I'll be staying at I-house again this upcoming semester. Most people apply to SK global since they are newer and have a shower and restroom in the room. I, however really recommend staying in I-house. First of all, it's 329,000KRW cheaper than SK. They rooms come with a mini fridge inside. In SK, you have to use the fridge that's located in the lounge of each floor, and I always heard people complaining about their food being stolen. I'm very.... protective... of my food, so I really appreciate that mini fridge.
I-house also has A LOT of shelf storage. The whole wall has shelves, which I enjoy because I can organize everything and the shelves on the desk won't look extremely cluttered.
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| Look at all those shelves! |
The main drawback at I-house is that the communal shower and restrooms get really dirty by Sunday because they aren't cleaned on the weekend. However, my solution to this was to use the first floor restroom that nobody really uses, and since my floor just happened to be the one with the dirtiest people, I would go to another girl's floor to take a shower.
Some SK drawbacks are that you have to separate your trash (food waste, plastic, glass,etc.), whereas in I-house you just throw everything out together. You also have to clean your own restroom, and sometimes it becomes a problem if your roommate is dirty and doesn't like to clean. The showers in SK don't even have doors!
PS. Both dormitories are connected on the 4th and 5th floors, so you don't have to go outside and sign-in at the other dorm whenever you want to visit your friends in the other dorm!
OK, now moving on to payment...
After your application is passed, go to the "MY Page" section on top. Then click on the "Housing Application Number."
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I just wired my payment today. The exchange rate was $1 = 1061 krw so the total came out to be $1406, including the $35 wire transfer fee. Honestly, that exchange rate sucks.
The wire transfer usually takes 3-5 days, so try to do this as soon as possible. Last time it took 4 days for them to receive the money, but I've heard of instances where it has take up to 7 days.
Now it's time to wait for them to receive the money. Then I can feel at ease knowing I have a place to sleep for the majority of my time there.
UPDATE: July 15, 2015 4:47pm. My housing payment went through so I received an e-mail from the dorms telling me received it. You should check your application to see if you were short or overpaid since exchange rates fluctuate a lot. Last time I overpaid by like 300 KRW, so I didn't really care about it, but if you overpay by a lot they'll refund you money once you set up your Woori bank account in Korea. If you were short by only a couple thousand won they let you pay when you arrive there. ALSO, don't forget to take a copy of your TB test result when checking in!
