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Accommodation in general
by v.chance
I would honestly recommend choosing this place last. It's liveable, but barely.
Basically, the best thing about this place is the community with people on your floor. IF you get a good few people, that is! The rest of the place, for what you pay, is crap.
Chandos Hall is pretty much an old, old building falling a ... part everywhere. I moved in for the 2011/2012 year, made some AWESOME friends but I'm sick to the teeth of this place. Here's a few problems for you:
- Maintenance is terrible at Chandos Hall. We've had a broken toilet seat for 6 months and, since moving in, my window STILL doesn't close completely and they still haven't bothered to fix it. It's freezing in winter.
- We lost heating for MONTHS and only had electric heaters. They, when they switched the HOT water off one weekend (they provided no alternative for showers), they forgot to mention the WHOLE water supply went off. So imagine students waking up, about 5 sharing a toilet, using the toilet, going to flush then realising it didn't work. No one in over the weekend so we had that stench and NO toilet for the whole weekend. No apology, no warning, NOTHING from Chandos.
- There have been floods all over the place on the floors because pipes seem to constantly break.
- Chandos Hall seriously has the worst water in the city centre. My friend's tap spits out little stones, I don't have cold water (only luke warm in BOTH taps) and it ALWAYS comes out cloudly. It's disgusting and you'll spend more money buying bottle water in all honesty.
- The plaster on the walls near the doors is falling off. These doors slam really, REALLY loudly and WILL wake you up if you live next to them. We have to keep them open constantly.
- Kitchen looks like something from Charlie Bucket's house before he got that stupid factory.
- Things constantly break. And I don't mean by force or drunk students... the handle has fallen off the grill three times now, just by pulling it down.
- The hobs and ovens have a tendency to 'stop working' randomly. It takes forever for someone to come and fix it.
- Three plug sockets in my room have failed SAFETY tests and have a huge "FAILED" sticker on them. Grim.
- You can literally break into any room with a card or prying at the doors. I'm lucky because everyone I know here who does this are my friends and we get on so well - but it's not very secure.
- The pipes make a really weird sound almost constantly. You get used to it... eventually.
Seriously, this place is falling a part. Last option only. Chandos Hall maintenance is rubbish; they may be nice people, but they really don't seem to care. Ridiculous living conditions and that's just the tip of the iceberg. However, the community here is awesome - but you're taking a massive risk because if you get stuck with boring people you will have a horrible time.
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Halls Of Residence At The University Of Dundee
by kyward
I have just finished my second year of University and during my first year I stayed in the University of Dundee halls of Residence. My particular flat was in the Belmont Tower (the oldest and ugliest building). The one advantage of this was that living in the ugly building meant it didn't spoil my view! While the outside of the building ... is old, the interior was updated when the newer buildings of Belmont and Heathfield were built on campus, and so the flats are actually very nice.
There were 8 of us living in my flat, 4 boys and 4 girls. I felt this was a nice mix and was happy I hadn't been placed in a single sex flat which some of them are. It is worth noting that if you live in Heathfield or Belmont the flats only house 6 students instead of 8.There are other halls called Tay mills, which I think house between 4 and 6 students and also West Park flats and villas which are around 6 people also.
Belmont Tower, Belmont flats and Heathfield are located on the main University campus just beside the Union and the sports centre. This was really great as it meant that I had everything I could need just on my doorstep. Tay Mills is located just down the hill from campus (about a 3 minute walk) and West Park is located further along the Perth Road towards Ninewells hospital. It takes about 20-30 minutes to walk from West Park to main campus (depending on how late you are). Many medical students live at West Park as it is closer to Ninewells hospital. However, being a medical student myself I couldn't see any real advantage to that. Most students from West Park get the same bus anyway so you are only saving yourself 5 minutes of bus journey time. There are several bus routes around the main campus to choose from and the nearest bus stop to get to Ninewells for me was only about 100m away from my flat. Due to the fact my flat was on campus, it was only a 5 minute stroll into the centre of Dundee to the shops, and 5 minutes from the two main clubs in Dundee (Fat Sams and Liquid). All in all, the location of the flats on campus is great and can't be faulted for convenience.
I was surprised be the quality of the flats themselves, having heard horror stories about student accommodation before going to University. To enter my flat there were two different locked main doors. Inside the first door were the post boxes (one for each student). There was then a different locked door leading to the stairs and to the two lifts. I lived on the 7th floor, so only when I was feeling particularly energetic did I take the stairs! The lifts were nice enough and were relatively quick so there wasn't much hanging around waiting for lifts. We did have a few vandalism incidents with the lift throughout the year but this only happened a couple of times and was promptly fixed. The combination of the two locked doors did mean that the flats were quite secure. This did become a bit of a problem after a night out though as the number of keys became a bit complex!
