Student housing is still one of the best performing property investments outperforming many other sectors, according to a report from property consultants Savills.
The firm’s student housing spotlight for 2012 is aimed at corporate investors, but includes insights and data useful for landlords with smaller property businesses.
The study highlights university cities with ‘opportunity target markets’ where demand for places is increasing.
Two key areas with extra demand are Lancashire and Edinburgh, the report reveals.
Edge Hill University, Ormskirk, saw a 105% increase in undergraduate applications, and Lancaster University around 100%.
Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh was also up more than 100%.
Universities with more than a 60% increase in applications were Dundee, Huddersfield and Stirling.
Demand was significantly down at at around a third of universities, with Liverpool John Moores performing worst at about -30%, while Leeds Metropolitan was dropped around 20%.
“There is a strong likelihood that universities will increasingly seek to avoid calls on capital and revenue arising from their own ageing accommodation and will look to generate capital receipts and improvements to their accommodation from investors through stock transfer,” said the report.
“This offers unprecedented opportunities for investors in high-quality university locations not otherwise available to them due to lack of newly built supply. We have analysed where the best opportunities lie.”
Other observations in the report suggest universities will have a higher percentage of students from overseas as demand from under 24 year olds remains static in Europe, the US, India and China, but is set to surge across the rest of the world.
Government reports have already suggested that the UK will have to cater for 30,000 more international students over the next decade - and that many of these new students will want to live in London.
For the capital, the study predicts that providers are struggling to match even a small percentage of demand and that most halls development is concentrated at transport hubs within London Underground zones 1 and 2.
