Artist impression of Kortenoord. ©Idealis
The room shortage is the result of a delay in getting a permit for a student complex at Kortenoord. Idealis had wanted to offer 300 temporary rooms for students at the end of October 2017, but that will now be next spring. Spokesperson Hellen Albers: ‘The permit procedure is more extensive than we had expected. That’s really a shame because now all of our plans have been delayed.’
In addition, Idealis has received only a few rent cancellations. ‘It’s not clear why, but not many students are vacating their rooms at the moment. That’s a problem because we really need the rooms.’ Idealis is now trying to stimulate the current renters to vacate their rooms: the first one hundred students who terminate their rent contract starting on 9 June will receive 100 euros. ‘A little push just to get things moving in the housing market.’
Room guarantee
Albers thinks that the international students, who receive a room guarantee from the university, will be able to find accommodation. ‘In August we will rent two buildings in Ede where the barracks are located to deal with the peak. We can accommodate 140 people there. And we have also reserved rooms for foreign students in the past few months.’ Dutch students will have to be more patient Albers said. ‘These students will find it difficult. We at Idealis are concerned about whether we can realize our intention of being able to offer everyone a room by 1 May.’
Other locations
After the project at Kortenoord, Idealis is going to build housing at the Diedenoort terrain, where 176 rooms will be available by the end of 2018. And they are creating student housing on Costerweg, where 264 new rooms will be available in 2019. In addition to these projects, Idealis is also looking at other locations. Albers: ‘The related memo, written by the city government, WUR and Idealis, has been pending for months in the city council. It was supposed to be on their agenda before the summer, but has been postponed until autumn. Unfortunately, this means that we now have to wait longer to hear which locations will be approved.’