On making it up to the 7th floor, there was the door to my flat, again locked. The one annoying thing about the door into the actual flat is that there was another door just inside it, which opened the opposite way. This created a bit of an annoyance if you were trying to carry large bags through the doors. Inside the flat was a long corridor with 8 single rooms coming off it, each with a locked door. The rooms were a good size and each one had an ensuite shower room. Included in the room was a single bed, a desk, a good sized wardrobe and a couple of cupboards. It is worth noting that bedding is not provided so you will need to bring your own duvet and pillows. The room was layed out in a strange way when I arrived so I rearranged the bed and desk to create more space. In the shower room was a toilet, sink, good sized shower and a heated towel rail. Everything was in great condition when I moved in (and when I moved out!).
At the end of the corridor there was a door into the shared kitchen area. There was a section which had two tables and 8 folding chairs for dining. There was also a cupboard for each student which had a lock on it as well as several more cupboards for sharing. As there were 8 of us in the flat there were two fridge/freezers and two ovens with 8 hob rings. This meant there was ample space for a few people to be cooking all at once. The only other kitchen appliance which was supplied was a kettle. All appliances were clean and working well when I moved in. We purchased one toaster between the flat but I did hear of flats where they ended up with 5 or 6 toasters as everyone brought one!
At the back of the flat was a door onto the fire escape stairs which also lead to the wash room where the washing machines and tumble dryer were housed. The wash room could only be entered using a code so was also quite secure. The only problem was that there were only 2 washing machines for the whole building. There were 9 flats in total, all with 8 people living in them, so 72 students sharing. This tended to become a problem at weekends when everyone panicked and did washing on a Sunday afternoon. The machines are coin operated so you need to make sure you have a good supply of change!
Sometimes noise was a bit of an issue in the flats. I couldn't hear anything from the two rooms next to me, but could hear any conversation from out in the corridor. I could also hear the girl who lived in the room above me walking around and flushing the toilet! To be honest, the noise didn't really bother me, but if you like complete silence then University halls are not for you anyway!
Sanctuary Management were the company in charge of looking after the halls and they really were strict. We had inspections twice in the year and any breakages will cost you dearly. We broke one folding chair after a party and we were charged £80 to replace it. We also had multiple visits from them when we had parties as other flats would complain of noise. Even though they were strict and they charged us a fortune for broken stuff, they were also really efficient at sorting out complaints. My shower stopped working once and within a day someone was round to fix it which I thought was great. If you lose your keys they are really quick at replacing them too.
In comparison to other halls at other Universities, Dundee is a tad more expensive. However, for your money you get a great sized room, your own toilet and shower and good quality accommodation. I have friends at several other Scottish Universities and Dundee halls are the nicest I have seen.
The best thing about moving into halls in first year was meeting lots of people. Very few of my friends from school moved up to Dundee so I had to meet a whole new group of people. Having 7 other people living in the flat meant that on my first night I had people to go out with and Fresher's week was amazing! You also get to know other people in the building and meet loads of people through them. It was nice to know there were other people around who had also just moved out of home and were in the same boat as you!
You can re-apply to move into halls in your second year and you can apply as a group so you know who you are living with. The University do some kind of discount for second year students in halls but I'm not sure exactly what it is as I wasn't interested in staying another year.
I would definitely recommend University of Dundee halls as they are great quality, mostly in a great location and filled with lovely people!
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Halls Of Residence At The University Of Liverpool
by Holland1
I went to Liverpool university between 1999 and 2002, and for my first year I stayed in Roscoe and Gladstone halls. I absolutely loved my time in R&G, and although things may have changed since then, I would confidently recommend them to prospective students.
The first time I went to see the halls was with my parents as ... part of an open day. I remember thinking how scenic it was (there's a pond type thing, probably won't be as amazing now but at the time was pretty unusual for halls), and it just had a nice feel about it generally. The halls are in a quadrant on four floors, and all the rooms have a small balcony (apart from the ground floor). It's a very sociable place to be, with people coming out on their balconies and shouting across to their friends, and you feel like you're never far from others because it's fairly small.
The halls offer meals which obviously costs a bit more than the self-catering halls, but for people who are away from home for the first time this is brilliant because it eases them into independence gently. I used to love getting up for breakfast and having a decent meal to start the day, and then they'd offer teatime meals, usually a choice of around five, so you only had to worry about feeding yourself at lunchtime.
The halls have porters who man the desk and sort any problems and give you your post. Your post goes into a pigeon hole and you give them your room number to collect it. The corridors are secured by key fobs, but there were always the usual problems with people letting strangers in and not waiting for doors to close before walking away. We never had any problems whilst I was there though, and as long as you remember to lock your room your personal belongings are secure.
I think there was some kind of "common room" with a TV and pool table somewhere, but we never used this because it was easier just to meet in friends' rooms and most people had their own TV in their room. The rooms are compact but have a sink area and balcony, a desk and notice board area to personalise the room to your taste. It was grim on first sight but I soon made it like home, and settled in really well.
There was a shared bathroom between 5 people per each corridor, but this never really posed a problem because everyone was doing different courses so we were all getting up and coming and going at different times. The toilet was also separate to the shower so you could still use it if someone was showering. There were extra toilets downstairs too.
I loved these halls, and made some good friends here. I can honestly say it was one of the happiest years of my life.
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