home, to listen to some calming music. Here’s a great example of something to listen to, that will relax you:

Andy McKee – Rhylynn

It will help calm you down, and may actually encourage you to take a quick nap. Worried about napping too long? Check out the app “Power Nap” on your phone. It will track your sleep activity based on desired length, and wake you right back up when your body is most ready to awaken.

Try Not to Worry

I know it seems like a completely unreasonable thought process. From personal experience, though, you need to know that these exams are such a small part of your life. Whether you do great on every one, do mediocre on some, or you don’t do as well as you’d hoped, everything will be ok. Try to focus on the long term. Yeah, these exams are going to suck a little bit, as they always do, but in the grand scheme of things, they’re just a paper test. That’s it.

Keep these things in mind. Final exams are very important, and you should definitely focus a great deal of attention on them. However, keep your life in order when doing so. Don’t lose yourself in the midst. You’ll forget more information than you’ll remember. And you won’t remember that information for longer than a few days if you cram anyways. So just calm down, use these tips to help you relax, and go NAIL THOSE SUCKERS!

Top Apartments for IU Upperclassmen

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Chances are, if you’re an upperclassman at IU, you’re looking for a place for next year that is quiet, easy to get to, close enough to campus to make travelling to class easy, and reasonably priced. This combination isn’t always easy to find. Don’t worry though, it is not impossible. We’ve built a list for you of places to consider looking at. Most likely, one of them will fit your eye.

The Gateway

Managed by popular Bloomington Property Management company, 10th and College Management, The Gateway is a new luxury style apartment building that offers students anything from studio to three bedroom apartments. The Gateway is actually two separate buildings, which are to be connected via skybridge! There will be retail space and restaurants on the first level, with levels two and three housing the collegiate apartments. Amenities are plentiful at this new location. You’ve probably noticed it going up, it’s right off 17th Street and College Avenue, overlooking Miller Showers Park. Overall, The Gateway is awesome.

Walnut Place II

Geared towards graduate students at Indiana University, Walnut Place II is managed by OMEGA Properties. The team at OMEGA have been leasing in Bloomington since 1985. This is a great new building, on the south side of campus, right by the Chocolate Moose. Apartments are to include hardwood floors, high-end stainless steel appliances, and spacious floor plans. Walnut Place II is only two blocks from Kirkwood Avenue, but still is far enough away to provide a quiet location for students to get work done in.

Bloom and Millennium

These two sister properties aren’t quite as close to campus as some others, but they offer an unbelievable combination of amenities. Between the two of them, there is an incredibly awesome indoor pool area, a great dog park, walking and hiking trails, every internal apartment amenity you can dream of, and a lot more. For an upperclassman that doesn’t mind driving five minutes to get to campus, these two properties are what dreams are made of.

The Village at Muller Park

Do you not have a vehicle on campus? The Village at Miller Park is for you. The Village at Muller Park offers a shuttle service for their tenants to campus. Whether you do or you don’t have a car, this apartment complex is great for upperclassmen. Their clubhouse offers a wide array of games and common areas, as well as a phenomenal outdoor pool. Located just a few minutes west of town, these places are great for grad students. It’s quiet, offers the amenities that students and young professionals thrive on, and offers more than reasonable pricing.

Henderson Crossing

Henderson Crossing offers probably the most central location on this list. This is a much smaller apartment building, which is managed by TEMPO Properties. Located one block southwest of campus, everything is walkable in a matter of minutes. Henderson Crossing has everything that you’ll need to succeed, and offers seasonal discounts to grad students. It’s a quiet place to live, but still close enough to everything to make travelling throughout campus easy. Check out everything that Henderson Crossing has to offer.

There are many more places throughout campus that offer great places to live for older students. However, this ought to get you started. Reach out to us if you need any help finding IU apartments.

Grocery Shopping On A Budget

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Everybody knows that eating out and ordering in is a quick way to blow your food budget for the month but grocery shopping can feel expensive too. In order to make sure you save the most, you need to plan ahead.

Making a List not only helps you remember what you plan to buy, it also helps you narrow your purchases to the things you need. A list can also be a way of tracking deals and coupons.

Don’t Shop Hungry. Make sure you eat a snack before you go grocery shopping because everything looks delicious and cheap compared to an empty stomach.

Couponing isn’t just for soccer moms. When done the right way, you can save tons of money by getting a few cents off here and there on essentials. Just make sure you read the fine print, sometimes a buy one get one deal is really a 50% off deal trying to get you to buy double.

Check Unit Prices before deciding which brand or size to buy. Sometimes a larger size container is still the same price as the smaller per unit.

Store Brand foods are often just as good as a popular brand’s product but much cheaper. Only special foods differ much in taste by brand.

