UC San Diego Reinstates Undergraduate Housing Guarantee Suspended During the Pandemic

Eight years ago, UC San Diego set into motion ambitious plans to expand on-campus housing as part of a strategy to enhance the student experience and increase access to a UC education by offering student housing at below market rates.

After reducing on-campus housing density as a way to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 during the pandemic, this year, UC San Diego was able to increase capacity and offer housing to all undergraduate students on the fall 2022 housing waitlist.

With the opening of the Theatre District Living and Learning Neighborhood in fall 2023, the university will, once again, begin offering a two-year undergraduate on-campus housing guarantee for incoming students. Copyright: HKS and EYRC

With the opening of the Theatre District Living and Learning Neighborhood in fall 2023, the university will, once again, begin offering a two-year undergraduate on-campus housing guarantee for incoming students. The undergraduate class entering fall 2022 also will qualify for this two-year housing guarantee.

“We are aware that finding housing at affordable prices is becoming increasingly difficult throughout California,” said UC San Diego Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla. “In response, we have enhanced our strategies to address the housing shortage and return to guarantees suspended during the pandemic.”

With 18,022 total beds on campus today, UC San Diego ranks third in the nation for student housing inventory and currently outperforms national trends by housing 39 percent of undergraduate students and 49 percent of graduate students. Starting in 2023, three new on-campus housing neighborhoods will open in successive years, adding 5,300 new undergraduate beds on campus by 2025.

• Theatre District Living and Learning Neighborhood will provide housing to 2,000 undergraduate students when it opens in fall 2023.
• Pepper Canyon West Living and Learning Neighborhood will provide 1,300 single-occupancy rooms to transfer and upper-division undergraduate students when it opens in the fall of 2024.
• The proposed Ridge Walk North Living and Learning Neighborhood, which is anticipated to open in the fall of 2025 to provide housing to an additional 2,000 undergraduate students.

To further reduce the cost of housing and therefore the cost of education, Chancellor Khosla worked successfully with the UC Regents and state legislators to develop the new $2 billion Higher Education Student Housing Grant Program that is helping to build new student housing across California. UC San Diego recently received a $100 million grant from the program, which will be leveraged to lower rates up to 55 percent below market for 1,100 low-income California resident students.

Providing access to affordable housing for UC San Diego students will continue to be a top priority for the university. Khosla added, “Our goal is to house 50 percent of all students by 2025 and to continue making progress toward a four-year housing guarantee at below market rates.”