Why Student Housing Occupancy Could Increase for Fall

Student housing occupancy could increase in the fall semester, according to Fred Pierce of Pierce Education Properties. In a recent video presentation on the state of the student housing market that GlobeSt.com gained exclusively, Pierce offered an optimistic outlook for student housing in the 2020-2021 school year. While he expects university enrollment will be flat, shuttered on-campus housing options could boost occupancy in adjacent student housing properties.

“I believe that university enrollments at tier one, power five football conference universities in America will be level this year. In recent years, those have been growing, and there are a couple of factors in this COIVD environment that may slow that down just a bit,” said Pierce. “That would include freshman. I think the freshman class may be slightly smaller, which would be the result of students taking a gap year or staying closer to home and enrolling in a community environment.”