KASS: Buying a house for college

Q:   I read an item in your column today with dismay that you did not complete the picture. You suggested it would be a good idea for parents to purchase a home in a college neighborhood for their daughter, who would then rent out rooms to other undergraduates.

As a resident in a very stressed neighborhood near a University (name withheld), I can assure you this is an idea fraught with problems.

We are surrounded by single family houses acquired by parents and other remote landlords to house undergraduates. Not a single one of them is cared for; everything from trash management to routine household maintenance is ignored, significantly impacting the solidity of our neighborhoods and the value of our remaining properties. To say nothing of the late night partying and drunken wandering through other people’s property.       Complaints to parent living hundreds of miles away are routinely ignored, as are most personal requests of the undergraduates to behave in a more respectful manner. Manner of the owners hide their responsibility by using an LLC as a shield. The town officials are clearly overwhelmed by the tide of complaints.

Few undergraduates seem prepared in the least bit to live in unsupervised properties; they demonstrate daily they need the structure and guidance of living in University supervised accommodations.

Please consider advice of this kind in it’s wider effects. It is not at all a healthy idea for the students to live in this manner. James.

A:   James, you have made a very good point. College students will be “college students”. However, over the years, I have had clients (parents) who bought a house for their student children, and they have been very satisfied. And to my knowledge, did not have the unruliness you have described.

I appreciate that parents will shield themselves behind their Limited Liability Company. And I also appreciate that university personnel are overworked and cannot address each and every issue. However, you and the other neighbors should   constantly call the police when there is too much noise and commotion. And, why don’t you and some of the other neighbors hire a law firm and go after each and every absentee family. They may be protected by their corporate status, but they still have to appear in court with a lawyer – and that costs money. And since they own property in your state, they can be sued in your state, even if they live out-of-state. It may also be embarrassing depending on who those owners are.

Incidentally, some of my clients actually bought property slightly outside of the college zone; they were successful in finding faculty to rent, instead of students.