OFF-CAMPUS LIVING AND IMPROVEMENT PLAN

Prepared for
Craig Chapman, owner and manager of Chapman Housing

Prepared by
Marcus R. VanPoppelen
Ferris State University

November 17, 2014

TABLE OF CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY...1
INTRODUCTION.2
BACKROUND....2-3
SITUATION...3
RECOMMENDATIONS...3-4
Introduction..3-4
Finding the Correct Fit.4
Company Staff & Maintenance...4
Communication4
CONCLUSION..5
APPENDIX 1: CURRENT OFF-CAMPUS LIVING FACT SHEET..6
WORKS CITED7

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Off-campus living is one of the bigger steps in a students college career. It teaches
responsibility, money saving and how to get ready for life after graduation. If when going to rent
a house for the first time and the students dont find what theyre looking for or the quality of
living is low then the benefits that this should bring will be diminished.
When it comes to off-campus living, more than half of all students from most institutions
are living in a rental house or apartment during sometime after they enter college. Each college
student is looking for different aspects for their perfect house, from physical to structural
components within the house. There are many policies and regulations also that need to be
followed so that these houses are in livable conditions for all the students and future leasers.
Recommendations are a key point in this report, and there are many options to consider
when restructuring or applying these to the place of work. Maintenance is the most important
issue that needs to be solved. From lack of work, to untimely work order responses and slow to
no communication of a completed work order; all of these factors go into affecting both the
students and staff of the business. If these things do occur benefits will decrease and fewer
students will be happy about their living arrangements. Adding more maintenance crew members
could help this issue, also creating a more convenient way to keep track of work done and in
progress should be issued. The staff needs to be more responsive to the renters that need help or
when issues are present. Not being able to get a hold of someone for questions can get
frustrating. The staff needs to be easy to work with so that all problems can be solved without
having to get a manager involved. Last, communication throughout the whole business with the
students is the most important part of a functioning business and rationale for solving problems.
Students should be able to easily communicate to whomever they need to find solutions if
something were to arise within the house.
In the end, these recommendations should be taken into consideration and used to help
benefit the students and business that will accommodate for these changes. Students will
recognize the business more in the future after these changes are put into effect. Good reviews
and comments from past leasers will bring in future business. Also, it will make the business
much better with more organization, timely repairs and communication that might have gotten
lost. All of these recommendations are easy to accomplish and can be utilized in trials or tests
before fully committing to change. Options are open to slowly come into using these
recommendations to make the business and the life off-campus easier for students.

INTROUCTION
This report examines students in college that choose to live off campus in rental houses
through multiple companies that are available within the college town. The report also goes
through the things that college students consider when looking for a rental house that is good
enough to live in. Many important factors go into renting a house for the first time that need to be
considered and analyzed when wanting a great house to live in during school. Recommendations
on how to help improve living conditions, quicker turnaround times on repairs and manager
responsiveness are in this report. All of these will help improve student living, but also bring
more benefits both to the tenants and manager/staff within the business.

BACKROUND
The goal is to help improve student off-campus living and responsiveness to maintenance
or questions asked to the staff within the business. If implemented, this well benefit the current
business by having more on-time paid rent by students, better feedback from current and past
renters, and more business overall from future renters. Also, this will benefit the students that
will have a better quality of living, less problems with appliances or house structure and the
happiness of the renters.
Living off-campus in college is one of the better experiences that there is to have. I was
looking forward to it the first day I got to Ferris State University and was moving into the dorms
as a freshman. Research by Delgadillo and Erickson (2006) states that around 60% of today's
high school graduates enter college after graduation, and almost half of current college students
choose to live in private market housing. For these students it is the beginning to living on their
own and getting the experience needed to thrive after graduating from college. It also helps many
students to understand responsibility by paying rent on time, keeping the house clean and not
damaging property. Many good lessons can be learned from living off-campus alone or with a
few roommates, but these can only happen if the rental houses are kept up to par and good
communication comes between both the students and staff. Rugg, Rhodes and Jones (2000)
reported that colleges and universities are increasingly relying on the private market to
accommodate student housing needs, and that on average 49% of students live in private
accommodations and not those provided by the schools. Living off-campus can have many
benefits, and with the large amount of students that live off-campus the staff must be easy to
communicate with.
There are many college institutions that also accommodate students for off-campus
living. These are typically the higher education institutions (HEI) that can afford buying out a
house rental company and able to rent these places out to students within the college. Many of
these businesses that are used have to comply with many government and health standards to be
able to be used for HEIs for student living. Rental house businesses that arent through HEIs
also need to follow certain regulations for keeping livable conditions when renting out houses.
Regulations and certain policies change throughout each state for rental properties. Some things
are permitted in all houses; such as fire alarms in each room, structure without mold or broken
foundation, working pipes for plumbing, etc. For these things to stay in order maintenance must
be provided or written within the agreement that problems will be sorted out by the people

