Building High-End Student Housing May Have Huge Social Repercussion

Bisnow recently held a Texas Student Housing event in Austin. The panelists, which included Page Senior Principal Larry Speck, discussed the ongoing topic of increasing costs and grandeur of student housing.

Larry explained, “Having extremely high-end student housing can have a really unhealthy effect of gentrifying a campus—if all the well-off students are in one nice new facility with all the bells and whistles and all the lower income students are in cheap old properties, it can create anger, bitterness and division.”

Larry has been a member of the faculty at the University of Texas School of Architecture in Austin since 1975. He is well known for his award-winning design, and he continues to educate the public on the impact that buildings have on their communities. “It’s important to mix backgrounds in college, and that includes in housing,” he said.

Bisnow is an online networking resource and publication for topics related to the commercial real estate business community. Participants at the Texas Student Housing event discussed the latest design trends and developments at universities and what actions private developers and schools are taking to continuously appeal to residents and investors.

View the full article on the Bisnow website.

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