A Year of Study in Flanders Now Costs a Student Living Away From Home at Least 18,000 Euros
A year of higher education in Flanders now costs a student who lives away from home at least 18,229 euros, according to annual calculations published by CEBUD, the budget and financial welfare research centre at Thomas More University of Applied Sciences. The figure, which excludes students who receive a study grant, marks a rise of 601 euros, or 3.4 percent, on last year and represents an increase of nearly 50 percent over a decade.
The findings, reported by VRT NWS and covered separately by HLN, have renewed debate in Belgium about the affordability of higher education, the fairness of the study-grant system, and whether planned cuts to family benefits will push university out of reach for lower-income households.
What the Numbers Show
CEBUD distinguishes between three categories of cost: strict study costs, broad study costs, and living costs.
Strict study costs — tuition, course materials, a laptop, study trips, and internships — average 1,980 euros for a student who does not receive a grant, 1,422 euros for a near-grant student, and 938 euros for a grant recipient. According to CEBUD, these figures are about 25 percent higher than five years ago.
Living costs, which the centre estimates at just under 10,000 euros, account for the largest share of the total. For students living away from home they total 9,993 euros, some 230 euros more than last year and roughly 25 percent more than five years ago. Recreation is the single largest component at 3,209 euros, followed by food, which costs 2,947 euros for students living away from home.
Housing is the other major driver. Rent and associated costs for a student room now total 5,963 euros, nearly 5 percent more than last year, an increase of 274 euros. Transport adds a further 271 euros for those living away from home. CEBUD notes that its transport estimate assumes students who take the train; a student who drives to campus would need an additional budget of 4,142 euros per year.
Students who commute from the family home rather than renting a room face minimum costs of 11,803 euros, up 314 euros, or 2.7 percent, year on year — also an increase of nearly half over a decade.
A Decade of Rising Costs
Ten years ago, in the 2016-2017 academic year, the minimum cost for a student living away from home was 12,334 euros, while a commuting student faced 7,956 euros. Both categories have since risen by close to 50 percent, according to the CEBUD calculations.
Nele Peeters of CEBUD emphasised that a substantial part of the headline figure reflects costs that any household would incur regardless of whether a young person is studying.
“The fact that the amount is so high has a lot to do with the living costs that are included in the calculation,” she said. “These are costs for food, clothing and recreation, for example. Every family has these costs. Whether you are a student or not.”
That methodological point has been echoed in public debate. Some readers argued that the true incremental cost of living away from home is lower, since students would eat and socialise at home anyway, while others noted that wages rose over the same period, softening the real-terms increase.
Family Groups Warn of Growing Pressure
The Gezinsbond, Flanders’ family association, said the figures confirm a widening affordability problem, particularly for single-parent households.
“More and more families are struggling to make ends meet, and therefore also to pay for higher education,” said Katrien Beeusaert, the organisation’s general director. “Especially for single-parent families it becomes almost impossible to let their child continue studying.”
Beeusaert also pointed to a trend of students taking on paid work alongside their studies. “We see that more and more students combine their studies with a side job to help pay for their studies and student life,” she said. “But combining study and work is of course not easy.”
The Gezinsbond directed particular criticism at the study-grant system, arguing that eligibility rules focus too narrowly on household income and overlook other assets or sources of income.
“They still too often end up with people who don’t need them,” Beeusaert said. “There is still too much focus solely on family income as a condition for a study grant. Other income or assets do not count. If we want to avoid further study becoming something only for the happy few, we will have to change those conditions for a study grant.”
Political Backdrop
The cost findings arrive during a tight budget round for the Flemish government, which has been weighing further savings to family benefits. In August, Flanders stopped paying the school bonus, worth between 23 and 69 euros per child depending on age, to the parents of around 1.1 million children who do not receive a social allowance, VRT NWS reported, a measure estimated to save about 50 million euros a year. Only families receiving a social allowance — around 530,000 children this year, down from 1.63 million — remain eligible.
The Gezinsbond said the change compounds existing pressure on household budgets, noting that a September school year is already an expensive period for families.
At the same time, savings on the Groeipakket, the Flemish child benefit scheme, have returned to the budget negotiating table, prompting the Gezinsbond to warn that the scheme should not become a “shrinking package.”
What to Watch
The CEBUD figures are a snapshot of minimum costs for students who remain financially dependent on their parents. The centre notes that independent students often face additional expenses that its methodology does not capture, and that costs vary widely depending on the chosen field of study.
With the Flemish government still searching for budget savings and family groups warning of mounting pressure, the debate over who can afford to study away from home — and who is effectively priced out — is unlikely to recede. The coming months will show whether proposed changes to study grants and family benefits address the affordability gap that the new figures lay bare.