Domain at College Park, where monthly rent starts at more than $1,000 per month not including utilities, opened on Campus Drive in the fall.

Junior Ori Gutin has about a five-minute walk from his classes to his off-campus house, where he lives with four roommates.

They buy groceries in bulk, cook and make house-wide decisions together, bringing down the cost of living — which Gutin said could get expensive.

“With the rising cost of everything related to higher education affordability, whether it’s textbooks, school supplies, housing … all of these things are placing an immense burden on students,” the environmental science and policy major said.

But Gutin said having a monthly rent installment of about $500 helps.

Gutin and his roommates are part of Co-op Housing University of Maryland, or CHUM, a student group that supports affordable housing by living cooperatively in houses in the College Park area.

But the rent Gutin and his roommates pay is not the most common price for off-campus housing — especially in the high-rise luxury apartment complexes that continue to appear around this university.

Domain at College Park, where monthly rent starts at more than $1,000 per month not including utilities, opened on Campus Drive in the fall, and the Landmark apartment complex along Route 1 is slated to open next fall with monthly rent installments falling around $1,100 per resident, according to online data.

“We’re a little more upmarket, we cost more, but there’s also greater value,” said Stacey Friedly, Landmark’s general manager, citing the location, amenities offered and the fact that it’s a new building.

Senior civil engineering major Landry Horimbere is the treasurer of CHUM. He said he sees some of the new high-end apartments near the campus as a threat to one of this university’s core values.

“There’s a lot of construction for really good but expensive housing, and it’s reducing the options in my opinion,” Horimbere said. “Without affordable housing, how do we expect to have any form of diversity in the school? The housing by itself limits the range of students who can actually go to the University of Maryland.”

Though Horimbere believes CHUM is one of the best options for off-campus housing, he said living with a group of friends in a house is one of the cheapest options — as senior aerospace engineering major Sam Bryk chose to do.

“We looked at our options, we looked at [South Campus] Commons, houses closer by and price was the biggest motivating factor,” Bryk said. “Commons was a little too expensive, and we’re paying almost 200 bucks less and we have a lot more space.”

South Campus Commons and Courtyards apartments will raise their monthly rent prices next year, with a 2.5 percent increase for Commons and a 3 percent increase for Courtyards, said Gina Brasty, regional manager for Capstone Management.

“We’re trying to cover the costs and provide excellent student housing at an affordable price,” Brasty said, noting the apartments’ rates are still some of the lowest prices for student apartment living in the area.

This need for high-quality housing that students find affordable is something the College Park City Council’s Diversity of Student Housing Subcommittee has been working to change for the past six months, District 1 Councilman Patrick Wojahn said.

Wojahn is also the co-chairman of the Neighborhood Quality of Life Committee, which includes the subcommittee. CHUM is an example of finding and maintaining affordable housing, he said, but the city needs more.

“There are some affordable housing options. … it could be a lot better,” he said. “There’s a great demand.”

Wojahn also said the subcommittee is exploring options to expand cooperative housing projects like CHUM, promote cheaper housing developments, explore subsidized undergraduate housing and improve some existing housing options.

Ariel Bourne, the Residence Hall Association student groups and organizations liaison, is a part of the subcommittee and said one challenge is figuring out what rent prices are affordable for students.

While the subcommittee is considering a range of $600 to $800 each month to be affordable, he said, that range is only truly affordable when the housing option is up to code and has good amenities, said Bourne, a junior government and politics and nutrition and food sciences major.

For some students, however, the quality of new apartments around the campus would be worth a price hike, junior Cierra O’Keefe said. She said she plans to move into Landmark next fall for her senior year.

“It’s new one of the big draws is you’re going to be the first person to live there and sleep in the bed,” the marketing major said. “And location is definitely one [plus].”

Now that upperclassmen will have a harder time securing a spot to live on the campus, thanks to a change in the housing process,the demand for off-campus living could also expand.

“Students should have other options, affordable housing that meets basic standards,” Wojahn said.