Tips for Student Flat Hunting in Aberdeen

Student Flat Hunting – Tips and Advice

It´s that time of year again when everyone starts looking for a flat for the upcoming academic year. Whether you are a first-year looking to rent your first private accommodation, someone further-on in their studies looking for someplace different or an incoming exchange or post-grad student, here or some of my tips for student flat hunting (in Aberdeen).

If you are an incoming first-year student or someone who wants to stay in halls again rather than looking for private accommodation, check out my Guide to Student Accommodation in Aberdeen. It´s a great overview of all the student accommodation options in Aberdeen. I also have more detailed reviews of places where I have stayed in:

Student Flat Hunting in Aberdeen - Spital — *Spital, Aberdeen*

Student Flat Hunting – Tips and Tricks

There are a lot of things to consider when moving into private accommodation. How many people will you be moving in with and how many bedrooms will you need? Which location will best suit your needs? What price range are you looking at and what are you going to do in terms of gas and electricity bills? In this guide to student flat hunting in Aberdeen, I hope to cover all these questions and more! So, let´s get started.

When should you start looking for accommodation?

You might be wondering when the best time is to start looking for a flat for next year? The answer is now! This time of year (March, April) is a great time to start flat hunting. Especially if you won´t be in Aberdeen over the summer! If you are staying over summer, then you can start looking later and perhaps go through an letting agent, however, I´d recommend using other sources instead. I´ll be going into where to look for accommodation later, but you can skip to that part by clicking here.

Aberdeen Sports Village, Linksfield Road — *Aberdeen Sports Village (ASV), Linksfield Road*

Size matters – How many people will you be living with?

Like with many things in life, size matters😉. And it´s no different when it comes to student flat hunting. Depending on how many people you are wanting to live with will influence both the availability and price.

Availability:

Unfortunately, it´s not always easy to find a flat with the number of bedrooms you would like. The easiest number of rooms to find flats for are two- and three-bedroom flats. It gets a lot harder when you are in search of a five-, and maybe surprisingly, a four-bedroom flat.
I was really surprised how difficult it was to find a four-bedroom flat in Aberdeen. In the end, I ended up moving into a three-bedroom flat (Yep, there was some drama, but I won´t go into that…), but initially, I was trying to find a four-bedroom place. They are quite rare and often they were in a bad location or one room was a lot smaller than all the others, making things a bit unfair.

It was a lot easier when I started looking for a three-bedroom flat. There are loads of options available! In my experience, you have the best chance of finding a good flat if you are a group of 2 or 3 people.

Price:

As you might expect, prices naturally go up for properties if they have more bedrooms. You can be lucky and find a place that works out cheaper, but that is rarer, judging from my experience.

Also, you might not be aware, that if you live in a flat with three or more people who are unrelated (i.e. a group of friends), the flat must have an HMO (home in multiple occupancy) license. As the landlord needs to pay quite a lot for that license, the prices for rent go up, too.
So, if you are looking for the cheapest option available, then a one- or two-bedroom flat is the way to go.

However, one the plus side, the more people you live with, the cheaper the costs for each of you will be for utility and Wi-Fi bills.

Location, location, location…

Obviously, you need to choose a location that suits you and your flatmates best. If you are studying on main campus (King´s College), you might want to be only a few minutes walking distance away from campus. Popular student flat locations include Kittybrewster, Spital, Froghall and Sunnybank (Old Aberdeen).

If you want to be close to campus as well as Aberdeen Sports Village (ASV), the Linksfield or Pittodrie area are very good locations!
You might also want to consider being closer to town (e.g. if you have a part-time job), so King Street and the Mounthooly area might be of interest to you.

Fun fact – King Street is the LONGEST street in the whole of the UK!

If you are a medical or biomedical science student (Why wouldn´t you be??? Click here to read my post about 5 Reasons to Study Medical Sciences in Aberdeen), you might want to keep in mind that you may be spending a lot of time at the Foresterhill Campus. If so, you may want to consider living closer to there; popular areas include Ashgrove Road or Rosemount.

But don´t forget, there is the 9U Bus Service that takes you between the Foresterhill Campus and Sir Duncan Rice Library. And although it may take a while, you can also walk there. I do it every day and it´s actually quite nice walking and chatting to your friends every day.

Careful:

Whilst Aberdeen is a fairly safe city, you might want to avoid some of the “dodgy” areas. When you are looking for a flat and are going for a viewing think to yourself: What´s the area like? Would I feel okay walking here by myself (especially in the dark)?

Areas I´d personally try to avoid are Urquart Road and the surrounding streets (on the way to ASDA/the beach), some areas of Seaton (Avenue, Drive, Road) and Bedford Avenue (the other streets like Bedford Road or Place are fine. It´s just Bedford Avenue that is slightly dodgy… Trust me, I went there for a viewing and I did not have a good feeling…).

