Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Renters in cohousing

[Stuart Staniford-Chen (stanifor]

Judy asks

> Am I right, the renters at N street are renting from people who happen 

> to own the houses there, as N street started, and aren't involved in the 

> community.  ?

This is correct.  At present, two of our houses belong to absentee  
landlords who have never had any involvement with the community at all.   
In the past the number has been as high as four houses.

>From their standpoint, we're a pretty good deal because we keep the houses  
full with people who are generally more reliable than the average student  
rental household.

>From our standpoint, the scheme has mixed benefits.  Obviously it's  
insecure - the landlord could always up and change his or her mind,  
leaving us without the house.  However, it does mean that our community is  
much more accessible to people of low income.  (I could not have afforded  
to get involved in Muir Commons, but I can here).  It means we get a fair  
turnover of people in their 20s coming through here all the time, staying  
a year or three, and moving on.  My opinion is that this is really  
valuable.  Firstly it means that there are always new and interesting  
people living here, and second it means that we get to send all these  
people out to other parts of the world already convinced of the worth and  
viability of a more communal lifestyle.  


However, whatever the merits or lack thereof, we don't do it out of  
principal, but rather out of pragmatism.  These houses are owned by  
absentee landlords who don't want to sell.  Our choices are either to rent  
from them or leave the fences up.  We don't like fences much here.

Stuart.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Stuart Staniford-Chen           |       Dept of Computer Science
stanifor [at] cs.ucdavis.edu            |       UC Davis, Davis, CA 95616
(916) 752-2149  - work          |               and
(916) 756-8697  - home          |       N St. Cohousing Community
Home page is http://everest.cs.ucdavis.edu/~stanifor/home.html