Don’t Buy Prepared Foods. A couple extra minutes washing and cutting up your produce isn’t that bad. You pay significantly more for the convenience of a ready-to-eat vegetable.

Prepare Your Meals On Weekends. Getting all your meals ready at the beginning of the week saves you time when you’re tired from school or work. It also prevents the lazy food ordering because you don’t feel you have the energy to make a whole meal.

Buying Produce in Season means you can still eat the things that are good for you and fresh without breaking the bank.

Buy Frozen when a food you want isn’t in season. It doesn’t really lose nutritional value and is cheaper than buying a food out of season when the shipping costs sky rocket.

Buy Deli Meat. Packaged meats are generally more expensive than going over to the deli counter and having them slice off the amount you want. That means you also get the right amount too, without more packaging, that you pay for.

Watch the Register as you check out. Sometimes sales advertised in the store haven’t made it into the programming of the register yet and things don’t always scan properly. If you watch the register and check your receipt, you can avoid accidents that cost you money.

Renter’s Insurance: Why should you consider it?

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Why Renter’s Insurance Is A Good Idea

You may not have thought about getting renter’s insurance in your search for an apartment but it is a very good thing to consider. Your landlord’s insurance will not cover your belongings, it only covers damage to their property and the appliances that are rented to you with the apartment. Many things could go wrong that would leave you without your things such as a fire, storm, or even theft. Thinking that you don’t need the insurance because these things probably won’t happen to you isn’t the mindset you should have either, considering renter’s insurance is actually pretty cheap for what you would get out of it should the need arise.

Payments

With renter’s insurance, there are options on how you pay for it. You can pay month to month or you can choose to pay all at once, once a year. If you choose to pay all at once, there is often a discount on the overall cost but sometimes it’s easier on the bank account to pay month to month even though you end up paying more in the end.

Being Ready

So now that you’re looking into insurance, you should know how to be prepared in the event that you end up needing to use it. A good plan of attack is to have all of the numbers that you would need to call in one place along with a list of information that they are going to ask for.

Inventory

One of the main things that they are going to want you to have is an inventory of your belongings and their actual worth. You may not think that you own that much capital in your belongings but the average person owns about $20,000 in belongings. Your table may be a thrift shop find but you’ve still got your computer, textbooks, clothes, etc. to consider. After you’ve got a list put together of your belongings, make sure you keep it safe. A hard copy kept in the freezer (in a plastic bag) should keep it safe in the event of a fire or your computer being stolen.

Understand Your Policy

Your renter’s insurance covers more than just your belongings. Depending on your policy, it would most likely also cover liability if somebody is injured and there are medical expenses in your rental property and it should also cover living expenses if you are displaced from your rental for reasons such as repairs.

Types Of Coverage

There are many types of rental insurance coverage. The thing to consider is whether you want to get ACV (Actual Cash Value) or RV (Replacement Value) insurance. ACV takes into account the depreciation of your belongings on a payout where RV estimates a payout based on what it’ll cost you to replace the belongs. An RV policy will have a higher premium but the policy would make it easier to replace your things should anything happen to them.

5 Decorating Ideas

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Apartments can be tough to decorate without over or under doing it. They have a lot of empty wall space but filling all of the walls in a small space can make it feel like they’re closing in on you.

1. Lighting your space properly will open up the dark corners so the amount of area you actually have is visible. Most apartments don’t have too many windows and they may be facing another building or just don’t let light in very well. A dark apartment will always feel more like a cave than a home, so add some lamps to liven up your living space.

2. Slim Furniture provides all of the benefits as it’s bulkier relatives but takes up less space, both physically and visually. Finding the right pieces might be difficult but once you do, you will have furniture just as comfortable as any other and looking much nicer in your apartment.

3. Rugs provide an alternative to the flooring your apartment came with and can be used to both individualize your space and you can use them to separate a room into it’s different functions. This is especially nice for a studio apartment but can also be used in an apartment with bedrooms to divide your living area from your work area.

4. Wall Hangings can either be bought or made by you. They give life to your walls and break up the large expanse of emptiness. The important thing to be careful of is making holes in your walls because your landlord will take the repair costs out of your security deposit.

5. Mirrors are excellent at opening up a space. The reflective surface not only makes it seem like there is more space in the room but it also reflects more light into the area. Mirrors also don’t look like they weigh a whole lot unless the frame is overly large so they won’t look chunky as a decoration.

5 Ways to Maximize Storage Space

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Finding space in your apartment to store miscellaneous belongings can be tough when an apartment only comes with one or two closets. There are ways of creating your own storage though that don’t mean your apartment looks messy.

1. Under The Bed is a good place to put a few flat or small objects. Just letting it stay empty is a waste of space in a place where space is in short supply. Keeping things you use more often toward the front will help you find them easier and keep you from making a mess digging through all of the things under there. If you are concerned that people can see your storage space, invest in a skirt for your bed.

