Apartments will be reserved in the Married Student Housing complex for foreign students and others who do not arrive in Cambridge until autumn, the University announced yesterday.

It was reported last week that all apartments would be rented to students on a first-come, first-served basis. But the University believes that such a policy would guarantee full occupancy by the spring before the new academic year.

L. Gard Wiggins, administrative vice-President, said yesterday that Harvard is anxious to provide living quarters for married students from foreign countries who particularly never get to Cambridge until a few weeks before classes start.

"Because of language and color problems," Wiggins said, "these students already find it very difficult to obtain satisfactory living quarters in Cambridge." He indicated that a major function of the new complex is to provide suitable apartments for them.

The University has already sent a questionnaire to each graduate school dean asking for an estimate of the number of these "hardship cases" the dean expects. Wiggins said that "as many as 100 apartments" might be set aside for these students and not rented until the fall.

Every student applying for an apartment in the fall will be required to present a letter from his dean affirming that he is a "hardship case." Such students will be virtually assured of getting apartments in the Project.

All other students will be assigned apartments this year on a first-come, first-served basis, but Wiggins said yesterday that "this is a brand new venture for Harvard and we will keep very close records. If one graduate school has so many married students that they take an unfair proportion of the apartments, some adjustment will be made next year."

Wiggins also announced that 22 of 60 new apartments have been leased already for February occupancy. He stressed that rental rates in the complex are virtually the same as prices in most of Harvard's other married student housing projects.

In the Botanic Gardens, the International House, and Haskins House, one-bedroom apartments rent for $100 to $145 a month. All three buildings are vastly oversubscribed, Wiggins said. Rents in the new Project for one-bedroom apartments will range from $105 to $140 a month.

According to Wiggins, the greatest demand thus far for the new Project has been for one-bedroom apartments