Accommodation

// Room Ballot // Rooms Database

We are very lucky here at St John's. The College is widely known to home some of the best accommodation in Cambridge. And you are guaranteed to live in, or close-by college, for all of your undergraduate years of study. They will even help with provision of accommodation for your graduate years of study too.

Freshers are assigned single rooms in the award winning Cripps Building so that they live altogether making the transition to university and the settling in to college life a somewhat less daunting prospect. They share bathroom and kitchen facilities with the other 7-8 students on their floor. There are 3 floors to each of the 8 staircases and good friendships are usually formed with those living nearby. Due to building works on certain Cripps staircases, some Freshers are also allocated rooms in North Court (where they will live in close proximity to many other Freshers') and in Northampton Street Hostels (which are actually within college grounds and are only home to freshers').

Rooms for the rest of the undergraduate student body are spread over all courts in college and range from large old-fashioned characterful single rooms up rickety old staircases, to newly refurbished double rooms (for sharing with a friend) to the occassional triple set including 3 bedrooms and a living room. Third and second years may choose whether they live alone or share a room with a freidna dn may select whichever room they like; the majority of second years stay in New Court, while third years / finalists typically occupy 1st, 2nd, 3rd or Chapel Court. Some rooms are situated outside of College, in College hostels or houses, which are situated very close by and allow groups of friends to live together.

Room assignment in the second and third years is done by random balloting, but with Scholar-preference (click the link above to find out more) at the end of Easter Term; single and double room ballots are independent. Rooms are selected during the Summer Break using the Rooms Databse (click on the link above to head straight for it).

Rent varies with the facilities and location of the room; shared rooms or smaller rooms, for example, will come at a lower rate. This can vary considerably, but is usually within the £700 - £1,100 range. The JCR frequently negotiates with College to keep rent as low as possible.

Broadband Internet access is available in all rooms, at a charge of £22 per term; you will have to provide your own Ethernet cable. Laundry facilities are available for free in the laundry room at the bottom of B staircase in Cripps. Lockout keys are available from the Forecourt or Cripps Porters' Lodge.

Accommodation may be available over the Christmas and Easter holidays, at the College's discretion. Students wishing to stay over the holidays should speak to their tutor towards the end of term. Students with a strong reason to stay over the Long Holidays should consult their tutor at the earliest available opportunity.