7% rise in student rent

Student rents have risen seven per cent across the UK in the last year, new research reveals.

Accommodation for Students' survey finds since the same time last year the average weekly student rent has risen from £56 to £60.

London remains top of the table at £102 per week, followed by Cambridge (£84 per week), Guildford (£83 per week), St Andrews (£82 per week) and Oxford (£79 per week).

The Scottish university cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow were also well above the UK average for weekly rents at £70 and £68 respectively.

However, England's redbrick universities of Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Nottingham, Newcastle and Leeds all had below average weekly rents.

The cheapest student rent is in Crewe, costing just £37 per week on average.

Also very cheap are the towns of Middlesbrough (£38 per week), Stoke (£40 per week), Wolverhampton (£42 per week), Bradford (£43 per week) and Sunderland (£44 per week).

"Now that students are accumulating large borrowings to subsidise their study the cost of accommodation has become a critical factor in their choice of university and our UK-wide league table for rents is a valuable tool for new students in assessing their university options," commented Simon Thompson, Accommodation for Students co-founder and director.

"Although southern universities are still more expensive for accommodation, with London way out front, some increasingly popular university locations have seen a corresponding rise in rents: Durham, Warwick and Loughborough are three good examples."

Accommodation for Students' average weekly student rents
1 - London £102.11
2 - Cambridge £84.36
3 - Guildford £83.18
4 - St Andrews £81.96
5 - Oxford £78.72
6 - Exeter £75.97
7 - Brighton £72.35
8 - Kent £72.33
9 - Canterbury £70.47
10 - Glasgow £69.50
11 - Eastbourne £68.89
12 - Bristol £68.67
13- Bath £68.50
14- Edinburgh £68.39
15 - Chester £67.68
16 - Chichester £67.31
17 - Bournemouth £67.07
18 - Durham £66.97
19 - Warwick £66.67
20 - Winchester £65.74
21 - Reading £65.43
22 - Loughborough £65.33
23 - Colchester £63.27
24 - Plymouth £60.38
25 - Lincoln £59.64
26 - Luton £59.52
27 - Southampton £59.38
28 - York £59.22
29 - Nottingham £59.09
30 - Devon £58.46
31 - Leeds £58.01
32 - Portsmouth £57.62
33 - Aberdeen £56.47
34 - Norwich £56.41
35 - Newcastle £56.40
36 - Sheffield £56.17
37 - Swansea £55.74
38 - Stafford £55.66
39 - Cheltenham £54.95
40 - Cardiff £54.87
41 - Manchester £54.72
42 - Birmingham £53.67
43 - Huddersfield £53.27
44 - Dundee £53.20
45 - Leicester £52.11
46 - Northampton £51.97
47 - Derby £51.82
48 - Preston £50.61
49 - Lancaster £50.16
50 - Bolton £50.15
51 - Blackpool £50.13
52 - Coventry £49.46
53 - Bangor £49.07
54 - Liverpool £48.14
55 - Salford £47.86
56 - Carlisle £47.08
57 - Hull £46.82
58 - Pontypridd £46.64
59 - Belfast £45.30
60 - Sunderland £44.45
61 - Bradford £43.21
62 - Wolverhampton £42.35
63 - Stoke £40.25
64 - Middlesbrough £37.85
65 - Crewe £37.22