renting the house. All of these important policies and regulations must be followed by the
business even if theyre not constantly checked by inspectors.
Lastly, there are multiple things that students look into when considering to live in a
rental house for the semester or a couple of years. Many students or renters look physically at the
house and also look within the staff of the business to see if the house is the right choice for
them. Physically, renters are looking for a good structure without cracks and degrading boards or
beams. Also, that there is no damage to floor or walls that cant be fixed easily or that doesnt
propagate into further problems for the house. The staff and management of the business play a
large part into whether or not someone will rent a house. Based on reviews, comments and just
by word from friends or previous renters will all come into effect when research of the business
is being done.

SITUATION
Picking the correct house with all of the aspects met when wanting to rent in a college
town is a big decision. I was inclined to make a decision when wanting to go from renting an
apartment to renting a house. First, research of the rental agency or business was done, reviewing
and asking previous renters of how compliant the staff of the business was and how easy they
were to get along with. The main concern and reviews said that many of the rental businesses
were hard to work with. Also, that the maintenance staff was slow on return time for work orders
and didnt make timely repairs. There were many comments stating that previous repairs were
not done well enough and needed to be fixed again within the week or a couple of days later.
Due to these maintenance issues the house will eventually deteriorate and not be pleasant enough
for future renters that may be interested. These seemed to be the main concerns when students
are looking for off-campus housing.
There is a difference between renting an apartment and a house. Both offer many options
that could either be the same or different. I have been in both of these situations and neither has
been acceptable in terms of maintenance, communication and responsiveness to work orders or
questions. In the study done by Delgadillo and Erickson (2006) the main two issues when renting
were found to be due to responsiveness and maintenance. This survey also has comments from
students that completed it. Students were responding with how the maintenance does not seem to
respond to work orders and is very slow to fix problems. Also, that the managers of these
businesses dont seem to care much for the tenants living in these rented houses and dont
interested in the upkeep of the house. These are all downfalls that will contribute to smaller
amounts of rentals each year and bad reviews that could ultimately lead to loss of business. If
these problems with renting houses persist then these rental agencies could actually go out of
business.

RECOMMENDATIONS
Introduction
There are multiple recommendations that I can make to help improve the growing rental
housing market in college areas today. These recommendations can become solutions to many

problems that are persistently impeding the business of rental companies trying to make money.
Most of these solutions being presented are easily accomplished with little to no expense to the
business that will pursue them. Also, steps need to be taking not only by the business but the
renters as well to make sure for properly flowing system.
Finding the Correct Fit
First, I would like to address the first step college students encounter looking for offcampus housing. If a student was interested in a house through a certain company this company
should be willing to show them houses that would fit their needs. This can be done by understand
the interests put forth by the students and evaluating the houses based on their opinions.
Communicate and openness is crucial from the manager and staff a part of the rental housing
agency to be complaint with these needs. This will not only ensure that the student gets the best
house that is complete with what they want, but it will also start to build the relationship needed
between the student and staff. Ultimately, in starting off this way it should be easy to hold this
relationship and have a great arrangement for future leases.
Company Staff & Maintenance
Next, the problem lies with upkeep of the house from past leasers and unoccupied months
were there needs to be constant maintenance. This problem can start with an unresponsive staff
when there are already renters within the house. Problems that are not fixed or poorly done will
lead into the house being in worse conditions than how it started. One solution to this problem
could be the addition of more maintenance personnel to be able to deal with the problems as
soon as possible. This will require hiring and creating a larger staff but could improve the
problem. Another recommendation is to have a twenty-four hour phone line that is open for
issues. Some businesses do have this in place, while others have the leasers waiting till the week,
if a problem arises on the weekend, for it to be fixed. Many issues that are obtained and work
orders that are written should be put into a list of importance per each work order. The staff
should also be regularly checking in with the tenants on how the maintenance is going. Calls
should be coming if it is still in effect, reassuring that the problem shall be fixed soon and how
the work went. Multiple issues can be addressed by h staff just through a phone call and then
relayed back to the maintenance to understand the satisfaction of the renters, how well the work
was done and if there is any continuing problems.
Communication
Finally, all of these actions and issues can be resolved from better communication
between all of the businesses staff and the renters of the house. Communication is a huge part of
any business and should be one of the most important parts when leases are being signed to rent
houses. This will help problems get resolved quicker with better comments and reviews coming
from present renters. Also, this will make the tenants that are currently living in the house be
more responsive to rent payments and possibly resigning their lease agreement for another term
or however long the lease may last. This will also help bring other newly interested college kids
willing to rent off-campus houses to the business. All of this is due to better reviews and talk
amongst friends that gets around.

