Re: Rentals and aging in community
From: Sharon Villines (sharonsharonvillines.com)
Date: Thu, 7 Apr 2011 08:53:04 -0700 (PDT)
On 7 Apr 2011, at 11:03 AM, Richart Keller wrote:

> By more age divesity, do you mean more young families?

The whole age group of 20-30 is missing from most cohousing communities because 
they are not yet ready or able to purchase homes. The young families may be 
able and want to lease a whole unit but single, unpartnered people in this age 
group would be happier and better able to afford studio apartments. Some are 
happy as roommates but this is the age where most are looking for independence. 
Cohousing is by definition more interdependent so to both live in what is 
essentially an extended family and share a unit with older people who have been 
able to afford to purchase doesn't provide the opportunity to develop 
independence.

We had a young man living here who was a roommate childcare provider who was 
about 21. Most roommates and au pair workers don't participate in the 
community, but he was quite independent and participated a great deal, even 
taking on governance issues. It was nice to both have his perspective as a 
person who had taken for granted a lot of sustainability and relationship 
issues and have the opportunity to educate him about cohousing and what it 
means to be financially and personally responsible for a maintaining a 
community.

If we educate this age group, the ideas about cohousing will spread more 
dependably.

Sharon
----
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org





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