Campus & Community

HRES proposes 2008-09 rents for Harvard Housing

7 min read

Variety of housing available

Harvard Real Estate Services manages approximately 3,000 apartments, offering a broad choice of styles, amenities, and sizes to meet the individual budgets and housing needs of Harvard affiliates (full-time graduate students, faculty members, or employees). Apartments are available in a variety of sizes: standard and double studios; standard and convertible one-bedrooms; and two-, three-, and four-bedroom units.

Harvard Real Estate Services has also introduced its newest Riverside Area Harvard Housing properties, which will be available in the summer of 2008. Units at 10 Akron St. will feature common and study rooms with wireless Internet access, a fitness center, laundry room, landscaped courtyard, and underground parking. All 151 apartments include a dishwasher, disposal, microwave, and carpeted floors. Heat, hot water, electricity, central air conditioning, and Harvard Intranet service is included in the cost of the rent. 28 Hingham St. and 387 Western Ave. are wood frame houses comprised of three-bedroom apartments including a dishwasher, disposal, microwave, carpeted and bamboo floors, and a stacking washer/dryer unit. Heat, hot water, electricity, central air conditioning, and Harvard Intranet service are included in the cost of the rent.

Harvard affiliates may apply for Harvard Housing online at http://www.hres.harvard.edu/rre.htm (click on Affiliated/)

Residential Housing). The homepage also provides information about additional housing options and useful Harvard and community resources for incoming and current affiliates.

Per University policy, Harvard Real Estate Services (HRES) is required to charge market rent for its housing. To establish proposed rents for 2008–09, HRES performed a regression analysis on three years of market rents for more than 4,735 neighboring apartments voluntarily posted at the Harvard Housing Office by non-Harvard property owners. These listings are weighted disproportionately toward older, smaller, owner-occupied buildings, so HRES engaged a leading local real estate appraisal firm, Byrne McKinney & Associates Inc., to collect additional private rental market listings from larger apartment complexes in Cambridge, and HRES performed a regression analysis on this additional data. The results of these combined analyses were reviewed and endorsed by an external expert, Jayendu Patel of Economic, Financial, & Statistical Consulting Services. These results (and other market research) agree that market rents are increasing at a steady rate and that HRES rents must rise comparatively to keep pace.

The proposed new market rents noted in this article have been reviewed and endorsed by the Faculty Advisory Committee on HRES Harvard Housing (described below) and will take effect July 1, 2008, for a term of one year.

All revenues generated by Harvard Housing in excess of operating expenses and debt service are used to fund capital improvements and renewal of the facilities in HRES’s existing portfolio.

Proposed 2008–09 continuing rents for Harvard affiliates:

Current Harvard Housing residents who choose to extend their lease for another year will receive either a rent increase of 4 percent or will be charged the new market rent for their apartment, whichever rent is lower. Heat, hot water, electricity, and Harvard Internet service are included in the majority of Harvard Housing apartment rents.

Harvard Housing residents will receive an e-mail from Harvard Real Estate Services in March 2008 with instructions on how to submit a request to either extend or terminate their current lease. Residents who would like additional information or help in determining their continuing rent rates for 2008–09 may call the Harvard Housing Leasing Office at (617) 495-1459.

Proposed increases for continuing former rent control residents:

Proposed rent increases for continuing former rent control residents who reside in Harvard’s properties will be announced in late March or early April.

Proposed 2008-09 rents for new Harvard University Housing leases:

HRES’s research for its proposed 2008–09 rents resulted in a recommendation that the overall new market rents for all new residents should increase, on average, 7.5 percent, starting on July 1. In support of Harvard’s fair market rent policy,* which is applied on a unit-by-unit basis, rent rates will increase for the majority of unit types, while some rent rates will stay at their current levels.

Written comments on the proposed rents may be sent to the Faculty Advisory Committee on Harvard Housing, c/o Harvard Real Estate Services, 7 Holyoke St., Mezzanine Level, Cambridge, MA 02138. Comments to the committee may also be sent via e-mail to leasing@camail.harvard.edu. Any written comments should be submitted to either of the above addresses by Feb. 21.

The comments received will be reviewed by the Faculty Advisory Committee, which includes William Hogan, Raymond Plank Professor of Global Energy Policy, John F. Kennedy School of Government; Jerold S. Kayden, co-chair, Department of Urban Planning and Design, director, Master in Urban Planning Degree Program, and Frank Backus Williams Professor of Urban Planning and Design, Graduate School of Design; Daniel P. Schrag, professor of earth and planetary sciences, and director, Harvard University Center for the Environment; Howell Jackson, James S. Reid Professor of Law, Harvard Law School; Peter Ellison, John Cowles Professor of Anthropology, Department of Anthropology; and James Gray, associate vice president, Harvard Real Estate Services (chair), Harvard University.

After the comments are reviewed and considered, the final rent schedule will be published in March.