CONCLUSION
In the end, living off-campus is a great thing and should be something experienced at
least once by all college students. Not only does it prepare you for the real world, but it is also a
time to live alone and learn about responsibility. There are multiple things that go into living offcampus. First you must look for the correct house while making sure it is in the best form with
little to no damage on the interior or structure. Whether the college offers off-campus housing or
you have to go to private owned rental agencies, it is up to the student to make accommodations
accordingly and find the correct house.
There were multiple surveys done to test for the main reasons that students complain
about off-campus housing after signing leases. Research found many things about the students
that lived off-campus, these surveys showed many things and that more than half of students live
off-campus. There were three main concerns that were reported from these tests, other students,
and by personal experience when renting a house. These are; lack of maintenance crew with slow
response times, low compliance from the staff within the agency that is giving out the rentals and
conditions on the house when moving in.
From being a past, present and future renter I have the experience to understand the
research I have gathered to understand some conclusions about off-campus living. After pulling
together what I have learned and experience there were multiple recommendations that were put
forth to help benefit future student renters and the businesses that come to pursue these options.
It all starts with finding the correct house for you. When in this stage, the staff should be very
helpful when trying to get the needs of the renter met and finding a home within the timeframe
they have. This is the first step in building the communication needed between the renter and the
businesses staff after the lease has been signed. Secondly, many companies need to increase the
number of people that they have in house and on maintenance. The only negative may be that
there needs to be more salaries paid out by the owner, which in turn will come easier as the
renters are becoming happier and spreading the word of the business. After work orders are
organized, fixes are done in a timely manner, and the staff is easily communicated with students
or renters will recommend this housing lender to more friends in the future creating revenue.
Lastly, communication must be the most important item practiced and done by the staff,
manger/owner and renters. With better communication comes quicker response on maintenance,
better responsiveness to questions and overall better/happier tenants.

APPENDIX 1

CURRENT OFF-CAMPUS LIVING FACT SHEET

In college students always begin in the dorms due to school regulations. When the
opportunity comes, students have the ability to move off campus and live one their own with
friends. This is a high point in college for some students being able to be independent. Many
students pick off-campus housing due to privacy and money savings. Some rentals can easily be
much cheaper than living in the dorms being forced to buy a meal plan and other random
expenses that arent necessarily included with a rental. Even though many students are generally
happy with their living conditions in rental houses, many houses also unclean and seemed to be
falling apart. Though more and more issues arise, there is still the fact of most students
disagreeing with the responsiveness and maintenance return time of most rental house
businesses.
Off-Campus Living Realities and Facts

Apartment/housing managers responsiveness and fairness are 50% of the reasons that
student give bad reviews on housing rentals.
Half to almost more than half of college students tend to life off-campus.
In Rocheleaus article (2014) he stated that it was about an even split for students that
lived on campus compared to off-campus students living in Boston area colleges.
Due to the survey (Delgadillo and Erickson 2006) it was found that the main influence on
how students feel about off-campus living is due to the manager.
Property managers that are responsive, get things quickly fixed and are easy to work with
are more likely to earn more renters over time.
There is a much higher percent of rental homes then owner occupied homes that have
moderate to terrible living conditions.
When focusing on house problems (Environmental Health Risks 2009) health problems
associated with bad house conditions ranged from 50% for mice to 72% for broken steps.
o These were based on separately analyzed problems from multiple houses.
Also within this study it is stated that about 11% of off-campus students living in their
houses do not have working smoke alarms (Environmental Health Risks 2009).
A significant percentage of students living off-campus experience problems with
appliances, visible molds, cracking, malfunctioning or missing smoke alarms, etc.

Works Citied
Christie, H., Munro, M., Rettig, H. (2002) Accommodating students. Journal of Youth Studies, 5
(2), 209-235.
Delgadillo, L., Erickson, L. V. (2006). Off-Campus Student Housing Satisfaction. Journal or Family
& Consumer Sciences, 98(4). Retrieved from EBSCO Host.
National Environmental Health Association (2009). Environment health risks associated with
off-campus student-tenant housing. Journal of Environmental Health, 71.6, p48. Retrieved from
General OneFile.
Pendall, R. (2007) From Hurdles to Bridges: Local Land-Use Regulations and the Pursuit of
Affordable Rental Housing. Retrieved from Google Scholar.
Rocheleau, M. (2014, October 09) Boston offers a plan to help colleges add dorms, The Boston
Globe.
Rugg, J., Rhodes, D., Jones, A. (2000). The nature and impact of student demand on housing
markets. York, England: York Publishing.