Manchester Met students offered £100 a week to live in Liverpool and Huddersfield as university hit by accommodation crisis

Manchester Metropolitan University students struggling to find accommodation in the city have been offered £100 a week to live in a different city and town. The offer comes after first year students have reported issues with finding a place to stay in the city through the university’s accommodation portal.

Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) says the accommodation crisis has come after it had ‘significantly more offer-holders than anticipated’. While it works to secure places for student within the city, it says it has offered ‘temporary options’ with private hall partners, including those in Liverpool and Huddersfield.

Yesterday, students received a message via the portal saying housing demand in the city is ‘currently the highest’ they have ever experienced. The message went on to offer the waiting students residence at halls 'a short distance away' in Liverpool and Huddersfield.

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It said students taking up the offer of living in Liverpool or Huddersfield - both of which are around 30 miles from Manchester - would be paid £100 a week 'to cover out-of-pocket expenses, including travel costs'. Both the halls in Liverpool and Huddersfield are around a '15 minute walk' from each place's rail station, MMU says, where students would then have to catch a 40-minute train to Manchester.

The Manchester Evening News spoke to one student who received this offer after waiting months to find a place to stay in the city. With her course starting in just two weeks, the photography student from Staffordshire, who preferred to remain anonymous, said they were ‘surprised’ to see the message offering them a place to stay in Liverpool.

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