Re: The popularization of the term Co-housing
From: Elizabeth Magill (pastorlizmgmail.com)
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2016 13:21:47 -0700 (PDT)
This conversation is quite confusing!!!

I think an HOA is the board for a condo. Certainly my cohousing community, 
organized as a condo, has an HOA.
However a group of people is legally organized, I think it still can be 
cohousing.

I think that an ecovillage is a description of a way of having an environmental 
impact. Surely there is nothing preventing an ecovillage from also being 
cohousing.

Some of these thigns listed are “not necessarily” cohousing, but that doesn’t 
mean they are “not” cohousing.

-Liz
Mosaic Commons Cohousing in Sawyerhill Ecovillage in Berlin, MA.
www.ecclesiaministriesmission.org
www.mosaic-commons.org
508-450-0431




> On Oct 24, 2016, at 8:13 AM, R Philip Dowds <rpdowds [at] comcast.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> Condos, HOAs and co-ops all exist at the pleasure of State enabling 
> legislation, and the definitions and rules for each vary from State to State. 
>  For our purposes, however, a key distinction is how much, or how little, is 
> owned in common:
> 
>  —  Condos often share much in common, especially if they are urban and look 
> like an apartment building.  Commonalities may include roof, walls, and other 
> parts of the weather envelope; mechanical and electrical systems (like 
> central heat and air conditioning); corridors, stairs, and elevators; 
> underground parking; and so on.  The entire outdoors is usually a single lot 
> owned by the association.  Since so much of the property value is owned, 
> maintained and insured in common, annual condo fees tend to be HIGH.
>  —  HOAs, in contrast, own little in common, and often look like single 
> family, duplex or row house homes in a suburban or rural setting.  
> Commonalities might be limited a shared private road, a swimming pool, and a 
> clubhouse.  Much of the outdoors may be partitioned by imaginary lines 
> defining private yards appended to different dwelling units.  Because so 
> little is owned in common, annual HOA fees tend to be relatively LOW.  But 
> each dwelling unit must pay its own separate costs for heat, electricity, 
> insurance, painting and the like.
> 
> Lots of compromises between these two extremes are possible, and successful 
> cohousing can be found in any of the models.  Best I know, however, there is 
> very little State law that formally acknowledges cohousing as a use type or 
> ownership type.  State law is about unit owners, landlords, tenants, and 
> property rights; the States know little or nothing about “intentional 
> communities”, “members", "consensus”, or other attributes distinctive to 
> cohousing.  So cohousing functions in the interstices of the real estate 
> ecosystem.
> 
> Thanks,
> Philip Dowds
> Cornerstone Village Cohousing
> Cambridge, MA
> 
>> On Oct 23, 2016, at 2:02 PM, Beverly Jones Redekop <beverly.jones.redekop 
>> [at] gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Our ecovillage "umbrella" includes cohousing for the residential piece,
>> organic farmland, a riparian restoration zone, and a future commercial zone.
>> 
>> "The overwhelming number of cohousing communities are HOA Condos or Co-ops."
>> How do other stratas (Canadian term that I believe is equivalent to
>> American HOA) include the fact of cohousing in your legally-filed strata /
>> HOA documents? We need to follow state/provincial regulations, but these
>> legal papers shouldn't mislead purchasers into thinking that it's a regular
>> strata.
>> 
>> On Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 8:37 AM Ann Zabaldo <zabaldo [at] earthlink.net> wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> Hello Ty —
>>> 
>>> My guess is this topic will get a lot of mileage on this list.  I’m just
>>> going to address a couple of things:
>>> 
>>> ...
>>> 
> 
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