Is BYU complicit in the abundance of substandard housing in Provo?

[SeattleUte]

Do bears sh-t in the woods? Was the Church complicit in medieval Europe's poverty and squalor?

[Blueintheface]

Miller Apts were $150/mo and was what I considered a livable shithole.

[wuapinmon]

I delivered pizza to every single apartment complex in Provo. ALL OF THEM. Some of the BYU-approved places like Branbury, were just awful. We had a joke in Roman Gardens that if you said, "We're out of peanut butter" the neighbor in the next apartment would smash his hand through the wallpaper and let you have some of his. Alta Apartments is the one place where I never ever, not one <redacted> time got a tip.

Weirdest place in Provo was over by Branbury. It had this domed courtyard that was humid and warm year round, like some three-story greenhouse with all the doors facing inwardly. I forget the name, but it was right by where the hill up to Orem starts to climb.

[frank ryan]

I delivered pizza to every single apartment complex in Provo. ALL OF THEM. Some of the BYU-approved places like Branbury, were just awful. We had a joke in Roman Gardens that if you said, "We're out of peanut butter" the neighbor in the next apartment would smash his hand through the wallpaper and let you have some of his. Alta Apartments is the one place where I never ever, not one <redacted> time got a tip.

Weirdest place in Provo was over by Branbury. It had this domed courtyard that was humid and warm year round, like some three-story greenhouse with all the doors facing inwardly. I forget the name, but it was right by where the hill up to Orem starts to climb.

Crestwood?

[Jeff Lebowski]

These anecdotes are interesting.

Sincere question here - I honestly know very little about the rental market: How does the "BYU-approved" housing thing result in high rent and/or substandard apartments? Walk me through the mechanics, por favor.

[falafel]

I delivered pizza to every single apartment complex in Provo. ALL OF THEM. Some of the BYU-approved places like Branbury, were just awful. We had a joke in Roman Gardens that if you said, "We're out of peanut butter" the neighbor in the next apartment would smash his hand through the wallpaper and let you have some of his. Alta Apartments is the one place where I never ever, not one <redacted> time got a tip.

Weirdest place in Provo was over by Branbury. It had this domed courtyard that was humid and warm year round, like some three-story greenhouse with all the doors facing inwardly. I forget the name, but it was right by where the hill up to Orem starts to climb.

Old Mill. I lived there. We had a pool inside our domed courtyard.

[jay santos]

These anecdotes are interesting.

Sincere question here - I honestly know very little about the rental market: How does the "BYU-approved" housing thing result in high rent and/or substandard apartments? Walk me through the mechanics, por favor.

Decreases supply.

[Flystripper]

Decreases supply.

Not sure on the particulars but given the limited supply of approved housing I would guess there is little incentive to keep up the properties. Its a slum lord dynamic so to speak.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Makes sense. Thanks.

[Moliere]

Not sure on the particulars but given the limited supply of approved housing I would guess there is little incentive to keep up the properties. Its a slum lord dynamic so to speak.

The standards obviously have to be enforced, so if a place is substandard al BYU has to do is threaten to take away their approval and things would get fixed quickly.

So is the OP iterating that BYU doesn't make sure it's approved standing is up to standard?

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I am in Provo a couple times a month. All of the slums are still around. The horrible apartments remain, but some of the homes get torn down and replaced with more apartments. Think about if you're the owner of the Riviera, Moon Apartments or the Glenhood, crap that was built in the 50s and 60s. They're a cash cow. You're getting at least $800 a month for each ghetto apartment from BYU students who probably have a fairly low incidence of getting evicted. Each apartment is probably less than a 1000 square feet.

I lived in a basement of a house with five other dudes one year. If I recall correctly, it had one bathroom. The kitchen had pipes running underneath the floor, and there was some kind of carpeted springy metal laid over said pipes. The wall between the kitchen and the bathroom had the structural integrity of one of those sliding/folding temporary walls that they have in LDS chapels. There was some piece of furniture dated from the Kennedy Administration in front of the wall to kind of conceal its flimsy nature. We started doing the old joke of filling a cup with cold water and pouring it on someone in the shower, only it escalated to pitchers full of ice water. Guys started locking the door, so one time we made use of the movable wall and poured a pitcher of ice water mixed with a couple mashed cloves of garlic.

That place was of course BYU approved.

[Uncle Ted]

I lived in a place called Steven's Apartments. It was $50/mo in the summer months and $80/mo in the fall and winter. Yeah, it was a shithole.

We own a condo just off campus that our kids stay in and rent to a few other students. The place is like Ritz-Carlton compared to where I stay as a student. Our kids don't know how good they have it. Given that we have no problem finding renters willing to pay top dollar I am guessing that there must be an abundance of substandard shitholes in Provo.

[SCcoug]

BYU housing has to be within a restricted geographic area (basically between 2200 N to Center and State/500W and East). I think the only time the off campus housing office inspects anything is when there are complaints.

[Non Sequitur]

One of the biggest gripes I've always had about BYU is that they tell kids where they can and cannot live. That is asinine. These are grown ups and it is not youth conference. The honor code is stupid, but the housing policies bring stupid to a whole new level.

[Uncle Ted]

One of the biggest gripes I've always had about BYU is that they tell kids where they can and cannot live. That is asinine. These are grown ups and it is not youth conference. The honor code is stupid, but the housing policies bring stupid to a whole new level.

Yeah, you should see the crap that landlords have to put up with. For example, at one time I had three of my kids living at our condo and they were having a cow because there were two girls and a guy living under the same roof. I told them that the condo was an extension of our Texas domicile (i.e. my kids were "living at home") and to shut the hell up.