If you’re looking for a college town where you can learn just as much from your surroundings as you can from your professor, it’s hard to beat Chicago. The Illinois city is home to plenty of public and private universities along with incredibile extra-curricular opportunities. It makes sense that students come from all over the world to study in Chicagoland. If that’s you, you’ve got some serious decisions to make when it comes to deciding what you should bring with you and what you should leave behind. Luckily, storage saves you from making too many of those tough decisions. Search for storage in Chicago and get back to focusing on the important decisions, like where to grab a slice of deep dish pizza.
Storage on a Student Budget
We know what you’re thinking. How are you supposed to pay for all of those $300 a piece textbooks and afford storage? In Chicago, rates are pretty reasonable. Unless you’ve got an apartment’s worth of stuff in tow, you’re probably going to want a 5x5 unit. These typically rent for around $48.31 on average, which means about $200 a semester. If you’re not sure what this size looks like, picture a closet, only much bigger than the one in your dorm room which you’re forced to share with two other roommates (this should be a crime). You can use it as a place to store seasonal items like clothing and sports equipment. Chicago summers are glorious, which is good news if you’re sticking around for an internship in between semesters, but winters are cold, harsh and made possible with the help of plenty of warm clothes and a bar that allows hibernation. Use your storage unit as an
off season wardrobe and you’ll never have to worry about being inappropriately dressed for the weather. If you’re a student athlete, you can apply this same principle to storing your gear during the off season. Just make sure you clean it before putting it in storage and consider
climate control so that your items aren’t ruined by mildew.
Storage Near Your Campus
If your university search efforts were focused on one Chicago university in particular, let us be the first to tell you: There are a lot of colleges in Chicago. You don’t want to just focus on a storage facility that caters to the needs of college students in general. You want one that focuses on the needs of college students at the place where you actually go to school. If you’re attending the
University of Chicago you’ll be searching for storage in the Hyde Park neighborhood. There’s a
StorageMart facility just a mile away that offers climate controlled units which are perfect for summer break along with specials like a free month of storage just for signing a lease. If you’re a student at
Chicago State University, you won’t be able to find storage that’s walking distance from school, so if driving a few miles or taking public transportation isn’t for you, consider
PODS portable storage. If you’re attending the
University of Illinois at Chicago, check out
Uncle Bob's Self Storage. It’s just a mile away and it offers online bill pay, so you don’t have to endure the winter cold just to drop off a check.
Student Safety and Storage
Whether you’re aware of it or not, your campus has ample security measures in place. There are most likely cameras in your dorm common areas, key coded access to housing, security officers and police dedicated to the area. Your campus is (or should be) well lit so that you feel safe walking home from your evening classes. We think that a storage facility should make you feel the same way. This is especially important if your weekday class schedule and weekend social schedule has got you visiting your storage unit at odd hours. In Chicago, the growing popularity of indoor units with multiple floors can mean security for everything you’ve decided to store, but what about security for you when you’re visiting the facility? When choosing the one for you, ask the facility manager about what
security measures are in place. This should include ample lighting, solid fencing and a gate system that only allows tenants and staff to enter the property. If you’ve got key coded access, find out how often that code is changed. If the answer is never, that means that previous tenants and anyone else who has the code will be able to enter the facility. Your facility manager should understand how important it is to keep tenants safe while they’re accessing their belongings. We know that sometimes accessing your storage unit can feel like a chore, but it shouldn’t feel like a chore in a place that compromises your sense of security.
