To understand the challenges and preferences of students moving abroad for higher education, University Living, a leading global student housing platform, conducted a survey, which revealed interesting insights. Through its observations, University Living saw a significant spike in the overall traffic from January to May 2022 in students looking for accommodation. There was a 2.5X increase in April and a 3X rise in May 2022 compared to the same time last year.
University Living’s analysis found that the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, and Ireland are some of the most popular countries among students choosing to move abroad to pursue their higher education. Besides, the platform also saw that finding suitable accommodations near their campus, financial constraints, language barriers, culture shocks, and remittance/current bank accounts are some of the common challenges students faced.
“Each year, there are thousands of students moving overseas for their higher education, and most of them face some common challenges. University Living was founded to offer them all-encompassing services that will make their study abroad experience smooth, seamless, and convenient,” said Saurabh Arora, Founder & CEO, University Living. “Our survey and analysis reveal in-depth insights into the challenges and preferences of students, which will allow us to cater to them more effectively. We also have ambitious plans for the coming year and some exciting things happening,” he added.
University Living has a 10 per cent market share worldwide with a 35 per cent share in India – something it plans on increasing to 50 per cent by the end of 2023. The platform will also be hiring for various functions as it grows. It has interacted with over 6 million students and been booked over 7 million nights across 265+ educational hubs.
Through its survey, the student housing platform noted that only 1 out of 6 students find accommodation in university halls/on-campus accommodation, although this data varies for each country. In 2015, the percentage of students opting for PBSA (Purpose-Built Student Accommodation) was at 8 per cent, it has gone up to 22 per cent this year. Interestingly, University Living also revealed that local educational government bodies prefer that international students live in PBSAs as they are more spacious, efficiently run, sustainable and reduce carbon footprint. From a student’s perspective, they offer more value for money, a better experience and environment, and more exposure as kids from various nationalities and cultural backgrounds stay together.
Furthermore, in terms of each country, the survey/report showed that Canada is still a supply-constrained market while the USA has more accommodation options, although the rising popularity of Ivy League universities is increasing the demand. Similarly, in the UK, some cities like Coventry are over-supplied by student accommodation, while some like Nottingham see high demand and limited supply. The Indian market, on the other hand, according to the platform, is far more fragmented, although there has been immense progress in recent years.
For the next year, the platform plans on reaching USD 10 million in revenue while expanding its footprint in North America, Europe, and Southeast Asia, among other countries. Incepted in 2015, University Living is an intelligent retrieval platform that offers a global student housing managed marketplace. It helps students across the globe find suitable and secure accommodation near their university campuses. Headquartered in Delhi, they have a 150-member strong team that works towards reinventing their services to better the user experience and digitally transform the overseas education journey.
