Monday, February 14, 2005

Feb. 14, 2005

By Ruthie Seeley, PR Intern

Wilmington, N.C. - More than 800 University of North Carolina Wilmington students came to the seventh annual Housing Fair Wednesday, Feb. 8, where 31 Wilmington-area apartment communities, real estate agencies and service providers offered information on off-campus housing.

Two UNCW students, Lisa DuChene and Kristina Falk, sat in a corner of Warwick Center ballroom sifting through the masses of information they collected at the fair. As rising juniors they will not have on-campus housing next year. But, they said, they were “leaning toward moving off campus anyway.”

UNCW is guaranteeing housing for approximately 82 percent of incoming freshman next year. By holding the fair, UNCW is trying to help displaced students find housing, Tiffany Murdock, graduate assistant for the Seahawk Perch, said.

“We are looking for a three-bedroom apartment, so we got a lot of brochures from places with three-bedroom apartments, and we plan on looking at them tomorrow,” DuChene said.

Kelli Mercurio and Ashley Wyssbrod, both freshmen at UNCW, went to the housing fair because “it would take a lot of time to go to each of the individual places, but all of the information is right here.”

“You can’t see 31 complexes in a week,” Murdock said, “It’s information overload for a lot of people.”

Mercurio and Wyssbrod said that the fair was a little overwhelming, but that “it’s a good overwhelming. I liked that all of the different apartment places were in one place so you don’t have to go all over Wilmington trying to find a place to live,” Mercurio said.

For senior Shelly Buffaloe and junior Heather Gordon, the information was the most useful part of the event. “Having so many different complexes offering information in one place allows you to find exactly what you want at the right price. For us, the price is the most important thing,” they said.

“Most people say it’s very helpful. People always say they found where they live at the housing fair,” Murdock said.

The different real estate agencies and apartment complexes offered food and enticement to UNCW students. Various UNCW departments and programs with services for commuter students also attended the fair.

Paula Kennedy-Dudley, director of Adult and Commuter Student Services, and Ashley Hudson, administrative assistant, Adult and Commuter Student Services, came from East Carolina University to observe the housing fair.

“We had our first housing fair in January, and we are looking for ideas on how to build ours,” Kennedy-Dudley said. “We’ve learned how to pump ours up a lot with displays and giveaways and music.”

ECU has 18,000 students living off campus while only 5,000 live on campus, Kennedy-Dudley said. After seeing the turnout at UNCW’s housing fair, Kennedy-Dudley said that ECU will “go all out next year.”