study starts, but still no living space

She had already come to Eindhoven from Romania in April to find a room. That is what 19-year-old Malina Corduneanu is going to study Computer Science at TU/e. Now it is August and she is in a temporary room of a friend who is traveling. In a few weeks she will be able to move into her final room. ‘I had to divert to Den Bosch, which is about 45 minutes away.’

In the scorching heat, Corduneanu walks with a full basket to the laundry room of the student complex on the Lombokpad, a few blocks of blocks on a vacant piece of land a few minutes’ walk from the TU/e ​​Campus. The site is largely deserted, most of the students are still on vacation.

hard message

The room shortage is, just like last year, very high in Eindhoven. It is estimated that there are 27 thousand rooms too few for students nationwide. This shortage mainly affects international students, who do not intervene. Just like a number of other universities, TU/e ​​has a hard message for them: if you don’t have a room by the end of the month, it’s better not to come this way.

“I went through 15 student housing agencies,” Corduneanu says, showing pictures on her phone. ‘Sorry, we don’t have availability for students anymore’, reads a stencil on a desk window. ‘Sometimes I was referred to a website where I first had to pay a registration fee. Then there were no houses. One time I was finally assigned a room. And then I had to pay rent five times as security. Of course I couldn’t afford that.’

It’s crazy, she says. ‘At first you think: ah, I’ve taken my entrance exam, I’ve been admitted, now I just need to find a house. But that turns out to be the hardest thing of all. A friend of mine went back to Romania because she couldn’t find anything here.’

To combat the housing shortage, a number of plans have been made in Eindhoven. New residential towers are being built on the TU/e ​​campus, which will probably be completed in a year and a half and should house a total of 735 students. In addition, temporary housing, such as containers, will be placed for 800 students.

Relaxed rules

Since August 10, the municipality has also the rules relaxed around landlady rent. If you are a homeowner or tenant of a housing association, you can now sublet an empty room without a permit. This should make it easier for students to find a room.

‘Due to the strong growth, the industry has an enormous need for additional engineers’, says Nicole Ummelen, vice president of the Executive Board of the TU/e. ‘We like to train those engineers, but then there must be rooms available for students. We are therefore very happy with the expanded hospita arrangement. We therefore call on everyone in Eindhoven who has a spare room to rent it out.’

A tour of housing associations, educational institutions and study associations shows that it is still too early to say whether the new scheme is being used and whether there is enthusiasm among students, tenants or homeowners for this form of accommodation. Everyone involved seems to agree that if the need is indeed so great, students will certainly be willing to live with a landlady.

Family from Taiwan

Yi-Kai Peng from Taiwan has been living with a family even before the settlement went into effect. He studies Aerospace Engineering in Delft and lives in Eindhoven for three months as part of an internship at Lightyear, a company that develops solar-powered cars. On Saturday morning he eats a Whopper in front of the library entrance. Soon he will continue working on his project.

He had ‘no success’ via Kamernet, says Peng, but after he had placed several posts in Facebook groups, he received a response. Whether he wanted to live with a family in Eindhoven. Husband and wife are from Taiwan, just like him, work at chip manufacturer ASML and had a spare room. And they didn’t charge rent. Peng wanted that.

And do you like it? Yes, he says, there are few rules and he can do as he pleases. They don’t eat together and socialize little. He works hard, he says, during the day he has his internship, in the evening he works on an Aircraft Design Challenge with five other students. At the weekend he often goes back to Delft. With a laugh: ‘I’m quite busy.’

Most on campus think that the new arrangement can certainly offer a solution for international students. Concierge Jos sees how much difficulty students from abroad often have in finding a home. ‘I recently had an American student here with his parents. They came to have a look for in a year. But Vestide (housing association for students, red.) already said there was little chance that it would work.’

Mark (26) and Tuan (28), both Data Science students, know first-hand how difficult it is when you come from a distant foreign country and have no network. ‘I’ve never even been asked for a hospital round,’ says Tuan. “No matter how many times I try. We Asian students have a different culture. Dutch students don’t feel like that.’

He laughs and says, “It’s not really not that we have OCD (compulsive disorder, red.). But let’s say we have a higher standard of organization.’

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