Housing Options and Opportunities for Salus Students

In this podcast, we hear a previously recorded webinar from Monae Kelsey, associate director of Student Engagement and assistant director of Admissions. She talks about housing and all of the resources, options and locations that incoming Salus students and current Salus students have.  

Q: Where can you start to find a place to live?

A: We offer a couple different options to assist you with your search. We are not a housing department, we don't have a residence life, so all housing is off-campus and you would be finding your own place to live. If there are apartment complexes, houses, any type of living arrangements that are available, we have a lot of companies or apartment complexes or families who will reach out and say, "I have this unit that I'm willing to rent to Salus students," which is really, really nice. So, on the MySalus Portal, you would have access to see that list of available rentals that they have submitted to us. It's not comprehensive of everything that's in the area, it's just those who have reached out to us and said, "Here are some properties that we are willing to rent to students." So, you can take advantage of that.

Most students live within a 10-mile radius of the Elkins Park campus. However, some people, they live a little, they want to live in the happening spots down in the city or they want to live in other places. And that's fine as well, you’ve just got to be mindful of your commute. Just a couple more things about the online database — it's intended solely for the use of current and prospective students of Salus. And it's used as a tool to assist you. If you want to use it, you can. If you don't want to use it and you want to go through your own mechanisms or tools to find housing, you can do that as well.

It's been supplied by owners and managers, like I said before, so the university, we don't really take a position on saying, "Oh, this is a place you should definitely live," or, "a place that you shouldn't live." But we will definitely refer you to students because the students are the ones who live in these places. So they can definitely say, "Yeah, I heard great things." Or, maybe not. But we don't live in these places, so we don't really take a position on that. And again, it does not represent all housing opportunities.

Q: What are the areas close to Salus?

A: If you are coming from out of the area, of course, you want to know what neighborhoods or sections that you can live in, or that's even close to the campus. So Abington, Cheltenham, Chestnut Hill, Elkins Park, Glenside, Huntingdon Valley, Jenkintown, Willow Grove, Wyncote, are definitely places that you can look into, in order to see, "Okay, least I know if I'm here, this is how far it is." So Willow Grove, for example, is probably about 20 minutes, depending on traffic. If you can get up Old York Road in a good time, then you can probably cut that down. But it's usually about 20 minutes if you're commuting during high traffic times. And then everywhere else is usually closer in terms of time commute.

Q: What are the apartments close to Salus?

A: These are where a lot of our students live. But again, it's not the sole place that you have to live. We have a good group of students who live at the Wyncote House, Towers at Wyncote, Chestnut Hill Village. Actually, at the Towers they hold a barbecue or a pool party each year, working with our ambassadors. And they host it for any students who come over and just hang out for the time. They do it as a gesture because so many students live there, and then they also use it as a time to showcase what the apartment offers as well. So, it works out. We like to jump in the pool every year, right? When it's nice and hot. I don't know if we will be able to do it this summer, but hopefully we will get back to it next year.

Q: How can I find a roommate?

A: So searching for a roommate, again, on the Salus Portal, we have a roommate matching service, where you can go and see a list of people who are also looking for a roommate. It has a a simple questionnaire to ask you basic things so you can just find someone who might match a schedule or values the same things that you do when it comes to living and how you like living. And then you can reach out to each other and see if it's a good match.

One of the biggest ways that our students connect with each other is through the class Facebook group. Most of you would have gotten a Facebook offer to join the Facebook page for your incoming class, and usually that Facebook page is managed by upperclassmen, the class counsel ahead of you. They are the ones who are mainly on that page and they are more than willing to give you tips, answer questions and connect with you. That's also a time where you could connect with your future peers and talk to them. "Who's looking for a roommate? Who's not?" And do that. All the links for the Facebook pages can be found on MySalus as well.

Q: Is there any transportation available?

A: This is for if you are going to be in the area and you might not have a car, or even if you have a car but you don't always want to drive it. We want to let you know that we have a whole transportation system right in this area that you can take advantage of. So, especially if you are going to be living maybe downtown or somewhere further out, you might want to take advantage of taking the train up or the bus and using that route in the morning. 

Or if you are going out and want to grab dinner in the city somewhere, you might want to take the subway, or the train, or a bus down as well. So, we have multiple methods. The closest train station is the Jenkintown-Wyncote Station. And what's nice about this is even if you are from out of state and you want to take an Amtrak screen or the Peter Pan bus, or take a flight, you can use the trains to commute down to those stations in order to get on your other mode of travel. The bus stop that is closest to us is Route 55. That bus runs up and down Old York Road and our campus is right on Old York Road. So, you can literally get on and off the bus right at the exit of campus.

Q: What other resources should people know about?

A: These are just some additional resources and websites that you can take advantage of in order to know what's happening in the area. Sometimes they have things around housing and all of that stuff, but a lot of these are good for knowing what's happening in the area. I know Campus Philly, they do a breakdown of neighborhoods that are popular, where the young professionals like to live, the students like to live. Visit Philly and Uwishunu, really popular as well to know what's happening in the city at all times. I know for us, we have a weekly student event email that goes out on campus and at the bottom, we always include a link of what's happening, something that might be popular that's happening that week, for students to just know if they want to take advantage of it they can. If they don't, that's fine, too. And then we try to produce a local area guide that you can also look at if you want to see what we have there for you as well. 

To learn more about the housing resources around Salus University, visit salus.edu/admissions