Cohousing-L Mailing List: Silicon Valley, CA new construction retrofit cohousing

[Fred H. Olson (fholson]

This is a reply to two messages posted on Jan 18-19 by Jasmine Gold
<juturna [at] ix.netcom.com> with the subjects:
New Home Developments
New Home Developments/Finding People Quickly
 
I decided to change the subject line to to be a bit more specific tho it
was hard to find anything short that would summarize this proposal which
is (my interpretation):
 
A cohousing core group would buy as many units as possible in a new
conventional development that has a somewhat cohousing-like layout.  It
appears that Jasmine does not anticipate getting cohousing oriented
households to buy ALL or even a high percentage of units in the
development.
 
Hmmm another variation on the theme.
 
This brings to mind thoughts on difficulty of getting into cohousing /
alternatives that I seem to hear so often.  I often hear from folks
something like 'We'd like to live in cohousing but it does not look
possible now '. Often due to cost.  But also feasiblity is related to
cost and finding other people etc etc.
 
I've made a couple starts at specific responses and found it difficult.
The possibile ways it might work out are numerous but hard to evaluate
- much depends on how many people are willing to buy in but the individual
household's decision whether to buy in depends (in addition to their
preferences and situation)  on how many other people are willing to buy
in.

Ack, it gets very 'iffy'.
 
I guess I'd suggest enumerating a handful of "what if's" and then ask
everyone you know or can contact which of those situations they would be
interested in. The what-if's can probably be easily ranked in a rough
order of desireability related to how many people buy in. Each what-if
should have a cut off date.
 
Some example scenarios:
A Whatif we have 18 hh ready to buy in the 23 unit area on March 1.
B Whatif we have 12 hh ready to buy in the 23 unit area on March 1.
C Whatif we have 12 hh ready to buy in the 12 unit area on March 1.
D Whatif we have 6 hh ready to buy in the 12 unit area on March 1.
 
If 18 households say yes to A you do it if only 17 say yes they dont.
If none of the whatifs get enough people to make them possible you dont do
any of them.  

This way everyone knows what they and others are committed to doing.
Note that in some ways it is easier to get people to sign on for the
larger group scenarios since it is easier to say yes to a more
successful proposal and since it is only a committment if it is
successful.

Fred

--
Fred H. Olson  fholson [at] cohousing.org    Minneapolis,MN   55411  
(612)588-9532  Amateur radio: WB0YQM          List manager of:
Cohousing-L  See http://www.cohousing.org and Nbhd-tc --  Twin 
Cities Neighborhood issues list.  See http://freenet.msp.mn.us