Manchester Metropolitan University offers students accommodation in Liverpool

Manchester Metropolitan students offered £100 a week to live...in Liverpool Credit: PA images

Students struggling to find accommodation in Manchester have been offered £100 a week by their university - to live 34 miles away in Liverpool and Huddersfield.

First year Manchester Metropolitan (MMU) students reported issues with finding flats and houses through the university's accommodation portal.MMU says the housing crisis has come after "significantly more offer-holders than anticipated have been accepting and meeting the conditions of our offer."

The university says the issue "affects around 2% of undergraduate students" planning to join in September.

It says it has offered "temporary options" with private hall partners in places like Liverpool and Huddersfield, both of which are around 30 miles from Manchester.It said undergraduates taking up the offer would be paid £100 a week "to cover out-of-pocket expenses, including travel costs".

The students starting in September have been offered accommodation in Liverpool and Huddersfield. Credit: MEN Media

One student, who wanted to remain anonymous, said "communication has been awful."

While another for Staffordshire, hoping to begin a photography course in September, said: “I’ve been on the lookout for accommodation since June.

"The whole system of getting accommodation is through a portal, and the information we’ve been told to secure a place is to just stay on the portal and refresh it.“We’ve been doing that every single day and I still haven’t managed to get accommodation and I’m due to start within two weeks.

"I live in Staffordshire which would just take about 40 minutes on the train. It would be quite pointless for me to pay however much a week to go to Liverpool.“That is not the city that I was expecting to live in and it’s competently different experience for me."

Email sent to "2% of students" who are attending Manchester Met in September 2022. Credit: MEN Media

A Manchester Metropolitan University said the city is in "significant demand for accommodation."

A spokesperson said: "We have offered places to our target student numbers this year and planned our accommodation based on long-term experience of how many of those offers are likely to be accepted, while also building in a considerable cushion.

"However, significantly more offer-holders than anticipated have been accepting and meeting the conditions of our offer. 

“The issue around accommodation availability affects around 2% of undergraduate students planning to join us in September.

"While we continue to work hard to secure accommodation for them in the city region, we are now providing temporary options with our private hall partners in Liverpool and Huddersfield.

"We will cover travel costs to Manchester for any students who take up this offer.

"We know that this will be disappointing for them, and we are doing everything we can to find them to rooms in Manchester as soon as we can."

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