York students are set to make a packet from Ascot Races
YORK UNIVERSITY students up and down the South Bank area are contemplating letting their houses for Ascot this year. With 300,000 visitors expected to inundate York in mid-June, few residents are unaware of the potential profit they could make.
Graham Walker, a York student who lives opposite the racecourse in an eight bedroom house, explained that “because we’re living on South Bank we’re right next to the Racecourse, which means we’re in a prime position for it.”
With a view of the Racecourse from his living room window, Walker and his housemates were hoping to raise £20,000 to alleviate the spiralling costs of student life.
His inspiration came from his sister, who “went to York University a couple of years ago, and she actually sub-let her house at Ascot, and made quite a packet from it.”
York letting agencies are advertising similar nearby properties, which can sleep eight with only five bedrooms, for £300 per person per night, totalling at £16,800 for an entire week. These staggering figures have already led to frenzy on the letting market, with hundreds of houses in and around York available to rent.
Berkshire is the usual home for the Royal Ascot event, but as that course is currently under a £185 million redevelopment scheme, the organisers have had to look elsewhere. The York course appeared as the obvious choice due to the appropriate nature of the circuit, but it appears that the accommodation plans were under prepared.
Fears that this unique strain and potential overload of the York private rental sector have led to students being begged for their houses. Walker remarked that a stream of flyers and adverts had arrived at his house over the past few weeks, advertising the potential money to be made from renting during Ascot.
However, he stressed that due to the contentious legal issues surrounding the sub-letting of a student house, Walker and his housemates have decided for the moment not to go ahead.
Realising that the hassle of moving out mid-term made it untenable, “we’d either have to move everything out, or keep everything here, but we’d have to draft some sort of legal contract for the people we’d be sub-letting to.”
Despite the legal issues and the hassle of a mid-term move he remarked, “there are quite a few students in the South Bank area, particularly on the Bishopthorpe Road area there are quite a few. It’s absolutely perfect positioning if you wanted to do this sort of thing, because it’s right next to the Racecourse.”
