Hopeful Home-Seekers Vie For Top of Housing List

Just to assure themselves of a roof over their heads next year, hundreds stood for hours yesterday, in the rain, without one.

The Harvard Housing Office yesterday began accepting names for its spring waiting list, and over 400 Harvard employees and graduate school students, about 14 percent of the total expected applicants, braved the elements yesterday morning to secure a better chance of receiving precious local housing.

Harvard owns more than 2300 apartments in Cambridge, 1600 of which are reserved exclusively for Harvard affiliates, including faculty, staff and students. About half of those 1600 are available for Harvard home-stackers each year, according to Nancy E. Kossan, and official of Harvard Real Estate, which oversees the Housing Office.

The first-come, first-serve waiting list is the Housing Office's primary means of assigning housing to the approximately 3,000 Harvard affiliates who apply each year for off-campus housing.

Despite their determination to submit their applications early, the process for assigning the Harvard housing does not guarantee that even those high on the list will receive housing. The chance of any applicant receiving housing depends on the type and availability of the desired unit, Kossan said.

There are two waiting lists per year, one in the fall and a larger list in the spring. The fall list includes affiliates who desire to move into Harvard housing between October and March, while the spring list serves those who would rather move in between April and September.

This spring's first applicants began arriving on a snowy Sunday night, prepared to wait overnight to assure themselves a high position on the list.

"We thought there would be a line, but we didn't anticipate people camping out at midnight," said Kossan. "We also didn't anticipate the snow," she added.

At the urging of President Bok, police began to compile an ordered list of names so that people didn't have to remain outside all night, Kossan said.

When the Housing Office opened at 9:00 Monday morning, those whose names were on the list were given priority.

Kossan said a new system of determining the waiting list would be implemented in October, for the fall waiting list, to avoid the long lines and the hassle.

Under the new system, applicants will submit their applications through the mail rather than in person. They will still be honored on a first-come, first-serve basis, based on the order of delivery to the Housing Office through the mail.

Julians G. Serafin, a chemistry student in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, waited on the line to have her name included on the waiting list. She arrived at 8:55 yesterday morning. She said, but did not enter the housing office until 11:20.

"I had no idea the line would be to long." Serafin said.

She added that the bad weather was a problem, but said "If I get an apartment out of it. I'd do it again.