Graduate student apartments finished, offers affordable rates
North campus' 164 newest additions seem to be settling in well.
The graduate student housing complex is finally complete, and students have finished moving in to the newest addition to the Central Michigan University campus. Every room is full this year.
“We have had this type of housing on our master plan for many years,” Joan Schmidt, director of Residence Life, said. “Because of the growth of graduate students, particularly in health programs and the new college of medicine, it was a very good time to build.”
In addition to students in the College of Medicine's inaugural class, students in 30 different graduate programs live in the apartments, including biology, business, chemistry and communications.
The addition of the new housing complex comes following a lack of on-campus graduate housing.
“There wasn’t an apartment on campus that was just for graduate students,” Nathan Tomson, manager of university apartments, said. “In the beginning, priority was going to be given to medical students, but because they were apartments, under the Fair Housing Act of Michigan, you can’t discriminate against applicants. So that’s why they’re open to all grad students.”
Once the plan was approved, Schmidt said a group of university representatives met and hired an architect, design firm and a contractor to begin construction on the new complex.
“Over the years, we have lost 96 apartments in what used to be Preston Apartments and 128 in Washington Court,” Schmidt said. “So, our apartment stock was dwindling and continuing to age. It was time.”
The new complex on north campus has 94 rooms with 164 beds, with no vacancies for the fall semester.
According to Tomson, the new complex is similar in appearance to Barnard Hall, which was torn down in 1997.
A one-bedroom apartment is $665 per month. The two-bedroom unit is $445 per month per person, and the four-bedroom apartment is $315 per month per person. An extra monthly charge of $35 is added for a furnished apartment.
When compared to major off-campus apartment complexes in Mount Pleasant, the new apartments are somewhat competitive in price.
Two-bedroom apartments are offered at different complexes including The Village at Bluegrass, 4300 Collegiate Way, Jamestown Apartments, 4075 S. Isabella Road, and Tallgrass Apartments, 1240 E. Broomfield Rd., and monthly rent ranges between $355 and $500 per month.
Bluegrass, Jamestown, Tallgrass and Deerfield Village Apartments, 3400 E. Deerfield Road, all offer four-bedroom arrangements going from $350 to $465 per month.
Tomson said upkeep costs of the apartments should not be an issue.
“Everything is brand new, and it is all state of the art equipment, so we’re very hopeful there won’t be a lot of upkeep,” he said. “We’re going for LEED Platinum certification, so there are certain products that will have to be bought to maintain that certification. There are certain things that will cost us money, but in the long run, they shouldn’t be too costly.”
