Anticipating next year's housing crunch and the increasing number of students looking off-campus for housing, the Office of Residence Life hired a full-time staffer to assist students with their off-campus housing searches. Director of Residence Life Richard DeCapua announced last week that Nicole Fadavi will assume the position of assistant director of Residence Life for off-campus housing in late April. Fadavi will help students locate as many off-campus options as possible and advise students on how to communicate with landlords and handle contracts, DeCapua said. Fadavi will look at properties near campus and establish contacts with real-estate owners and landlords in the area, DeCapua said.

The search for an off-campus staffer has preoccupied ResLife since the beginning of the academic year.

With the demolition of Ridgewood slated to begin in May, resulting in the loss of 109 beds, Dean of Student Life Rick Sawyer said many students looked off campus for next year. The new Ridgewood will house 194 students and will be completed in 2009, senior administrators have said.

"This is not a temporary quick fix, but a permanent position in the office," DeCapua said.

Students will still be responsible for finding their own off-campus housing, DeCapua said. Fadavi comes to the University from Mercy College in New York and worked with off-campus housing at Suffolk University in Boston.

Finding the right person for the position was a difficult task, DeCapua said. "This is one of the hardest positions I've ever looked for," he said.

DeCapua added that Fadavi will not be under a great deal of pressure at first because most students will have found off-campus housing by now, and she will have the summer to build a program that will launch next semester.

As of now, there is no official agreement between the University and real-estate owners in the area.

Some students, such as Elana Fox '08, said they found off-campus housing through friends. "It might be a good idea to consolidate near by housing in one database," she said. "So that people without friends off-campus can also find off campus housing."

Anna Scodel '09 expressed similar sentiments. "If we hadn't known a person living in the house, we wouldn't have found out about it," she said.

"It would be helpful to have all resources in one place, in stead of going around and asking people," she added.

Other students, like Maddie Goldstein '09, appreciated that Fadavi will help students understand how to deal with a landlord and fill out the proper paperwork.

"I had no idea what I was doing, going into a lease," she said.