“I had a gap between leases twice.”

Szuyin Yeh, graduate student in math, had to store her belongings in her friend’s apartment until her new lease began.

“I only had a gap for about four days, so I figured I wouldn’t spend money on storage,” she said.

However, many of Champaign’s storage facilities have remained near capacity throughout the summer, partly due to many gaps between leases.

U-haul, 306 E University Ave., has only a few, sporadic vacancies at its three Champaign locations throughout the summer said Ray Bey, U-haul customer service representative.

“And the phones don’t stop ringing with people soliciting space,” said Bey. “It’s definitely one of our busiest times.”

Illini Store-it Mini Warehouses, 611 W. Kenyon Rd., also has three locations near the Champaign area. Terry Long, manager of the 611 W. Kenyon Rd. warehouse, said all three of the facilities were almost at capacity.

“We have been generally busy for the past few weeks,” said Long. “And things won’t calm down until the beginning of September when students are back in their apartments.”

The warehouses often sell out smaller units during the summer months, leaving students to rent larger spaces they often don’t need.

“That happened to a friend of mine once, but they gave her the same price as the smaller units would have been,” said Kim Fricke, a senior in chemistry.

The warehouses work with students to give them discount prices on the larger facilities due to student rushes every spring and early fall said Long.

“We realize we are dealing with college students,” said Long. “We know they don’t always have a lot of money so we do our best to help out.”

With many apartment leases ending before new leases begin, students have limited options as to where to leave their belongings for a short period.

However, some apartment companies work to help students in these circumstances.

“When people let us know with enough time, we try to get their apartments ready quickly and have them move in early,” said Lundon Burton, leasing agent for Campus Connection.

Campus Connection also offers limited storage space to future tenants

Nancy Fleming, manager of On-Campus Rentals, said they do not offer storage areas but do have a set of apartment buildings which start their leases earlier than most.

“For students with storage problems, I advise they look for storage areas early on or ask a friend who might have the apartment and space to store their things,” she said.