Hey guys, my name is Nola and I'm a second-year History student at UCL. In this video I'm going
to try to break down what you might be able to expect spending will be as a student here in
London. I'm also going to have my friends come on camera to tell you themselves how much they spend,
because obviously it's going to vary a bit per person. So yep, I've also put on my Instagram
story asking other UCL students how much they spend in a week. So stick to the end of the video
to find out because I'm going to average what everyone spends to give you a true scientific
answer. To keep things simple, I'm going to split up my spending into four categories and I'm gonna
go through them in order of importance as in what I know I definitely am going to need to spend
versus things that are kind of just for fun. So in my first year at UCL, I was in Campbell House
East which is a student accommodation. So this is a self-catered accommodation and I paid about
£180 a week. Now that I'm a second-year, I have my own place and I paid £217 a week. The reason
why it's quite a bit higher is actually because I have the biggest room in our flat right now. If
we all paid evenly, like not according to room sizes, it would be £185 per person. So getting
a second-year flat it does not have to be more expensive than first year. Per week utilities
is about £11 for us. Accommodation is just going to be one of those things that you know you're
gonna have to pay - London is expensive. You can try to find a cheaper place of course to live
for second year. This is kind of a non-negotiable expensive London thing um rent, there you have it.
Oh do you want, okay do you want to sit in the chair and say how much you spend in the week. This
is my friend Adam he does Medicine at UCL and he's going to tell you how much he spends in a week.
Um, I think I'd spend about £110 a week - a £110 a week? Ok. Yeah, roughly there. And what would you
say you spend most of your money on? Um food, going out to eat always. Yeah. Yeah. Because,
I don't think ahead and I don't prep lunch and then I wake up too late to make a lunch
so then I have to go out for lunch. Yeah. Thanks Adam! Yeah. Thanks for your response.
But now we're going to move on to some things that are a bit more controllable with our own
expenses food is a big category it's actually what I spend the most money on because there's
so many restaurants and my friends and I like to eat out but this is definitely more within
our sphere of control. Because UCL is near Tottenham Court Road we actually have access
to quite a few grocery stores. I shop at Lidl because I found that is the cheapest one so
far normally for groceries I'll spend about £20 to £30 a week. The other main store that I shop
at is Oseyo which is a Korean grocery store and that's just where I get a lot of my Asian food.
Now where the food category is going to go up in cost is when you add in eating out. If you
just only eat in you can actually save so much money. Now for eating out I would say most main
meals are going to cost somewhere between £7 to £15, this can add up really quickly and I
try to limit myself to eating out two times a week. So if we're on the higher end of the
spectrum that's another £30. I personally really love to eat out and I don't really go clubbing
or anything. The cost that I would be spending on clubbing tickets or alcohol I instead put to
food. So not including rent let's say we spend about 60 pounds a week on food and eating out.
How much do you think you spent how much do you spend in the week as a UCL student in London?
Um, I think like £80 ish, okay and what would you say you spend the most money on? Oh,
eating out. Yeah, it seems to be a common theme with our friend group. Now we're going to add
travel costs. Cool thing about living in central London is it's pretty much walkable to anywhere
depending on how much energy you have and how much time you have. I could easily get around for
an entire week without having to use the tube or take any buses. But maybe you're living a little
farther away in second year or or maybe you want to go travel to like South Kensington or something
and you want to take the tube. I don't blame you, that's like an hour walk. So the Tfl is going to
charge you depending on how far you go and how many zones you go through in London. I would
say though that you're probably not going to use this that frequently so per week I'm going to put
travel costs which includes the bus the tube I'm gonna cap this at maybe £10 a week. Actually no,
I'm gonna lower it, I'm gonna say £5 a week. If you find that you are taking transportation
lot it might be a really good idea to get an oyster card. This gives you a third off
all your Journeys. It is like a fee that you pay for the entire year but you can apply it to your
oyster card which means you also get a third off travel within London. Another tip if you're new
to London I would download CityMapper, this app is honestly a lifesaver. It gives you a ton of
different options of transportations on how to get to where you want to go and I found this is like
the best GPS for cities. So currently we're only at £65, not including rent. I'll just ask okay,
how much would you... wait do I look at you or the camera? How much would you say you spent in a week
as a UCL student in London? Um, I'd say roughly £70, no not seventy, that's way too low. Maybe
like £80 to £100. Okay and what would you say you spend the most money on? Groceries because
you know we go to Lidl, Oseyo, Sainsbury's all the different ones, it adds up. Okay,
okay cool thanks. Add socializing on top of this. Once again this category is largely controlled by
you and I guess also your friends. There are a lot of free things you can do in London like going to
different museums, checking out different markets that kind of stuff. At the end of the day, both
socializing even if you just go to a café you're probably going to want to buy a coffee or if you
want to go out clubbing you're gonna have to pay for clubbing tickets and you know some alcohol
for pre's that kind of stuff. Society events also sometimes cost money depending on the materials
and the activities that you're going to be doing. Visualising I'm gonna put it to about £20 a week
so now we are at £85 a week not including rent. This is how much I would expect to pay in a week
if I'm you know socialising eating out twice a week. As you can see there are definitely a lot of
ways to cut back on this. I would really strongly encourage you guys to keep a record of what you're
spending. I use Notion and I kind of just write down what I'm spending and the category that
it's in so I know like where most of my money is going. I know some people use Excel spreadsheets,
Word you can kind of use whatever you want. I think a table format is usually the easiest and
as long as you're keeping track of those expenses it's going to help keep you accountable and just
show you where your money's going. Okay so that's the end of the video, I hope it was helpful and
kind of gave you some insight. Also I got all the responses from Instagram and I added it up did a
little division and it turns out that the average amount is £123 per week. Now keep in mind for
some people I wasn't sure if the number they put included their rent or not, did a little zhuzhing
around for that, to kind of like estimate. But it also seems that most people are saying they spend
about a hundred pounds a week so I guess that is like a good estimate, £100 not including rent. So
with that said I know money is a really big factor when choosing University and deciding to live in
a place like London. I hope that this video kind of helped make that process a little bit easier
in deciding and yeah so bye. This is Bobo, I think Bobo um that's definitely not making it.