Just to clear a few things up, there's a difference between a peaceful campus and a dilapidated run down campus. Yes it's pretty quiet especially on weekend in fact it's a ghost town, but it's the worst looking campus I have seen out of maybe 100 or so. The campus was designed about 60 years ago (part of it by a prison architect) or so and it shows. there's no money spent on general upkeep or landscaping and it's incredibly drab. when it rains, mud runs rampant and renders much of the campus unwalkable. Not being a jerk but if you found it inspiring, you need to visit some more campuses. The university of phoenix online campus looks much better, smaller but better.
About rent, a lot of these guys are international students so unless you get a car you can forget about off campus housing because the campus is isolated and there's nothing around for miles. Also I'm not sure if craiglist is the solution. On campus, you're looking at 700 at least and off campus it's probably more. There are very few apartments off campus in general. Long island housing is very expensive especially towards the port jefferson direction and food prices are also very steep.
the reputation of the program is sadly out of their control. it's best subject is pure math by far and still many serious math students have never heard of it or think of it as being on the fringe of top 30 or worse. that's due to a combination of their location and overall reputation. Usually you want to find a program with good personal fit but with stony brook, I'd have to say tread carefully if you have other funded offers. It looks pretty obscure even if you look for work in nyc where it's saturated with ivys and other international brand names.
only redeeming factor is you can hop on the train and be in new york city in 2.5 hours, which is what 80% of the school does every weekend to escape their misery.
there's about 100 other complains easily but i don't want to rent
if anyone else has other funded choices other than stony brook, seriously visit before you decide. all the domestic students i know there are miserable. The international ones sadly don't know any better. Don't think of all this as an attack but just a friendly suggestion.