If you’re new to USC, or unfamiliar with the off-campus living situation, you’ll soon learn that pickings can be slim if you haven’t reserved an apartment six months in advance. Don’t panic yet! Check out these interesting living quarters before you consider a cardboard box.

In 2010, Amy Woodell, a fourth-year retail and fashion merchandising student, returned from a summer mission trip in a slum of Lusaka, Zambia, which changed the course of her life. The Cary, NC native had long dreamed of a fast-paced life in the New York City fashion industry, but the widows and children she met at an orphanage began to consume her thoughts.