Taking a room you have never stood in is the part of an international placement that people put off, usually until the options have thinned out. It is avoidable, and the reason it is avoidable is that none of the steps actually require you to be here. This is the order they go in.
One — see it on video
Tours run seven days a week, in person or over video for people who are not in Canada yet. It is the same tour, done on a phone.
Use it properly rather than passively. Ask to see the actual floor and the actual room type rather than a show suite, ask to be walked from the room to the kitchen to the bathroom in one continuous shot, and ask to see the window and what it faces. A video call is better than photographs precisely because you can direct it, and a gallery of pictures cannot be interrogated.
Two — hold it for 48 hours, free
This is the step that makes the whole thing low-risk, and almost nobody asks about it. A reservation holds a specific room for 48 hours at no cost.
Across time zones that is exactly the gap you need. You finish a video tour at eleven at night your time, you want to sleep on it, you want to send the link to a parent or a partner in another country and hear back. Two days covers all of that without the room going to somebody else while you think, and without you paying for the privilege.
An operator who wants a decision and a payment in the same call is telling you something about how they do business. Ask every one of them this question.
Three — get the approval documents ready first
Approval is the step most likely to add a week, and it is entirely preparable in advance. A guarantor or proof of income is required — there is no quiet exception, and it is better to know that now than the week before you fly.
With a guarantor, the guarantor is the security and nothing further is asked. Without one, approval is on documented income, and in that case last month's rent if you are approved without a guarantor. For a placement, the employment side of your paperwork is the relevant evidence, so have it in hand rather than promised.
The application itself is digital end to end. How it works sets out the full sequence and the amounts.
Four — what you are actually paying, and when
So there are no surprises at the point where money moves: $200 processing when you apply, $150 key deposit at signing which comes back when the keys do, and first month’s rent. Beyond that, last month's rent if you are approved without a guarantor. No brokerage commission, and no charge for the tour.
The minimum term is 4 months, which is the length of a standard placement, so you are not signing a year from abroad to cover four months on the ground. Rooms start at $220 a week and the room types page has all six grades, which is worth reading before the video tour rather than after.
More on intern housing
- A second co-op term
- What four months costs
- Booking for a January term
- Your first week on a placement
- The co-op term housing calendar
