Housing Selection Process

In order to participate in the housing selection process you must pay the $300.00 non-refundable housing application fee. The deadline date is March 1.

• Cash, personal check or money order is accepted at Red Hawk Central. Make checks payable to “Montclair State University,” and bring or mail this payment to the Student Accounts Office at Red Hawk Central, 2nd Floor Atrium, Susan A. Cole Hall, Montclair State University, 1 Normal Ave. Montclair, NJ 07043. Please be sure to write your Montclair State University CWID number on your check. View Red Hawk Central Hours of Operation.
• You may also pay your housing application fee via NEST utilizing a credit card or e-Check.

Submission of this fee indicates the student’s interest in participating in the housing selection process.

• Outstanding Balance: If you have an outstanding balance for the current term, you are ineligible to participate in the general room selection process. It is your responsibility to clear any delinquent charges.
• Holds: You are only eligible to participate in the housing selection process if your account is in good standing, which means they do not have any holds on your NEST account. It is your responsibility to ensure that all holds (except academic probation) are removed from your NEST account. Please check your account prior to room selection. If you remove a hold on the day of your housing selection, you must contact the Office of Residence Life to have the hold removed from their RMS account. The hold must be visibly cleared in NEST for Residence Life to remove the hold. Please Note: It may take some time for the staff to remove the hold from your RMS account.
  • If you have financial hold at the time of housing selection, you are not allowed to reserve a bed space. Once the account is paid in full, you will be eligible to participate in housing selection as long as it is within the determined time frame. If you have missed your time frame, please contact the Office of Residence Life and we will assign you a new time frame or advise you of your next step.
  • Academic probation does not prevent a student from selecting housing.
• Up to Date Immunizations: You are required to submit proof of vaccination status prior to signing up for housing and moving into a residence hall. Failure to submit proper immunization documentation will result in housing being forfeited. View a full list of required vaccinations, including COVID-19.

Residential accommodations are available only to registered students of the University enrolled in a degree-granting program. Priority is given to undergraduate students registered for and maintaining 12 or more credits per semester and graduate students registered for and maintaining 9 or more credits per semester. Make sure to review your credit hours now so that you know how many credits you will have at the end of the spring semester to determine where you can reside for the upcoming academic year. Credit hours are determined by adding your earned credits and your currently enrolled credits.

• The Village Credit Hour Requirement: In order to be eligible to live in The Village, you must have completed 50+ credit hours at the completion of the spring semester.
• Hawk Crossings Credit Hour Requirement: In order to be eligible to live in Hawk Crossings, you must have completed 30+ credit hours at the completion of the spring semester.
• Frank Sinatra Hall Credit Hour Requirement: In order to be eligible to live in Frank Sinatra Hall, you must have completed 24 + credit hours at the completion of the spring semester.

Please Note: Students residing on campus in one of the Traditional Residence Halls are required to purchase a valid meal plan. Please refer to the Dining Services website for detailed meal plan descriptions. Students residing in Hawk Crossings or The Village Apartments are exempt from the meal plan requirement; however, students who choose to take a meal plan will have the option to do so through Dining Services.

Housing Selection Priority Status

• Current Residential Students: Current residential students have the utmost priority, given they have completed all requirements above on time, to select housing. Current residential students will be assigned a date and time to select housing based on their total accumulated credits. This means that generally, seniors select first, then juniors, then sophomores, and finally freshmen. Current residential students also have the option to pull in current commuter students into available apartments/suites/rooms.
• Current Commuter Students: Once the cycle of current residential students has commenced, then-current commuter students have priority to select housing. Current commuter students will be assigned a date and time to select housing based on their total accumulated credits. This means that generally, seniors select first, then juniors, then sophomores, and finally freshmen. Current commuter students can be pulled-in by current residential students that go through the housing selection process first.
• Graduate Students: Graduate students are prioritized to reside in The Village at Little Falls. Graduate students wishing to live in traditional-style accommodations are reviewed on a case-by-case basis. Graduate students will typically have access to the system during the entire housing selection process because the bed spaces that they are selecting differ from the Undergraduate bed space list.

When selecting and accepting a housing assignment, you are making a legally binding contractual commitment for both the fall and spring semesters. This means, that any cancellation inquiries for housing must be made as a request and are approved and denied at the discretion of our policies and procedures.

Prior to room selection, you must enter the Residential Management System (RMS) and electronically sign the Residence License and Dining Services Agreement. You will be unable to participate in room selection if you do not electronically sign the agreement. You will have five (5) business days from the day in which you self-select or are pulled into a bed space to cancel your housing. All cancellation requests must be submitted in RMS. You will receive an email to your Montclair State University email confirming their cancellation and forfeit of their housing application fee. After those five (5) business days, you will be held financially responsible for that bed space for the entire academic year (fall and spring).

Get more information on our Housing Cancellation Policy.

You have the ability to either proceed through the general room selection process alone, pull in students while they complete the process, or be pulled in by another student who is completing their process. If you do not have a specific student or students that you are looking to live with, please be sure to accurately complete the Lifestyle Preferences section of your Housing Agreement. During the housing selection process, you will be able to view other students’ Lifestyle Preferences to determine potential fits for future roommates.

Once you determine who you plan to live with and whom the designated person will be to select your bed spaces for the room/suite/apartment that you would prefer to reside in, it is that designated person’s responsibility to complete the selection process for all individuals involved. It is the responsibility of each student to log into RMS and sign their Housing Agreement prior to the start of their selection process.

Once the spaces are selected, you will not be able to re-enter the system to select a different space. Please pay close attention to the suite, room or apartment you have chosen. You will be billed according to your selection. All selections are final.

Please Note: If you are allowing a proxy to select and confirm a space on your behalf for the upcoming academic year, you must first enter the RMS system prior to your selection time and electronically sign the Residence License and Dining Services Agreement and create a roommate code.

Current Residents with Open Spaces

Current residents (lived on campus during the fall semester) can request to have a friend be placed in an open space. Simply copy the below email template and email our office at reslife@montclair.edu as soon as you are aware of the space becoming available. A member of our team will confirm the vacancy and complete the room change or placement. Please be sure to copy the student that you are looking to bring into your space! We will not complete the room change or placement if the student is not copied on the email!

Due to the ongoing changes in housing assignments, we cannot guarantee that your requests will be granted. We will do our best to accommodate your requests.

Email Template

Dear Residence Life Team,

My name is FIRST NAME, LAST NAME and my CWID IS M123456789. I am aware of a vacancy that will become available for the spring semester in my room/suite/apartment. I would like to pull in FIRST NAME, LAST NAME, CWID NUMBER M123456789 into the space. They are copied on this email.

Please let us know if this can be completed. We appreciate your help!

How to Create a Roommate Code

If you are looking to be pulled into a space, you will need to create a Roommate Code in RMS prior to selection. This is to protect the students by not disclosing personal information (including their CWID number) to other students, and instead, create a specified code that will only work for this purpose. In order to create a roommate code, you must complete the below process before the housing selection process begins. This process is usually available the same week as housing selection begins.

• Log onto the Residential Management System (RMS)
• Enter your NetID and Password
• Click Next Step after “Create My Roommate Code”
• Enter a 4-digit numeric code
• Select “Finish”

The roommate code process is only for students who need to be pulled in.

Room Changes

If you are dissatisfied with your housing selection, you will have the opportunity to log into RMS and complete the Room Change process. The room change process will be designed to allow you to select a different housing assignment after you have made your initial selection. The Room Change Process will be available to students until a date designated by the Office of Residence Life. Room change processes are only for the student completing them. You will not be eligible to pull in another roommate during this process.