Why woudl anyone join a cohousing group? | <– Date –> <– Thread –> |
From: Bob's Cohousing Mailbox (cohowings.network.com) | |
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 1996 12:45:26 -0500 |
I've been lurking on this list a while, and a number of questions have come to mind which possibly the list can answer. A) Why would anyone join a cohousing group? Having twice visited our local (Monterey) cohousing group, and having lurked here for over 18 months while our family contemplated its future, I am left wondering why anyone would join a cohousing group. The basic idea, of ecological and socioeconomic benefits to be garnered by joining a cohousing community, quickly becomes overshadowed by the reality of the situation. Cohousing groups seem to work their asses off for years in order to get started, only to live in properties that are (as far as I can tell) overpriced, smaller than similar stand-alone properties of the same value. In addition to more expensive interior square-footage, the land where one can live is also usually restricted, whether it's a community courtyard or open acreage to one side of the housing. Of course, Monterey could be an exception, but the photos I've seen of other properties seem to bear this out: Monterey is hemmed in by a busy street on the south, a precipitous hill (almost a cliff) on the north, and rental apartments all around: not the kind of place I want my 18-month-old tottering about. This is not to slam Monterey, but to illustrate the concerns which our serious co-housing search generated. Additionally there's the aspect of the work involved: not only is setting up such a venture incredibly daunting, but the ongoing maintenance seems rather intense as well: meetings and maintenance parties seem to be the rule. I am not against these things per se, but it seems that the end result of cohousing is 1) more work and less time, 2) more expense for the privilege, 3) less space to live in. Also there was a concern of faith -- what if this all failed? What if, whatever group we joined, it just collapsed for some reason? It was hard to imagine where we'd be in that case: homeless, with our money tied up in some collapsed cooperative? Finally, an aspect aside from everything else is the need to integrate into a tightly-woven community. In the case of Monterey everyone seemed very nice and all, but there was a clear sense that this was a team. Now that's not BAD, mind you, in fact it's great -- but there was a concern on our part that coming in after all the hardest work was done would leave us as "outsiders" among a core-group which had been justifiably forged by the experience of setting up the place. Those were some of our concerns generated by studying cohousing in general, and our only local site in particular. B) Why would anyone reading this mailing list want to join cohousing? Recent flame-fests as well as frequent posts about the work involved seem very discouraging to the casual reader like myself. Questions regarding "how to solve disputes," mediation, filtering out potential members, and the whole awful "diversity" thread are not very encouraging. When we initially looked at cohousing I was very very enthusiastic, and my wife was skeptical but interested. My picture of cohousing was that it would be a little more expensive in the short run, cheaper in the long run due to efficiency and economy-of-scale, involve LESS maintenance because of shared labor (i.e. mow EVERYBODY'S lawn once every two months, rather than mowing my own lawn every week), have greater community, living space, and interactive potential due to shared facilities, and have more facilities due to pooled resources (i.e. the savings on lawnmowers and snowblowers alone would enable the group to purchase photographic or computer or whatever kind of equipments), and more free time to enjoy the community, resources and family. Instead I am left with the perception that cohousing involves more labor; more interpersonal conflicts which place more on the line and take more work to resolve than simply being irritated by one's neighbors; is more expensive and requires more labor; yields less free time and less quality-of-life due to endless meetings and maintenance; places the family at significan financial risk; is hard to get into and out of; and yields what benefits? Please feel free to correct my misperceptions: I am not trying to "dis" cohousing, but I am expressing the perception that long study has yielded for me and my family. Maybe cohousing is just "not for us": maybe I'm seeing it colored in some manner (goodness knows the Internet does not encourage complete clarity). -- Bob Alberti's Cohousing Mailbox coho [at] wings.network.com Network Systems Corp. bob.alberti [at] network.com "My views do not represent those of my employer, although nobody here thinks it at all unusual to cohabitate a common workplace, organize meetings, share resources, and have both private and public spaces."
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Why woudl anyone join a cohousing group? Bob's Cohousing Mailbox, June 19 1996
- RE: Why woudl anyone join a cohousing group? Rob Sandelin (Exchange), June 19 1996
- Re: Why woudl anyone join a cohousing group? Stuart Staniford-Chen, June 19 1996
- Re: Why woudl anyone join a cohousing group? Jim Nordgaard, July 8 1996
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