Balch Hall Reviews

Pros:
very nice location - located near two bus stops so very convenient. also located next to louie's food truck (perfect for grabbing a midnight snack)
BIG rooms! very spacious! (the first floor rooms are MUCH smaller than the upper floors)
sink rooms (there are no sink rooms on the ground floor tho)
quiet - good for studying
right on top of Carol's cafe

cons:
no AC
quiet - err no social life
bathrooms can get quite nasty / smelly
walls are super thin and the hallways are quite echo-y (no bueno if you're gonna be ~frisky~)
lots of bugs - have fun getting used to killing them
sometimes can get depressing
some girls can actually be really disgusting - in my year, someone left a bag full of pee in the kitchen trash
friends said that th...See more

There were ants on my 6th room floor... how did they get up there? Really spacious rooms, possibly the largest singles you have on north campus. Location is really convenient to get to central campus/the bus. The elevator is jank as hell though and so is the building overall. It's an old building so don't expect too much insulation either, I had to use a portable heater to survive winter. No A/C.

Riding the elevator is by far the most exciting activity on campus. Put that together with the desk chairs that easily and suddenly tip backwards and the friendly spider companions in the bathroom, and you have the recipe for a perfect dorm!

The rooms are huge unless you're in a forced double/triple. The forced rooms are still spacious enough. Quiet dorm, lots of singles. Building is so old that they can't replace the missing window screens because the company that made them doesn't exist anymore. Unfortunately, this means large, chitinous bugs and moths for the warmer parts of the year, especially if you live on the lower floors.
Bathrooms and water fountains on each floor. The bathrooms are maintained and stalls should be clean unless your floormate has gastrointestinal issues... The showers are curtained. Water pressure was like being softly drooled on by a camel (bad), and occasionally the water refused to warm up.
Each room shares a sink room with its neighbor. It's a coff...See more

Overall I liked my room and it was the closest dorm to classes. However, it was very antisocial and I only made a few friends on my floor. There are 4 general common rooms rather than 1 for each floor which made it hard to meet the people living near me. If you are looking to make friends with the people on your floor, Balch is not the place for you but it is a very quiet and pleasant living space overall.

I lived in North Balch in a double on the ground floor. Rooms are generally bigger than the other dorms, but it can vary. Ground floor doubles are pretty big but some singles are bigger. There are definitely some unlucky closet-sized rooms scattered throughout the building. Many rooms had a personal sinks or a shared sink room although mine didn't have one. Some rooms even have private baths but most people will be using public bathrooms.The interior of Balch is okay but definitely needs remodeling (fortunately that will be happening in 2020/2021). The windows in the rooms lack insulation and the heaters can malfunction. Bathrooms tend to be pretty old and gross. A lot of showers are leaky and certain bathrooms lack hot water. Balch has fou...See more

Personally, I loved Balch. It is a unique and historic building with beautiful lounges. I got lucky with my room as it was big and had a great view of the courtyard. Cons are that the walls are thin if you have noisy neighbors and there are occasionally spiders or stinkbugs.

Some pros: great location with 2 bus stops in close proximity so it's easy to get to classes and back home from ctown late at night w/o worrying about walking a lot in the dark. relatively quiet. cute lounges but they're pretty old and smell kinda weird. huge plus is that tatkon center and carol's cafe is right downstairs so it's convenient to get a quick snack or study with friends there. bathrooms can get super disgusting if you live on a floor/unit with a lot of girls.

some cons: elevator for south balch was broken for more than half of the school year (hard to bring heavy packages and laundry up many flights of stairs). no air conditioner. huge beetles, spiders, stinkbugs, flies, etc. can get in easily thru its windows that barely clos...See more

Pros:
- great location! not too bad of a walk to class or to nasties. also there's a bus stop literally right outside of balch and buses come around every 15 minutes
- everyone was pretty nice in my unit
- weekly snacks from the RAs
- the rooms are huge (if you're not in a forced triple like i was)
- kitchens for every unit
- Carol's Cafe!! loved being able to walk downstairs in my PJs to get coffee during finals week
- heating was so good during the winter

Cons:
- every time you shower you gotta kill a few bugs + hair everywhere in the showers
- i'm serious i got so fed up w my unit's bathroom that i went across the hall to the other unit to shower. i found out that the girls in that unit went /downstairs/ to shower bc they couldn't s...See more

I lived in a single freshman year and my room was not only super spacious but also came with a private sink. Most of my friends would hang out at my dorm because of the size.

Balch is also very quiet and makes for a great place to study. Some units are older than others though and the elevator takes some time to get used to.

Balch is also very convenient in terms of location. It’s the closest to campus and to the bus stop, but a bit far from the dining halls. It’s also right above the Tatkon center, where you can study or go to the cafe.

Overall, I loved my time at Balch and would recommend it. It’s a bit old, but definitely has its charms!