Studying at ANU (interstate costs)

[osgood]

Hi atarnotes/ ANU students,
I wasn't sure how to go about getting answers to these questions so I thought I'd pop them here and hope for the best.
For varied reasons, it's somewhat necessary that I study interstate post year 12 and wanting to study inter-relations, ANU sounds stellar and the phB sounds right up my alley.
Mainly, I was wondering how interstate students afford accommodation.
I'm guessing families are largely willing to assist in the fees but as hinted to earlier, I'm in a bit of a odd situation and regardless, come from a lower working class family- so the twenty grand is a stickler.
I'm hoping for some kind of scholarship but it's a bit vague as to whether the undergrad ones can be used towards accommodation- there's one marked specifically for accommodation anyway.  Speaking of which, apparently a scholarship accompanies the pHB- can this be used towards accommodation?
Anyway, I am just really not in the know, so it'd be lovely if someone could throw me things to consider- financial aid, bursaries, general info ect.
Much appreciated. 

[#1procrastinator]

Mainly, I was wondering how interstate students afford accommodation.

I'm on Centrelink + using my savings my savings but I might need to get a job eventually.

I'm guessing families are largely willing to assist in the fees but as hinted to earlier, I'm in a bit of a odd situation and regardless, come from a lower working class family- so the twenty grand is a stickler.

$20,000? 

Speaking of which, apparently a scholarship accompanies the pHB- can this be used towards accommodation?

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm sure you can use scholarship moeny however you see fit  :p

[Lasercookie]

I'm on Centrelink + using my savings my savings but I might need to get a job eventually.

Yeah I'm pretty much in the same situation, getting by pretty well so far. I'm finding that I usually have to resupply on groceries every fortnight or so.

The rent does vary for each hall. B&G and Fenner Hall are the cheapest ones. The catered halls are expensive. http://accom.anu.edu.au/UAS/977.html is a good start, where it'll take you to a link with the prices for each residence, and also a link about accomodation bursaries. Read everything on that site basically

Each hall also offers bursaries for rent I'm fairly sure, they should be listed somewhere on the accommodation website. I don't know about the other halls, but Fenner Hall also has a PhB busary for half-price rent.

$20,000? 

The new Tuckwell scholarships that they're starting up this year gives 20k a year.

There's more scholarships than that, http://students.anu.edu.au/scholarships/ug/ is a good start for those. There's a variety of scholarships for 99.70+ students too. That page lists all of those. Don't quote me on this, but I'm not too sure if there's a specific PhB scholarship anymore, but I'd imagine a lot of PhB kids would be eligible for one of those merit ones anyway.

There's also organisations/foundations and what not that offer scholarships that you'll want to look into, your careers teacher or someone at your school might know stuff about those.

How you get to spend scholarship money is up to you I'm fairly sure, most of them will detail how you get the money (whether it's bulk payment, or applied directly to your rent etc.)

[osgood]

Oh no, the $20 000 was related to guestimated accommodation costs, which I borrowed from:
http://students.anu.edu.au/think/life.php

Is that an inaccurate number?

[osgood]

Hmm, I know I'd definitely be eligible for Youth Allowance/ Centrelink financial aid- I am really not in the know here- but I have no idea how much help that'd be. Would you be able to throw some numbers ect?

[humph]

I was on an NUS (which at the time was $10,000 a year), plus from second year onwards I was a tutor, which added a couple hundred dollars a week. For the first two years I did get a little bit of financial help from the parents (I was staying at Bruce Hall, which is pretty pricey), but after that I was fine financially.

If you have a good scholarship (the NUS is $12,500 these days) you can survive without a job at somewhere like B&G or Fenner (and possibly Unilodge), but one of the catered colleges will be too pricey. Without such a scholarship, you'll need to work a job that gives you quite a few hours a week and hope for a fair amount of youth allowance.

[osgood]

This is all very helpful. Thank you.
(Thank you for the email #1procrastinator, I can't reply to them for some reason..Just to clarify, do you and laserbluedd receive help from your parents?)
Just to clarify, to some extent, my parents would be willing to help out (I think), but the more I can fund myself, the better and the worst case scenario would be me having to 'get up and go' but I don't really want to consider that.
Anyway, I think the NUS is out of my reach, but between an equity scholarship of $5000 or a merit scholarship of $6500, some kind of youth allowance/ rental assist (guestimating about $200) and a part time job of average wage and hours, how would I fare in an uncatered college? If I were to still be flailing, approximately how much would my parents have to chip in?
So sorry for all these questions- your replies are all very helpful!

