Apartment near Stanford U??

[AlfonsoR]

Hello fellow Pelicans, hoping someone in this great community can help me find an apartment near Stanford for my niece.

Price is a consideration and commute time is too. This would be a 5 year journey. I am not familiar with the area, but have been told to stay away from the city of East Palo Alto.

I would appreciate any help and/or advise.

Thanks,
Alfonso

[wildthing]

Good advice to stay away from EPA. That's where all the crime happens. However, Palo Alto is horrendously expensive to rent. Think 2500 for a one bedroom apartment. The elem. and high schools are top rated, that's why.

Best bet, I'm assuming she is a student, is to find other students to share rent with.

Try scouring sfbay.craigslist.org to get some ideas.

[biosurfer1]

Anything available through the school? student housing? dorms? Any where that isn't crime ridden in that area will be big $$$$

[AlfonsoR]

Thanks folks. I will check craigslist.

She is a student or will be this fall semester. She has already checked school related lodging, but apparently there is a waiting list.

I have also heard that folks in Portola Valley and Woodside area sometimes rent an apartment behind their house. If anyone has any leads on something like this, that would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[Don Ro]

Try Mountain View, just down the road a few minutes south of Stanford.
Also, Redwood City just north of MV...near Stanford.
.
A condo complex across the street from Stanford at:
410 Sheridan
has condos for rent at times...I know of several Stanford folks who live there.
.
Good luck.

[Rinty]

My wife stayed in Escondido Village, which is right on campus, when she was at Stanford. I believe it's part of student housing, and it wasn't bad. Here's the website:

Housing Options | Student Housing

[911boost]

My sister and her husband did their post doc work at Stanford. They lived in Redwood City and rented an older little house. It was a cool area. Don't be afraid to look outside as the public transportation is good there.

Bill

[MRM]

Even if there is a waiting list she really has to sign up for student housing and try to get in. There's always a big shuffle at the end of the summer and they will go deep into the waiting list for students who want to live on campus. Living in student housing will be her best option by far.

[ckissick]

Originally Posted by MRM

Even if there is a waiting list she really has to sign up for student housing and try to get in. There's always a big shuffle at the end of the summer and they will go deep into the waiting list for students who want to live on campus. Living in student housing will be her best option by far.

This is true. Is she a freshman? I know that in the past, freshmen were required to live on campus. Maybe not any more.

[AlfonsoR]

Not a freshman. She is going for a doctorate.

Thanks to everyone for all the tips! We are or will be looking into all of them. Keep them coming.

[Tobra]

My niece found one of those mother in law type apartments behind a house over there, Los Altos maybe, I believe her work hooked her up. I will see her mother tomorrow and will ask. There will be bulletin boards around the school too, or there were back in the day. I found both my apartments in SF just driving around the neighborhood I wanted to live and saw a sign in the window.


Keep in mind that I am old, so this happened a long time ago.

[AlfonsoR]

Thanks Tobra. My niece has been pretty good about doing her research, but the more analog search (feet on the street) is much harder to do when you are several hundred miles away.

[MRM]

Alfonso, this reminds me of my experience going to law school. The town my school was in was within driving distance but still quite a distance from where I lived. And in the pre-Internet days it was hard to get information. I think my experience might be useful.

I went up to campus for a visit and tour the week before classes started. I signed up with the campus housing people who assured me that they were full but put me on the waiting list. I thanked them politely and then went to the basement of the law school building where they posted apartments and things for sale. I picked a couple of those little tabs people cut into their fliers with their information on, and I went walking. Fortunately I walked west because the first street I crossed from campus was Snelling Avenue. One of my flyers had a Snelling Avenue address, so I looked down at the address and up at the street numbers and realized the house I was looking for was on the corner directly across from campus. Compounding my good luck, the landlord happened to be there, doing something with the lawn, and the deal was struck right then and there.

For the next three years my life narrowed down to waking up in the morning and crossing Snelling to eat breakfast at the meal hall, continuing to classes, returning to the meal hall for supper, and then crossing Snelling to go to my room to study and end the day. A thousand days like that and I was a graduate.

The point of the story that's instructive here is that when I came in for registration the following week the campus people had a room for me. I would have taken it if I had known it would be available, but my room across the street turned out to be fine.

The moral of the story is that on campus housing is usually best, the waiting list moved exponentially in the last week before classes, and it always works out in the end.

Good luck to your niece. She should contact nostatic for advice. He spent more than his fair share of time at universities in that area, and excelling in all senses of the word with a series of degrees that he's spent the rest of his life being too modest to admit to. Although his alma mater and Stanford have a bit of a rivalry, I'm sure he'd be generous in giving pointers to a fellow doctoral student at the "other" Harvard of the west coast

[AlfonsoR]

MRM,

Thanks for the story, it gives me hope that she will find something on campus. And she seems to be aware that her time will be very precious, better to be close than to have to commute.

I will PM nostatic.


Thanks again!!

[speeder]

My brother went to grad school at Stanford, pretty sure that he was in some type of student housing. I'll try to remember to ask him when I see him. The others are right in that she wants to be on campus, (or adjacent), there is no room for housing stress in that situation.

[nostatic]

I don't know the area around Stanford - I lived in San Francisco proper in '94, then in Berkeley for half of '95 before heading back down to socal. I can't speak for Stanford's setup, but Caltech had graduate student housing that was easy to get into and fairly reasonable. Even still most moved out after a year to the surrounding area. Of course Caltech is over an order of magnitude smaller university, so not sure on the scaling. One of my colleagues is a Stanford alum and is up there fairly often (he also had a company up there). I'll ask him tomorrow if he has any advice.

[speeder]

Originally Posted by nostatic

One of my colleagues is a Stanford alum and is up there fairly often (he also had a company up there). I'll ask him tomorrow if he has any advice.

Based on what has been going on in that part of the world lately, the best advice would probably be to quickly make several million dollars and just buy a condo. Invent something, stat.

[AlfonsoR]

Any further help available guys? Thanks.

[Palum6o]

I share a house with 2 Stanford grads in SSF, I'm sure one of them would be glad to talk to your niece. The rentals here go quickly, Craig's list is the place to check on a daily basis, but connect her with another student who knows where to go. Send me a PM with your info and I'll pass it along.