Public · Buffalo, NY

SUNY Buffalo State University

5,066 full-time students in fall 2024 and college-controlled housing for 1,983: about 39.1 beds for every 100 full-time students. The other 3,083 live somewhere the college doesn't control. That is the outer edge of the private market, before you take out commuters and students living with family.

1,983 college-controlled beds (39.1 per 100 full-time) 3,083 full-time students beyond them
6,188total students, fall 2024
5,066full-time
$9,024typical housing charge, 2024-25 academic year
$17,158aid office off-campus food and housing budget

Enrollment

Of 6,188 students enrolled in fall 2024, 5,255 were undergraduates and 933 graduate students. 5% studied exclusively online, students who don't need a bed near campus. Headcount fell by 282 from fall 2023 (−4.4%).

Housing the college controls

IPEDS counts 1,983 beds of institutionally controlled housing for 2024-25. That figure is the school's own capacity, on or off campus, so it includes halls the college leases or manages but not private buildings that simply market to students. Capacity shrank by 799 beds from the year before (2,782 in 2023-24).

What students pay

The typical 2024-25 housing charge for a student sharing a room was $9,024 for the academic year, roughly $1,003 a month spread over nine months. Food added $7,070. For aid purposes the school budgets $15,986 for food and housing on campus and $17,158 for a student living off campus away from family, $1,172 more.

Those are the college's own figures. Private by-the-bed rents near campus can sit well above or below them, so check current asking rents before you underwrite a project.

How lenders read a campus like this

At 6,188 students the campus is below the 10,000-student minimum in Fannie Mae's Multifamily Guide for Dedicated Student Housing (Part III, Chapter 1, section 103.01). Freddie Mac has no stated enrollment floor, but its own product summary says most of its student housing loans are at schools with 15,000 or more students. Banks, debt funds and conventional multifamily programs are the likelier lenders here.

To size a specific property, use the student housing loan sizer. It works by the bed and shows which constraint sets the loan.

Among the 65 New York campuses on this site, SUNY Buffalo State University ranks number 36 by full-time students beyond college housing. See the New York table.

Other campuses in Buffalo

Source: Fall 2024 enrollment, IPEDS DRVEF2024 (provisional release, December 2025); 2024-25 housing capacity and charges, IPEDS COST1_2024 (December 2025); IPEDS HD2025 directory (July 2026). Beds per 100 and the gap are arithmetic on those figures.
MeasureValue
Total enrollment, fall 20246,188
Total enrollment, fall 20236,470
Full-time students5,066
Undergraduates (full-time)5,255 (4,703)
Graduate students933
Exclusively online5%
College-controlled housing capacity, 2024-251,983
Capacity, 2023-242,782
Beds per 100 full-time students39.1
Typical housing charge, academic year$9,024
Typical food charge, academic year$7,070
Aid budget, food and housing on campus$15,986
Aid budget, food and housing off campus$17,158
All first-time, full-time students required to live in college housingNo
Combined food and housing charge (if not split)not reported

IPEDS unit ID 196130. Erie County. School website. Figures are as the institution reported them to the National Center for Education Statistics. The live-on question asks whether every first-time, full-time student must live in college housing; a school with exemptions or a later-year requirement can answer no. How this data is built.