Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Move In Procedures?

[Diana Carroll (dianaecarroll]

If the issue is that the elevator is a bottleneck, then it's absolutely
reasonable to have a procedure. My community (Mosaic Commons, Berlin, MA)
does not. But I moved one of my kids into his college dorm; the dorm was
eight stories and there was one freight elevator and one passenger
elevator, and it did help the chaos of move-in day that the college had
established a procedure for how to use the elevators for moving furniture
while not making the upper floors inaccessible for hours at a time. (For
them it was basically that furniture going UP went in the freight elevator,
and then it was empty for the trip down, so that it was faster; people
going down should take the "accessibility" elevator if they needed it for
accessibility, otherwise walk.

Obviously, you aren't going to have 100 college freshmen all moving in on
the same day. But you probably have a single elevator and you want the
building to be usable by all residents, even while a move is occurring. And
move-ins are not a one-time event. If you have thirty units, you'll have
thirty move-ins in the first few months, and then move-ins of individual
families many times over subsequent years. If every move-in means that the
upper floors of your building become inaccessible during the move, that's a
real issue that needs consideration.

Although we don't have elevators and we don't have documented move-in
procedures, we do have some community norms that we should probably
document so we can communicate them better, e.g. where people should park
their U-hauls to minimize impact on neighbors, that if people want help
from the community they should send email ahead of time, that it is helpful
to announce when the move is to make sure the pull-in areas are clear of
parked cars, etc. But even if we had written them down, they wouldn't help
you, because they are all very specific to our site plan and
community culture.

Diana

On Fri, Oct 2, 2026 at 2:57 PM Katie Henry via Cohousing-L <
cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:

> Hi Ann,
>
> Community move-in is a one-time event. It's unlikely that anyone will have
> written procedures. You realize what you did wrong when it's over, but
> you'll never do it again, so why bother documenting it?
>
> You need people who understand the buyer priority for closing (financial
> or other reasons) and people who know construction status and move-in
> logistics. For example, in my current community, we needed the cash buyers
> to close first so we could have comps for the buyers who were getting
> mortgages, so we had to prioritize the certificates of occupancy for the
> cash units.
>
> This will be the most stressful and chaotic time in the life of your
> community, even if it's managed well. If you don't have members who can
> coordinate this effort while dealing with their own personal move, I
> encourage you to hire someone for that role.
>
> Katie Henry
> Heartwood Commons - Tulsa (Oklahoma)
> https://www.heartwoodcommonstulsa.com/
>
> ------------------------Ann Lehman wrote:
>
> Hi Folks,
>
> The Berkeley Moshav is getting closer to move in. If you have move in
> procedure, especially if yours included using an elevator can you send me a
> copy?
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