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Research on the linkages between student migration and residential change in university towns and cities has mainly focused on neighbourhoods with deeply engrained and relatively mature expressions of studentification. Limited attention has been given to neighbourhoods that are in the process of being studentified or experiencing the preliminary, trend-setting flows of student inmigration. As a result, there is limited understanding of the pace of local demographic change and population restructuring in studentifying neighbourhoods. To these ends, this paper analyses the term-time addresses of students in Brighton, UK, between 2006UK, between /2007UK, between and 2008UK, between /2009. A volatile residential distribution of student populations is revealed. We explore the factors underpinning these shifting student geographies by focusing on a specific neighbourhood undergoing profound population transformation during the period of study. This allows us to reveal how studentification unfolds 'in situ', shedding light on the rapidity of population and demographic restructuring that is mediated by the conversion of family-dwelling houses to student Housing in Multiple Occupation. Our findings are pertinent to recent planning policies to engineer balanced populations and housing markets by regulating the (over)production of student Housing in Multiple Occupation in university towns and cities. More broadly, the paper serves to demonstrate the value of adopting a longitudinal approach to gathering primary qualitative and quantitative data to track local changes to migration flows, demographic and population structures, and neighbourhood transformations.

Rising concern about the negative impacts of students on 'host communities' has triggered debates about the consequences of studentification in the UK. For some commentators, purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) appears the panacea for studentification, as it offers the potential to reintroduce balance to studentified communities by redistributing student populations in regulated ways. This paper explores this contention, drawing upon focus groups and household surveys conducted in the vicinity of a PBSA development in Brighton, UK. The paper concludes that the location of this development in a densely populated neighbourhood has engendered adverse student/community relations, conflict, feelings of dispossession and displacement of established local residents. It is asserted that future developments of PBSA should be mindful of these issues and their implications for questions of community cohesion, quality-of-life and belonging in established residential communities. These findings are discussed in relation to debates of age differentials, segregation and new-build gentrification.

Pre‐existing literatures on post‐student migration have mainly focused on inter‐regional flows of young educated migrants, the attendant redistribution of human capital around the UK, and the impact on local and regional economies. This paper argues that the parochial focus on labour‐motivated graduate migration (usually to first employment), and the absence of data enabling individual migration histories to be traced longitudinally across the post‐student phase of the lifecourse, has masked the complexity of the patterns and processes of migration in this social group. Drawing upon recently collected primary data from a retrospective survey of the migration histories of a cohort of students who left the University of Southampton (UK) between 2001 and 2007, this paper reveals that post‐student migration trajectories are complex and precarious across the 5‐year period after leaving university. During this prolonged period of instability, the parental home (and parental support more generally) provides a crucial safety net. This begs questions about the impacts of post‐student transitions to financial and residential independence on the resources and intergenerational care exchange frameworks of contemporary mid‐life parents (terms such as ‘sandwich generation’ and ‘pivot generation’ refer to the multiple family roles and responsibilities of mid‐life parents who are caught between meeting the needs of their adult children and their ageing parents). It is suggested that the well‐being agenda in migration studies is helpful for refocusing the lens of enquiry on the impacts of return migration to the parental home on graduate migrants, their families, and the potential trade‐offs that might occur between generations. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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