Students moving to Singapore for a year

[ken0805]

Hi

Me and two other British students are moving to Singapore this August to study at Singapore Management University for a year. As we are are not staying in a student hostel we will have to find our own apartment to live in and we need a bit of help!

Obviously due to our limited budget as students, we're a bit concerned about finding an apartment that will be within our budget. We would like somewhere cheap as possible probably around £300 ($S 630) a month each. But realistically we know that it will be difficult to find this. I'm personally probably able to afford £450 ($S 950) maximum for accommodation a month, I'm not entirely sure about the others.

Preferably we'd like to have our own rooms and not share, so a 3 bedroom apartment would be ideal, however we're flexible with amount of rooms, for example if we meet another student looking for a room we could have 4+ rooms.

As we're studying in SMU we're looking for an apartment with easy access to this. We understand that SMU is in the centre and most probably out of our budget range so are willing to commute, therefore somewhere near an MRT station would be great!

So basically, what areas would be best to live in based on this information, how much roughly will rent cost based on having your own room, and are there any good estate agents/realtors to recommend?

Are there any other factors that need to be considered as well? For example cost of utilities/bills

Cheers! Look forward to hear your replies!

Rich

[beppi]

You will have to look for something called HDB (= government build low-cost housing, with the individual flats sold to Singaporeans, who can rent them out under certain, well-restricted circumstances).
HDBs are available in all areas (except in the city centre near SMU) and 3-bedroom flats are available for S$1500-S$2000. 4-bedroom ones are rare.
As long as you are near an MRT or direct bus to the centre, the location is unimportant.
But I have no idea how easy it is to find a landlord willing to rent to three sharing students and only for a year (standard contract length here is 2 years).

Good luck,
Frank

[Mad Scientist]

I try my 2 cents here

YMCA Singapore do provide back packers on a shoe string budget if you wish to go along this route

Try this link
http://www.ymcaih.com.sg/Web/main.aspx? ... d7b9c9c8c4
There are several back packer temporary accommodations in SG


Once you are here and had yourself organise and orientated to the life in SG, then source around for more permanent rental apartment.
HDB is definitely much cheaper in terms of rents compare to private condos. The HDB landlord/owner will need to verify your student pass with MOM prior leasing. Look at the classified ads in the local papers is the way to go.
For more on renting from HDB owners go to www.hdb.gov.sg

[Strong Eagle]

See what you can come up with here. Not affiliated, just know people who have used it.

http://www...com.sg/