U. of South Florida Greek Village Costs Cause Difficulty

[exlurker]

The cost of leases in the U. of South Florida's Greek Village can be hard to meet if a chapter does not have enough members living in the Greek Village housing, according to a story in the Oracle, the student paper.

The story indicates that one fraternity may vacate the building it is now leasing, due to proiblems with meeting the lease payments.

Sort of a sad situation, but it does serve as a reminder that planning and budgeting for housing expenses is a crucial task for many chapters.

http://www.usforacle.com/vnews/displ.../41f7a443b7a68

[Rudey]

Wow. That's some cheap rent.

Anyway, with Greek village type housing, what happens if the chapter doesn't pay?

Does the University go after the local alumni board, students, the national office...?

And let's say a chapter couldn't pay and was evicted, is there a huge demand by fraternities to set up shop in these villages? And they can't use the village for other purposes right (like hosting the hockey team)?

-Rudey

[ShaedyKD]

This is the way it worked in my chapter. Whomever wanted to live in the house were able to do so, on the basis of seniority. After that, if any spots were left, names would be randomly drawn, starting with the newest pledge class. Those sisters with names drawn could either live in the house, or find a sister to live there in her place. If no one would take their place, and they still refused to live in the house, they would have to pay the rent for the room, whether they lived there or not.

My chapter had the fear instilled in us, that if we did not fill all of the spots in our house, we would have GDIs moving in! Since the houses are owned by USF, and chapters just rent from them, USF residence services can rent the rooms out to any student just as they would a dorm room. Unless of course, the chapters are paying the complete rent due, regardless of whether or not the house was full.

Obviously USF has been allowing KS to go into debt with them, instead of allowing other students to rent the rooms. I believe at least one other chapter that had a house in Greek Village was forced to leave due to financial hardships. Another GLO has since moved in and taken over rent payments.

If the chapter has an outstanding balance with the school, I imagine USF would go after the Inter/National Organization, because they are technically in contract with the university through their house corporation.

[AGDee]

The way AGD would handle this is:

If you can't fill the house, then the remaining rent payments are divided by the number of women who are not living in and they pay that amount for a parlor fee. So, if you weren't making $1000 of the rent payment by live ins, and 20 women were living out of the house, they'd each pay $50 a month in parlor fees. After all, they do use house resources even if they aren't living in.

Dee

[Tom Earp]

Here in lies the Problem.

While many Schools are building Greek Housing, the per bed cost is not really figured in for a Not Full House.

With This type of Contract, it is a hell of a way to force Greeks off of Campus.

Granted there are Parlor Fees for non Housed Members, that still does not cover the cost of filling a bed to pay the rent.

The Schools Should remember that with New Housing, that payoffs are not going to come in with a full head of steam and pay off these New Housing Units immediately, it is going to take time, trial and error to keep GLOs alive and functioning.

It sounds like they have Housing Management who are in for the quick fix and not the long haul.

Just look around at other Schools with the same situation. UCT, at Murfreesboro for one.

[BSUPhiSig'92]

It's always better to underbuild than overbuild. I've seen many chapters at Ball State (my alma matter) that have folded because they overbuilt, then couldn't afford to meet the mortgage payments when there was a downturn.