Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: fire and safety hazards from hoarder

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> On Sun, Apr 21, 2019 at 3:53 PM Fern Selzer/US/CA/95003/NBC via
> Cohousing-L <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:
>> 
>> I have been searching in the cohousing-l  archive for something on these 
>> topics and couldn't find anything.   Has anyone had the experience in their 
>> community in dealing with a hoarder?    The people who have seen it think 
>> it's a fire hazard and also looks dangerous for the person living there for 
>> a variety of reasons.   There are rats there also.

There will also be cockroaches, if there aren't already, and once those get 
started, it’s all but impossible to get rid of them. If you have attached 
units, everyone will be infested.

You can call social services and ask for help. In all likelihood the problem is 
much larger than just collecting lots of stuff or never throwing anything away, 
and it will probably get worse. The Mayo Clinic has an article explaining 
hoarding disorder.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/hoarding-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20356056

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