Students who are new to leasing apartments at the University of Illinois have most likely been exposed to the stress that comes from hunting for the perfect place. With the vast amount of properties that students can choose from on and surrounding campus, others only look for one particular aspect when it comes to renting: finding an apartment that is pet-friendly.
By looking for a pet-friendly apartment, students are already faced with the issue of having to narrow down their options, since not all apartments allow pets.
“Pet-friendly apartments are definitely less common than non pet-friendly apartments,” said Kristen Fleming, an alumna of LAS, who lived on campus with a pet while attending the University.
Lauren Johnson, a sophomore in LAS, has also described her process of searching for a pet-friendly apartment to be less than ideal.
“It’s been pretty hard. Usually I try to find places that I like, and then I call to ask the management if they accept pets,” Johnson said. “Most of them don’t.”
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Searching online can make the process of finding a pet-friendly apartment simpler because students are allowed to narrow down their choices by the simple click of a mouse.
“If you’re looking online, which is usually what I did, most websites like Craigslist and leasing companies’ websites have an option where you can search for pet friendly apartments,” said Fleming.
Johnson, a first-time apartment lessee, has also been looking online, which she says has made her search a bit easier.
“I’ve been using the Daily Illini Classifieds search on their website, and that has helped me a lot,” she said.
Some pet-friendly realtors include Bankier Apartments, Gabe’s Place Apartments and MHM Properties.
One bright side to the search, however, is cost.
“Generally, pet-friendly apartments aren’t any more expensive. Usually you have to pay an extra deposit or even a little extra each month specifically for having a pet,” Fleming said.
Some students end up living in pet-friendly apartments even though they do not own pets, like Paige Millburg, a sophomore in LAS, merely because of greater convenience.
She chose her current apartment because of its openness, she said, which was something non pet-friendly apartments seemed to lack.
“We didn’t move into this apartment because we intended to get a pet,” said Millburg,
In the end, the apartment benefits not just the student, but also the pet, making all the hard work of searching worth it for loving pet owners.
