The benefits of homestays for short-term students

It sounds like the perfect solution: people in the community inviting the world into their home by opening their doors and welcoming international students into their lives. Homestays are certainly immersive and personalised experiences that can help ease the accommodation challenges faced by institutions that recruit short-term students. In recent years, demand for short-term lets has far outstripped supply, with many private landlords, as well as institutions themselves, prioritising licence agreements that span the entire academic year. It is often a struggle to find affordable short-term accommodation when the potential for voids and lost income is so great.  This, in turn, has a detrimental effect on student recruitment. Homestays offer a positive alternative: an innovative way for higher education institutions to transform the threat of crisis caused by the perpetual lack of short-term lets into an opportunity for growth and reputation enhancement. 

This blog considers some of the many benefits of homestay programmes, which reach far beyond practical living arrangements. Whilst acknowledging the potential challenges in delivery, it argues that a well-managed programme provides a wonderful opportunity for institutions to offer a differentiated student experience, which is highly desirable amongst many short-term learners.  

#1 – A warm welcome 

Short-term international students, by their very nature, ‘hit the ground running’. All too often, they face a high-pressure situation upon arrival, caused by the need to integrate quickly. With such high expectations, this moment can be extraordinarily difficult and lonely.  Isolation erodes students’ confidence, increases insecurity and diminishes feelings of belonging. Trusted hosts, however, can support institutions in providing a warm, personalised reception. For example, host families often make virtual introductions pre-arrival, meaning students feel secure in the knowledge that a ‘family’ awaits them. Homestays, therefore, become an extension of traditional orientation activities, even more so when the host community fully embraces its role in helping to deliver a tailored and time-sensitive welcome.  

#2 – Family life 

The immersive experience of living as a part of the family is incredibly valuable. It has a high impact on both participants and the host family because it leads to a deeper understanding of different cultures, which opens career and life opportunities for everyone involved. Many homestays lead to lifelong international friendships that help foster independence and confidence borne of human connection.  

A successful homestay programme nurtures emotional intelligence and an inclusive learning environment. It provides a respectful and welcoming setting that encourages emotional expression in students through the four main pillars of emotional intelligence: self-awareness, self-regulation, social awareness, and relationship management. It helps create safe spaces where it is easy for short-term students to share feelings as part of regular family life, helping to ensure that no one ever feels alone. Homestays can aid socialisation and the sense of being part of a global network. For those motivated by a desire to ‘fit in’, they offer a ready-made community with the reassurance of safety.   

#3 – Living like a local 

In a successful homestay, students feel like genuine citizens in the place in which they live and study, making them much more likely to be active citizens and helping to bridge the ‘town and gown’ gap. In short, if they feel connected, they are more likely to contribute.   

Increasingly, the concept of community has become a differentiator when it comes to the marketing of international education. Institutions are striving to achieve a sustainable international student experience alongside a sustainable reputation through placemaking: capitalising on local assets and creating physical places that promote community participation and connection. A well-run homestay programme will complement institutional missions around civic purpose and the free exchange of ideas by furthering engagement and bringing comfort and security through membership of a like-minded community. Homestays offer a deeper kind of experience where you get to know a place through meeting locals and hearing the stories that shape them. They also offer a unique and memorable way for short-term international students to develop their language and learning skills, meaning that students are more likely to reflect fondly on their experience in years to come when members of their alumni community. 

#4 – Increased impact 

It is not difficult to see how homestay programmes can positively impact a far greater number of people than might initially be assumed, including the host’s relatives and friends, schools, business environments and the communities whose lives are touched by contact with international students and by the friendship they offer.  

Exploring how best to capture this wider impact is important to counter concerns that may be raised at a time when institutions are looking to do more with less. Experiences can be difficult to quantify, but the potential for homestays to help generate stories and achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is great. 

Barriers v Benefits: Weighing Challenges Against Lifelong Benefits 

Homestays are not without challenge, and the shortage of homestay places compared to demand is often cited as a cause for concern that must be balanced with affordability, quality and location. Paying competitive rates plays a crucial role in attracting new host families, but this must be balanced with the need to recruit hosts with motivations aligned with institutional goals. To deliver true value, a homestay programme must reflect modern life, requiring staff commitment to developing a network that prioritises collaboration and co-creation while truly reflecting our diverse societies in terms of profile and character. When well-planned and when hosts feel appreciated and compensated fairly, homestays offer a solution that helps foster ‘everyday multiculturalism’, through both micro-level encounters and daily activities.  

That said, some aspects of family life may not always seem convenient to newly arrived students. For example, not all hosts live within a mile of campus, and some have work-structured routines - meaning that students must occasionally navigate previously unforeseen experiences such as commuting or eating dinner at specific times.  These challenges can be overcome with investment in thoughtful allocation processes and by ensuring students are fully prepared for the experience by discussing how and why a match was made. Institutions can manage host commitment and their readiness to receive students by organising events to recognise and celebrate their contribution and by creating opportunities for host families to meet and network with each other to share best practice and build an internal support system. 

Whilst it is acknowledged that all programmes carry a safeguarding risk, ongoing monitoring and preventative work will help minimise problems and cultural misunderstandings.  Interventions may be necessary, so students should know how to raise a complaint. However, this should not dissuade institutions from implementing structured and well-managed schemes. Homestays transform students into confident language users by helping to remove the fear of making mistakes. They offer a personalised student journey and encourage learning through experience. As a result, the seemingly routine act of daily living provides a meaningful space for vitality, wonder and culture, while helping institutions address practical housing challenges and accommodate students with flexible study dates.