The University of Hawaii at Manoa has long had an office that assisted students and faculty to find rental housing.

The program’s website provides this description:

The University of Hawaii Off-Campus Housing Referral Program (OCH) is a rental referral service provided by the University. Our on-line listing service is available to the public for listing available rental properties to all students, faculty and staff of the University of Hawai?i and UH affiliate schools. We have a variety of information regarding renting in Hawai?i to assist the university community in finding suitable accommodations.

Our website serves as a primary resource for all University of Hawai?i students, faculty, and staff who are searching for, or offering, rental properties. To access and view our listings you must be a current UH student, faculty, or staff member. To use our on-line listing service, members of the university community will be prompted for their valid UH username and password. You may also contact us with your questions, suggestions, or concerns anytime.

But the office is now set to shut down at the end of the year.

According to the website:

Due to changes to our services and the rise in resources providing rental referrals, the Off Campus Housing Listing Service will officially shut down on December 31, 2017.

A friend in Manoa emailed several university officials upon hearing the news.

To Whom It May Concern-

I am an EWC Alumnus and long time ( 53 years) Manoa resident. For several decades I have made 2 rental units I have on my Manoa property available to UH and EWC affiliated students and faculty significantly below market. As we all know, housing is especially scarce and often ruinously costly in Honolulu, especially in the Manoa/University area.

One uniquely valuable resource for landlords and more importantly UH and EWC affiliated students and faculty has been the Off Campus Housing Office , long located on Dole Street. This morning they have posted a notice that the office will be closing permanently on Dec. 31. When queried about why they made this decision, I was told that there had been to many complaints about their web site so rather than repair or upgrade a simple web site, they decided to close the office. That makes about as much sense as deciding to shoot the patient because he has a cold as opposed to giving him some aspirin.

If this office does in fact close, it will end the only portal available to the many members of the UH and EWC community who seek housing in a very limited and costly market and simply reinforce the notion that Honolulu is just too expensive with to few housing alternatives available to attract quality students and academics to the UH and EWC community.

I hope that you can take measure to insure that this valuable resource is not lost.