The Impact of COVID-19 on Student Housing

Students are returning to many colleges and universities in the US, but questions remain. Among the uncertainties, how will institutional investment in student housing and the real estate sector be impacted by the coronavirus pandemic?

More institutional capital has been allocated to the student housing sector in recent years, and this sector has shown real promise with some sizeable deals. This paper explores some of the challenges that the student housing sector may face as a result of the pandemic, and it uses newly released data from Yardi Matrix to illustrate how some schools that rely on international and out-of-state enrollment could be in trouble if we do not see a return to pre-COVID-19 enrollment levels.