2. Behind Corner Furniture is a little niche you can use to your benefit. A chair angled right can make a space suitable for any number of items to be carefully tucked away. This would be a really good place for your cleaning supplies. It would give you easy access and nobody is going to think you’re messy for leaving cleaning supplies a little bit visible.

3. Open Storage makes finding things much easier and when it’s used in the right places, doesn’t look bad. The bathroom is a good place to utilize open storage, especially since most apartment bathrooms are really small and lack space to keep all of your necessaries. Kitchens or an adjacent dining space is another ideal place to use open storage for your cooking supplies.

4. Bookshelves don’t have to be just for books. Arrange some of your more decorative belongings out in the open as a display. It can be a good way to show visitors a bit more about you and start a conversation or give them something to look at while you grab an item quick.

5. Multipurpose Hampers are a good place to throw a backpack at the end of the day or your sweatshirt instead of on the furniture and as a bonus, closing the lid makes the hamper into an inconspicuous storage space. If you have a pet, all of their toys can just go into a hamper since they don’t really require organization. Hampers don’t have to be just for dirty clothes.

5 Tips for Keeping Organized

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Of course it would be great to have a nice, big house to live in, but as college students, we generally live in a nice, small apartment. To make the most of your limited space is no easy task, so here are some tips to making sure you are keeping organized in your small space because staying organized is a sure way to keep clutter out of your living space.

1. Make a chore list. It may feel strange as an adult to have a chore list, but it is an effective way to make sure you are getting everything done. There is always more to do than you think and keeping track of all of that is just easier if you have a list to look at.

2. Make a playlist. When you are trying to tidy up, it is easy to get distracted by something else around you. Blocking out other noises and also giving yourself a rhythm to work to will keep you efficient, reducing the amount of time it takes out of your day to make your apartments less cluttered.

3. Use one calendar. If you have a calendar of events that contains all of your obligations in one place, it makes planning your time that much simpler. Knowing when you have time allows you to plan ahead so you aren’t rushing around and throwing things down instead of putting them where they belong.

4. Give everything a place. When all of your belongings have a place to be, they aren’t out and about around your apartment. Not only does this de-clutter your living space, it also makes it easier for you to find things later when you need them, especially if you are in a hurry.

5. Get rid of things you don’t use. If you haven’t used it in a year and it holds no sentimental value, why do you still have it? Things that you don’t use are just taking up space in a place that is already limited in that respect. If the issue is that it still holds some value and you are unwilling to give that up, sell it or donate it. This way, you aren’t just throwing it out.

Finding Your First Apartment: Evanston

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Finding your first apartment is a nerve-racking experience. Whether you are just starting off college or simply moving to a new city, each area has its own unique tricks to finding your perfect place. While there are many options to choose from, there are important details to consider that help narrow down the decision pool. Among these are price, area, utilities included, and also nearby amenities.

Finances: What can you expect to afford in Evanston?

One of the most important things to consider when you are looking for an apartment in Evanston is your price range. Before you begin, you should sit down and figure out how much you can afford to spend every month and then don’t forget to leave an amount to pay your initial security deposit. Costs to take into account are rent, groceries, utilities not included in your rental agreement, and extracurriculars since Evanston is just north of Chicago and offers its own entertainments as well.

Rent is one of the biggest costs of living to consider and it fluctuates depending on what type of apartment you are looking at (studio, 1 bedroom, duplex, etc.), area, and amenities included in your rental agreement. Evanston apartments can generally cost between $700 and $1000 a person per month. Proximity to NU can also affect the price of your apartment. (Many apartment leases do not include electricity and some also exclude internet or charge extra on top of rent.)

Area: Where should you live?

Evanston is a decently sized town and as such, there are a few areas to choose from when deciding where to live. Most neighborhoods are near the university but a couple are a bit far. Areas near the campus include; Downtown, Central Street, Dempster Street, Main Street, and Chicago Avenue. Each area has a different appeal and you should always research the area you are looking at before signing a lease.

Looking: What to look out for.

While you are searching for your apartment in Evanston, be sure to keep an eye out for things included in the rental cost and things that are not. The biggest costs to look for are heat, cooking gas, electric, internet, and if the facility has on-site laundry. Before you sign a lease, read it over carefully because some landlords will try to slip in a clause that you do not need to sign on with. If you are questioning anything in the lease you can search for the Tenants’ Rights Handbook.

Finding Your First Apartment: DeKalb

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Finding your first apartment is a nerve-racking experience. Whether you are just starting off college or simply moving to a new city, each area has its own unique tricks to finding the perfect apartments near NIU . While there are many options to choose from, there are important details to consider that help narrow down the decision pool. Among these are price, area, utilities included, and also nearby amenities.

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