The city of Madison has already taken a good first step in order to make off-campus housing more accessible to students. However, this task is only half completed; the city should finish the job it started.
There are many headaches that go into finding an apartment. What many students are unaware of is the current prohibition on showing an apartment is a relatively new conception. It used to be that landlords could show an apartment whenever there was interest, leading to the signing of next year's leases literally weeks after moving into the current year's place. Thankfully this process has been mostly curbed by the imposition of a ban on the showing of apartments before Dec. 15.
However, while this ban is a good thing, it has been compromised by the failure to ban lease-signings as well, causing a more confusing situation than existed before the ban. Under current regulations, landlords cannot officially show apartments, but can nevertheless sign leases for them. This has lead to a situation where in order to get a good place to live students are forced to search on their own without outside assistance, often times without even knowing what is currently available or what will become available once Dec. 15 arrives. Then, if through some obscure Web site a good place is found, the student has to go to the apartment and implore the current residents to let them poke around the house to see if it is indeed a worthy place to live, all the while inconveniencing the current residents. This inconvenient system has resulted from the current patchwork attempt to alleviate the housing crunch.
A more systematic approach to housing reform would benefit everyone involved, tenant and landlord alike. Instead of just banning showings, the city should ban signings as well. This way those unaware of the legal loophole or uncomfortable with unannounced intrusions on current residents would not be disadvantaged in regards to their more informed and unabashed competitors.
The city should also push back the freeze on signings from its current date of Dec. 15 to a date some time in second semester. Under the current system current residents are asked to decide if they are going to return after only four months of their lease have expired, therefore causing renters to have to worry about finding a new place before being allowed to settle into their current abode. Also, the current date discriminates against freshmen who are just wetting their feet here in Madison, and are not yet prepared to know who they would want to live with. Finally, a date so close to finals creates extra strain during an already strenuous time in most students lives.
The City Council has done a good job in starting the reform of housing practices, now it should finish the job it left shamefully unfinished, for the current reforms only hinder students, instead of helping them as they were meant to.
