House Room Rents Revised To Increase Middle Brackets

A new streamlined schedule of rents for rooms in the Houses will go into effect next fall, reducing the top prices of suites and making more House accommodations available at the medium price level.

Culminating an investigation which has been conducted since last spring by a committee of House masters and Senior tutors and by Aldrich Durant, business manager, the new rate for House suites were announced last night by Professor Ronald M. Ferry, Winthrop House master and chairman of the masters' committee.

Most affected by the new plan are the top-priced suites, the maximum cost of singles being reduced from $500 to $420, and of doubles from $360 to $330. The maximum cost of triples has been set at $300.

Fairer System

By reducing the maximum prices of suites, the masters hope to abolish undergraduate suspicion that wealthy students can buy their way into the Houses. Occasionally in the past, although turning away many applicants for moderately priced rooms, the masters have been forced to give their most expensive accommodations to the first bidder, even if he was on probation.

In order to compensate the University for the decrease in top-priced room rents, the rates of some of the other suites, especially triples and doubles, have been slightly increased.

Reducing the number of rent levels, the masters and Durant have arranged the new schedule so that the rates increase in grades of $30 instead of $20. Thus the possible rents which a student may pay for his accommodations will be $100, $120, $150, $180, $210, $240, $270, $300, $330, $360, $390, and $420.

Simpler, Too

The fewer number of rent levils will make the allotting of rooms each spring considerably simpler, the masters hope. They also believe that with the rates increasing in sharper steps students will be more likely to mark down on their applications the amount that they can afford to pay and will not attempt to buy their way into Houses by going beyond their means.