Cohousing-L Mailing List: Apportionment of Common House Costs <fwd>

[Fred H Olson WB0YQM (fholson]

Message author:  TC.CORNELL.EDU!ANARRES!GAARDER   Steve Gaarder
Posted by the COHOUSING-L sysop. (after several days delay - sorry)


We (EcoVillage of Ithaca) have come to one of the Great Questions:  how
to divide the costs of common house maintenance and operations.  (We
will also hit, quite soon, the question of the cost of common house
construction.)  The question is whether to divide common house costs
evenly among the units, or make it proportional to the number of shares
attached to a house (which is proportional to square footage). 
Arguments made for the latter (by shares) include:

1.  Larger houses usually have more people, which means more common
house use.

2.  People whith larger houses have more money invested, and thus should
pay more.

3.  Dividing by shares helps keep the smaller units affordable.

Arguments for dividing by unit include:

A.  People's use of the common house varies widely, so household size is
at best only loosely related to common house use.

B.  Dividing by unit is simpler, and avoids arguments over who uses the
common house more. 

I'd like to hear what other groups have done, or are considering.
Thanks!

Steve Gaarder
gaarder [at] anarres.ithaca.ny.us

--
Fred H. Olson       fholson [at] uci.com         Amateur radio: WB0YQM
1221 Russell Av N,  Minneapolis, MN  55411  voice: (612) 588-9532      
Sysop of COHOUSING-L listserv & gopherspace (gopher: uci.uci.com)