Amenities:

Don´t forget to look what else is in and around the area you are looking for flats in. If you want to join the gym, is there one close(ish) to you? If you have a pay-as-you-go gas/electricity meter, is there an off-license shop where you can top up nearby? Most importantly, how far away are the supermarkets that you can go to? You don´t want to be carrying your shopping home for miles! If you want to check out my Student Guide to Food Shopping in Aberdeen, click here.

Aberdeen King Street — *King Street, Aberdeen*

Student Flat Hunting – Don’t go through letting agencies!

This is probably my best/most important tip! Don´t bother with letting agencies! They can really screw you over (trust me, I´ve been there…). Also, most properties advertised by letting agencies are available immediately. That means that if you are looking for August/September entry in March/April, they will not even show you around the place! Unless you are here in the summer and are able to look for flats just a few weeks before you want to move in, trying to find something through a letting agency is a real waste of your time! Instead, you should look at some of the options mentioned in the next section.

Kittybrewster/Bedford Road Aberdeen — *Bedford Road, Kittybrewster, Aberdeen*

Where to look for properties – Resources

Like I said, letting agencies are not the way to go. As Aberdeen is a real student city, there are plenty of landlords who let their flats exclusively to students and know that people often don´t want to be moving in before August/September. So – it is those people you have to get in touch with!

The BEST place I think by far to find good accommodation FOR STUDENTS in Aberdeen is via the AUSA website. They have a page on which landlords can advertise their properties and you can get in touch with them.
Often, there aren´t any pictures and just vague descriptions of the flat, so you won´t truly know what it´s like until you see it. BUT, at least the landlord knows you don´t want to be moving in immediately. I will leave a link to the AUSA page here.

Other places you can use are Gumtree, and even Facebook Market Place or Accommodation Groups on Facebook.

Go for a second viewing! Re-check things you could have missed.

Obviously, do not rent a place without having seen it first. I think that´s a given.

However, if you like a place, I would really recommend you have a second look at it before you sign the lease. When you find a flat you really like (which can take a while) you might be super excited and so happy you have finally found something that you just want to sign on the dotted line immediately!

Before you do so, however, I´d recommend looking at the flat a second time before you sign the contract. Go into the viewing with a more critical approach and take off the rose-coloured spectacles. Think of things that were on your “checklist” and see if the flat offers you everything (at least almost, it will never be perfect) you wanted.

Here are a few examples of things to check:

Are the bedrooms of a similar size? Is everyone in agreement over who gets which room?
Where are the sockets located in the bedrooms (I know, first world problem…)
Is there enough storage space in the rooms, flat, kitchen? Is there a large fridge/freezer?
Does the landlord have a gas and fire safety license? Are there smoke alarms, fire extinguishers, fire blankets, etc.?
Does the landlord have an HMO license (if the flat has three bedrooms or more)?
Do you feel like the flat is in a good and safe location?
Can you afford it? What is the rent and what are the additional costs going to be?
Are you able to leave your things in the flat over the summer?
Do all the appliances work? Does anything need fixing?
Is all the furniture in the flat included? I.e. is the flat fully-furnished? Is there anything additional you might have to buy (e.g. desk, chairs, chest of drawers)?

Pittodrie Street Aberdeen — Pittodrie Street, Aberdeen

Think about additional costs…

It´s important to remember that when you no longer live in halls, you will need to start paying for gas, electricity and Wi-Fi yourself.

Don´t forget to ask the landlord about how, and roughly how much you will be paying for gas and electricity. If he can´t give you a rough figure, talk to the current tenants and find out from them!

External Gas Meter Flat — *Our pay-as-you-go gas meter*

Gas and Electricity

In some cases, you will be sent a monthly bill directly from the gas/electricity provider. Sometimes, there is a pay-as-you-go system.

We have that at our flat and I think it works really well, as you can keep a close eye on how much you are spending. That means you´re not confronted with a surprise bill charging you a fortune at the end of the month. For us, when the money has run down, the water goes cold and the lights go off! It can be a pain sometimes having to go to the shop to top-up your card because suddenly there is no hot water (been there, it´s no fun and it was the night before my exam…)! But if you keep an eye on it, you can avoid surprises and late-night visits to the off-license store, whilst monitoring how much you are spending.

Rarely, the landlord will offer you some kind of deal, where you pay a higher rent but don´t have to worry about utility bills. This may seem like a good deal, but you should try and find out if it is really worth it or if it would work out cheaper if you paid for it yourself.

Wi-Fi

There are hundreds of Wi-Fi providers and you can just choose whichever plan is best for you. Look out for special (student) deals or discounts if you refer a friend – maybe both you and another household can benefit from that! Personally, we use the Wi-Fi from Direct Save Telecom and pay £30/month. It works very well, and I can really recommend it (not sponsored😂…).

Council Tax

Also, don´t forget, as students, you are exempt from paying council tax – but don´t forget to apply for exemption! You can do it online on the Aberdeen City Council Webpage (or your local city council if you are not in Aberdeen).

I hope you find this post helpful when it comes to your student flat hunting in Aberdeen! Hopefully, I´ve mentioned somethings that you had not thought of yet! In the meantime, if you are looking for more student advice, check out some of my other posts:

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