Footscray Pad For Pupils

The Age

Saturday July 7, 2007

Katherine Townsend

UNIsity is aimed at overseas and local tertiary students, writes Katherine Townsend.

FOOTSCRAY

UNIsity

200 Ballarat Road

$145,000-plus

Private sale

Agent Avion Properties 9373 0338

Melway 2S B3

MELBOURNE'S student accommodation numbers have leapt in the past decade with the construction of several multi-storey apartment buildings in the city and Carlton.

Now, Footscray's first purpose-built student accommodation has been opened, to service the local Victoria University students and other tertiary students who want to live outside the CBD.

The UNIsity development, on the corner of Gordon and Ballarat streets in Footscray, offers 112 one and two-bedroom apartments six kilometres from the city.

More than 3000 overseas students study at Victoria University, as do many country students, who need a roof over their heads, and the university says it has lengthy waiting lists for accommodation.

For investors keen to tap into this growing rental market, UNIsity's prices begin at $145,000, with rents for one-bedroom apartments at or about $185 a week and for two-bedroom apartments at or about $340 a week.

Designed by Bird de la Coeur architects, the UNIsity block is in the centre of Footscray, with a tram stop outside the door and a McDonald's next door, and only a short walk from Footscray shops and station. Some of the apartments have balconies and many have views over the Maribyrnong River and to the city. UNIsity has six floors of apartments, two levels of underground parking and shops on the ground floor.

The first residents will move in within a month and the IGA supermarket being built in the ground floor retail complex will open in September, Avion Properties' marketing agent, Nick Cartledge, says.

Like most purpose-built student accommodation, the block comes fitted with the things modern students need: on-site security, central meeting areas, high-speed internet access and bicycle-storage areas. Mr Cartledge says the apartments are being sold furnished "with a $4000 package to ensure consistency for the student tenants".

He says security is a key factor in maintaining high occupancy rates in student accommodation.

"With many young overseas students coming here to study, naturally, their parents want to make sure their accommodation is secure and safe," Mr Cartledge says. He says, by the third year of occupation, many similar blocks "are 80 per cent occupied by women students. They like the sense of security and safety." There were four two-bedroom apartments remaining for sale and 11 one-bedroom apartments, Mr Cartledge says.

© 2007 The Age

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