[JellyDonut]

Oh no, the $20 000 was related to guestimated accommodation costs, which I borrowed from:
http://students.anu.edu.au/think/life.php

Is that an inaccurate number?

Kinda. If you live on campus, chances are, you won't even be using public transport at all. Similarly, you get like heaps of printing credit at uni so 5 bucks a week on stationary is also untrue. Rest is kinda right

They also inflated the off-campus costs. I'm paying like $160 a week for rent lol.

[Lasercookie]

(Thank you for the email #1procrastinator, I can't reply to them for some reason..Just to clarify, do you and laserbluedd receive help from your parents?)

Nah I don't.

The stuff on that ANU link lists the kind of stuff you might end up spending money on, for each of those items you might be able to guess how much you might end up spending. My spending varies week to week, but overall I'm spending a lot less than what that website suggests.

Hmm, I know I'd definitely be eligible for Youth Allowance/ Centrelink financial aid- I am really not in the know here- but I have no idea how much help that'd be. Would you be able to throw some numbers ect?

It's probably worth going into Centrelink yourself one day and just talking to them. It varies a lot depending on your parents income etc.

[Jenny_2108]

btw just saying, if you apply to B&G, they also have scholarship for b&g residents based on your academic result and contribution to this accommodation, joining in activities etc but you cant apply for it until you come here and stay, fill out the form.

And you can find a part-time job to pay renting as well

[lala1911]

It's achievable.
$407.50 Youth Allowance + $75 rent assistance per fortnight (around that, depends on how much rent is). That's $475 fortnightly there. You can live off that (or work casual/part-time to get that extremely useful bonus $100-200), providing that you don't blow money easily.

I'm sure you're eligible for more payments. Also, I'm positive that once you leave home, you receive a payment... around $1000 I thought I saw on Centrelink. Don't exactly quote me on this, but I'm fairly positive.

So.. if you're receiving $475 a week, you're able to live in at ANU for $181/pw. That would leave you with $72/wk left with around $55/wk.

You can find out what you're eligible for at this link:
http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/enablers/centrelink/abstudy/payment-rates

Hope I helped

[Lasercookie]

You can find out what you're eligible for at this link:
http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/enablers/centrelink/abstudy/payment-rates

I'll just point out that you linked to the payment rates for ABSTUDY, not Youth Allowance. Some of the rates might be similar, but there are quite a few differences there. Since it's best to also look at all the pages about eligibility and various conditions so I'm not going to bother giving a direct link to the Youth Allowance/Rent Assistance payment rates.

[lala1911]

I'll just point out that you linked to the payment rates for ABSTUDY, not Youth Allowance. Some of the rates might be similar, but there are quite a few differences there. Since it's best to also look at all the pages about eligibility and various conditions so I'm not going to bother giving a direct link to the Youth Allowance/Rent Assistance payment rates.

Hi. ABStudy and Youth Allowance, you still receive $407.50 fortnightly and approx $75 $100 a week for rent assistance, it does depend on how much rent is. Assuming the rent is $189 a week, you can expect up to $136 a week actually, so my $75 guess was wrong, I'd estimate around $100/pw then.
Youth Allowance: http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/enablers/centrelink/youth-allowance/payment-rates
Rent Assistance: http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/enablers/centrelink/rent-assistance/payment-rates

[Lasercookie]

Hi. ABStudy and Youth Allowance, you still receive $407.50 fortnightly and approx $75 $100 a week for rent assistance, it does depend on how much rent is.

Yes, but the ABSTUDY link lists "other payments and benefits" that "may be payable in addition to" which don't apply to Youth Allowance. Hence why I pointed it out in case someone reading this didn't realise that it's not the Youth Allowance page that you gave them.

[osgood]

Hmm, thank you all so much for the insight once again- very helpful. I'll be sure to pop into centrelink at some point this year but I'm tentatively hopeful.
Thanks again!