Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Renters

[Kevin Wolf (kjwolf]

At 08:19 AM 2/1/98 -0600, Ed Cynewski wrote:
>In the breif time that I've been subbed to the list, I've noticed that
>renters are the exception rather than the norm in Cohousing communities.
>Any feedback about experience with renters in this type of housing would
>be much appreciated.

Ed

Almost every house in the N Street community started as a rental.  This
neighborhood was and is known as having among the lowest rental rates in
town, the most student rentals and least number of owner occupied homes.
Startiug here allowed us to have many lower income people be part of the
community.  

Six of the houses in the community were bought from their landlords by
tenants in the community.  By negotiating directly with the owner and not
through a real estate agency, our community members cut an average of 3%
off the house price.  

Five of the houses in the community are still rentals.  The cost per room
in these houses are among the lowest in town.  The landlords seem to be
willing to keep the prices lower because they know they have a good deal in
no tenant problems, lost rent etc.   

We haven't done a study of it but I wouldn't be surprised if over the last
ten years, especially during the first 5) N Street has had among the lowest
average adult income of any co-housing community.  (This not so true now
that more of us have moved up in our professions, and we don't have as many
students.)  

It seems intuitive that by going the retrofit route in a lower income
housing part of town, there is a much better chance of having the cohousing
community be composed of lower income people.  

Kevin 
Kevin Wolf & Associates    - Consensus Facilitation
724 N Street               - Strategic and Watershed
Davis, CA 95616              planning
kjwolf [at] dcn.davis.ca.us     - Internet development  
Phone 530-758-4211         - Stanislaus Stakeholder proccess
Fax   530-758-2338           
http://www.dcn.davis.ca.us/go/kjwolf