Welcome to the College Real Estate Page for the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas. Many parents ponder whether they should buy or rent while their students attend college. For some the answer is to buy and for others the answer is to rent. College Real Estate hopes to help you find which is the right answer for you. Another great tool in helping you decide is our College Real Estate guide book that walks you through the entire process of buying student property. We hope you find this site useful and welcome any and all feed back. If you would like to be connected with a College Real Estate's exclusive Realtor in Lawrence, Kansas please visit our buying page. If you have decided that buying student housing is not the right answer for you and would like to be connected with a leasing specialist please visit our leasing page.
Whether you prefer the University of Kansas…KU…or just “Kansas”…all three refer to the public education institution located in Lawrence, Kansas that is home to the crimson and royal blue Jayhawks. With a student body of 27,875 and a faculty rounding 5,500, KU is by far the largest university in the Great Plains area. U.S. News and World Report surveys around 1,400 institutions of higher education annually and the 2007 list ranked KU as 88th in the list of Best National Universities.
One of the first public radio stations in the nation, KANU, began at KU in 1952 and to this day, it is completely run by students. Speaking of firsts, KU was the first school to crack into the academic study of sociology in 1890 and the KU academic computing department can boast about their active involvement in setting up the Internet in the 1990’s. KU excels at basketball, research, internationalizing students (one in five Jayhawk seniors studies abroad before graduating), and balancing academic and social endeavors.
Another thing KU is good at is keeping the price down. The Princeton Review, Kaplan’s, and other college reviews cite Kansas as one of the best buys in the nation when it comes to higher education. Tuition is 13 percent lower than the national average and the cost for in-state students of $6,153 per year beats out other Midwestern schools such as the University of Iowa and Illinois. The price jumps up significantly for out of state students, with a hefty price tag of $18,714 per year. No matter where you are from, room and board will average about $6,150 annually.
Located in Lawrence, Kansas, the KU campus is just 30 miles from the major metropolitan area of Kansas City. Lawrence itself is a mid-sized town with 88,500 residents and a reputation for liberal philosophy, distinctive culture, and a strong artistic and musical presence downtown.
Many small neighborhoods comprise the residential areas of Lawrence, so most students looking to buy or lease off campus housing property begin their search based on proximity to the campus area…the closer to campus, the more desirable. If you are interested in purchasing real estate in Lawrence, you can expect property to appreciate about 4% annually. A typical two bedroom house will go for $130K to $150K, while three bedroom homes usually run between $160K and $180K.
If leasing is more your style, you will have no trouble finding rental properties in Lawrence. There is no shortage of multi-family housing and apartment options, so the student housing market remains pretty competitive. Most two bedroom apartments will lease for 12 months between $600-$800 each month. You don’t need to allow too much time for apartment searching since there are so many options, but finding a one family home to rent could take a bit longer. If you plan to begin school at the end of August, you should be looking for a rental home in early to mid-summer, but you can wait to start looking for apartments to lease until the beginning of August.
College Real Estate’s goal is to make the moving transition as worry and stress free as possible so we have created a moving center which provides you with helpful information from your utility providers to local grocery centers, restaurants, churches and much more.
College Real Estate also offers a How To database that will keep a new homeowner or those of you renting a house or an apartment from paying an arm and a leg for a service that can easily be done yourself. You can learn how to fix the garbage disposal, light the pilot light, the best way to get rid of rodents, and many other useful lessons. We invite you to take advantage of this knowledge or even post your own helpful article.