Welcome to Cambridge, a city where the real estate market is dominated by the 31 colleges, most of which are major landholders. This means that, with legitimate alternatives hard to come by, renting accommodation from College is often the best option. The majority of the College’s graduate accommodation consists of variably-sized rooms in Edwardian townhouses clustered around ‘the Village’ (the Harvey Road area, just south of Parker’s Piece). In fact, this is a relatively convenient location about 7 minutes’ cycle ride from the Old Courts (i.e. the main College hub), 5-7 minutes from the train station, and 7-10 minutes from the Sidgwick Site (where most of the Humanities faculties are located) and the Barton Road Sports Ground (where the College has its rugby, cricket, and football pitches and squash courts).

Caius also offers the following postgraduate accommodation options:

  • Shared houses on Fitzwilliam Road and Chesterton Road.

  • Houses for students with partners/families on Drosier Road.

  • Flats (for students with partners/families and for individuals) around the Harvey Road area, Alice Cheng House and Radcliffe Court.

Rooms

The rooms are generally banded into groups. The first is larger and therefore more expensive, the second smaller and less so; all are very livable, and the large ones are often unusually spacious. Each room comes furnished with a bed (usually a small or 3/4 double), desk and desk chair, desk lamp, wardrobe, bedside table, and bookshelf (or two). The rooms share access to gyp rooms (small kitchens) or larger kitchens used by the whole house. Many of the houses also have generous gardens in the back, and a fixed barbecue behind the MCR at 6 Harvey Road is available to all – as is the allotment behind 2 Harvey Road.

The College provides accommodation for postgraduates for the duration of their course (up to 3 years are guaranteed), with some accommodation set aside for couples/families or disabled students. All postgraduate houses have cooking and free laundry facilities, as well as bike sheds and backyards open to all residents – your room key also functions as the key to the front door and garden door of your respective house.

Caius also offers accommodation for couples and families, upon request. Contact the Accommodation Office for this. For more information about accommodation, please visit the College’s graduate accommodation page.

Cleaning

The College cleaners, or ”bedders”, will clean the kitchen and bathroom daily, and they will also clean your room once per week. They are always very nice and happy to chat! If you do not wish to be disturbed, please place your rubbish bin outside your door before 9 AM on your room clean day, and it will be cleared for you while leaving your room untouched. The rota for when certain rooms will be cleaned can be found on a noticeboard in your house.

Couples and Families

Caius offers couples’ accommodation, including for those with children. However, these are limited in number and allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. Caius is particularly notable for having 16 self-contained flats (9 in the Harvey Road precinct, 6 in Alice Cheng House, near the Caius boathouse, and 1 in Harvey Court), as well as 2 houses on Drosier Road (just off Harvey Rd), available for postgraduate students living with their partners and/or families. These are very popular, and allocated by the Caius accommodation manager, Wendy Fox. Do contact her at accommodation@cai.cam.ac.uk if you have any questions, or if you wish to see the latest list of available rooms with their respective prices.

Generally, students with dependent children are prioritised (particularly for the houses, or the large flats if the houses are unavailable). For new students, here are some tips to maximise your chances of securing a couples house or flat:

  • Reach out to Wendy early at accommodation@cai.cam.ac.uk expressing your interest – don’t be afraid to email again if you don’t hear back!

  • Try to meet your conditions of study as early as possible, as accommodation can only be formally allocated once this is ticked off.

  • When filling in the accommodation request web form, once again write in the free text box that you are very keen on a couples/families house or flat. You can also use this free text box to specify other requests; e.g. that you would like to live in the same household as someone else. Wendy reads all of these comments and tries her best to meet requests.

For information on local childcare services, you can visit the relevant University or College web pages.