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There’s been a bit of a fuss lately involving the lease on Rochdale Apartments. The apartments are operated through the Berkeley Student Cooperative, and the lease is coming up for renewal at the end of the school year.
The apartments are built on land leased from the university for the sweet price of $1 a year, and seems like a much better situation than the last bit of real estate we saw at that price. The cost to student residents is a little steeper, at $1,788 a semester, but that could all be about to change.Some have said the university has been shaky during recent months in its confidence that it would renew the lease. This prompted a large campaign and petition, even though it seems neither the university nor the co-ops are really sure about what’s happening.
But you can’t argue with cheap rent, we suppose. If we could lease a block of land for the price of a pack of gum, we can’t say we’d want to give it up either.
The complex is also currently home to many low-income students and has several disabled accessible units.
Image Source: MacQ under Creative Commons
Slated Co-op Lease Expiration Prompts Awareness Campaign [Daily Cal]
Save Rochdale, Save Our Home [Facebook]
Comments:
Nov 22, 2009 at 3:51 pm
This article does not even cover the half of it. The cheap lease is part of an agreement with the UC that included the BSC having to pay off large loans to cover land improvements and other finances. It is certainly more complicated than having a “sweet deal”. I would recommend a little more research on this issue.