Cohousing-L Mailing List: Responsibilities of absentee landlords - anyone with expertise in creating online, interactive courses?

[Pare Gerou (paregerou]

Hi Sharon and All,


Very interesting question.  While not common in the US, there is no reason
a community cannot legally restructure itself to maximize recruiting,
orienting, and preparing new members better – regardless of whether they
are renters or owners or subletters of absentee landlords.  The distinction
in the US between renters and owners is sometimes used as a proxy for a
discussion about level of commitment or proper orientation and preparedness
for community.  As far as I can tell, the latter is what people seem to
care most about, and we are trying a different approach.



In our community, people own shares in the entire village LLC company, and
they own a leasehold in their unit.  The community legal entity remains an
LLC after move-in.  This legal structure better reinforces cohousing
collective self-management, including reinforcing the membership circles'
authority to provide strong membership outreach, orientation, and
preparedness.  The closest thing the US has is a legal condo association,
but that structure has its limitations.


Reorienting the entire community for genuine "jurisdiction and authority"
over getting and orienting new members enables consensus and sociocracy to
thrive, and it prevents the usual attempt to shoehorn orientation into a
largely private buyer/seller legal transaction, hoping for the best.



If that information seems too distant from orienting new renters or
subletters to you- because of our structure, we can enforce attendance at
and plan to have a robust set of orientation sessions or mini courses for
each new buyer.  This is in addition to the usual attendance at a meeting,
a meal, a welcome packet, a signed equity contract, required consensus and
sociocracy training, and things other cohousing groups do. Since we
continue to operate as an LLC after move-in, we see it as a necessity for
doing collective business together that we are all on the same page going
in.


We would love to make the orientation mini courses more interactive and
less lecture style.  If another group has an interest in creating an
online, interactive, mini courses for their orientations, we would love the
company and expertise of any of your members who know interactive course
platforms.  *Anyone with a background in creating online courses or
interactive content out there interested in talking?*


Pare Gerou

www.GreekVillageCohousing.com