* In keeping with the University’s fair market rent policy that was established in 1983 by a faculty committee chaired by Professor Archibald Cox, the rents for Harvard Housing are set at prevailing market rates. The original faculty committee determined that market rate pricing was the fairest method of allocating apartments and that setting rents for Harvard Housing below market rate would be a form of financial aid, which should be determined by each individual School, not via the rent-setting process. Additionally, the cost of housing should be considered when financial aid is determined.

New Market Rents for New Residents Effective July 1, 2008

• 18 Banks/8A Mt. Auburn: (no utilities included): one bedrooms $1,510–$1,600; two bedrooms $1,910–$1,970.

• Beckwith Circle (all utilities included): three bedrooms $2,154–$2,241; four bedrooms $2,604–$2,700.

• Botanic Gardens (all utilities and Harvard Internet service included): one bedrooms $1,525–$1,575; two bedrooms $2,200; three bedrooms $2,735.

• 472–474 Broadway (all utilities included): one bedrooms $1,565.

• 5 Cowperthwaite St. (all utilities and Harvard Internet service included): studios $1,475; one bedroom convertibles $1,825; two bedrooms $2,100.

• 27 Everett St. (all utilities included): one bedrooms $1,585–$1,800; three bedrooms $2,650–$2,800.

• 29 Garden St. (all utilities and Harvard Internet service included): studios $1,450–$1,470; double studios $2,035–$2,170; two bedrooms $2,420–$2,440; three bedrooms $2,855–$2,875.

• Harvard @ Trilogy (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): studios $1,499-$1,529; one bedroom convertibles $1,882-$1,942; double studios $ 2,120-$2,220.

• Haskins Hall (all utilities included): studios $1,230; one bedrooms $1,470.

• Holden Green (no utilities included): one bedrooms $1,260–$1,530; two bedrooms $1,585–$1,715; three bedrooms $2,175.

• 2 Holyoke St. (all utilities included): one bedrooms $1,432–$1,542.

• Kirkland Court (all utilities included): one bedrooms $1,485–$1,595; two bedrooms $1,875–$2,075; three bedrooms $2,520–$2,700.

• 1306 Massachusetts Ave. (all utilities included): studios $1,375; one bedrooms $1,575; two bedrooms $2,075.

• 65 Mt. Auburn St. (all utilities included): studios $1,360; one bedrooms $1,650–$1,710; two bedrooms $2,045.

• Peabody Terrace (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): studios $1,230–$1,260; one bedrooms $1,460–$1,490; two bedrooms $1,790–$1,816; three bedrooms $2,610.

• 8 Plympton St. (all utilities included): studios $1,260–$1,310; one bedrooms $1,650; two bedrooms $2,085–$2,185; three bedrooms $2,710.

• 16 Prescott St. (all utilities included): studios $1,200; one bedrooms $1,418–$1,468.

• 18 Prescott St. (all utilities included): studios $1,200; one bedrooms $1,418.

• 20–20A Prescott St. (all utilities included): studios $1,255; one bedrooms $1,535–$1,675; two bedrooms $2,085; three bedrooms $2,675–$2,880.

• 22-24 Prescott St. (all utilities included): studios $1,290; one bedrooms $1,560.

• 85–95 Prescott St. (all utilities included): studios $1,260–$1,310; one bedrooms $1,650.

• Shaler Lane (no utilities included): one bedrooms $1,387; two bedrooms $1,700–$1,825.

• Soldiers Field Park (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): studios $1,365–$1,455; one bedrooms $1,575–$1,665; two bedrooms $1,965–$2,100; three bedrooms $2,630–$2,692.

• Terry Terrace (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): studios $1,300–$1,330; one bedrooms $1,560–$1,650; two bedrooms $1,915-$2,020.

• 9–13A Ware St. (all utilities included): studios $1,230; one bedrooms $1,490; two bedrooms $1,875.

• 19 Ware St. (all utilities included): two bedrooms $2,426; three bedrooms $2,565.

• One Western Ave. (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): studios $1,560; one bedrooms $1,835; two bedrooms $2,300–$2,360; three bedrooms $2,900.

• Wood Frame Buildings, Agassiz Area (inclusion of utilities varies by property): studios $1,350; one bedrooms $1,571; two bedrooms $2,050; three bedrooms $2,101; four bedrooms $2,789.

• Wood Frame Buildings, Harvard Square/Mid-Cambridge Area (inclusion of utilities varies by property): studios $1,352; one bedrooms $1,704; two bedrooms $2,265; three bedrooms $2,867.

• Wood Frame Buildings, Riverside Area (inclusion of utilities varies by property): one bedrooms $1,378-$1,809; two bedrooms $2,030-$2,632; three bedrooms $2,309-$3,092.

• New Construction, Riverside Area, 10 Akron St. (all utilities and Harvard Internet service included): studios $1,475-$1,585; one bedroom convertibles $1,835-$1,995.

• New Construction, Wood Frame Buildings, 387 Western Ave. and 28 Hingham St. (all utilities and Harvard Internet included): three bedrooms $2,829-$3,126.