Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: "Like Minded People" & Resales

[lilbert (lilbert]

This is all very interesting, but I think it would be more helpful to 
actually answer questions that people have asked to the list. Isn't that
what this list is for? Hello?

Nobody has written a word about resales. I was going to, but thought it
might not be very helpful, since we've had great luck with very little
effort on our collective parts. But since everyone else seems to be
cloistered in their ivory towers...

We have no hard and fast rule about who our members can sell to. We don't
really have a legal leg to stand on anyway. What we have done is let people
sell to whomever they wish, with the understanding that the group will help
with sales. This has evolved to be more helpful than it was years ago. We
now have a membership committee, and we didn't used to. We had abandoned it
after we moved in, for lack of energy and interest on anybody's part. But we
felt the need to start it up again, because there were a few families who
were selling at the same time, and there was a certain amount of tension
around that. The committee is a sort of adjunct to the website. The way it
has been working is that people contact me and I refer them to the committee
(of which my husband is a member, so there isn't a whole lot of bureaucracy
involved here!), and they answer any questions about our community and our
units for sale. If they are interested, they can set up a tour. Really,
since we got the website up and running, we've had no shortage of interested
buyers. Often, however, their unit size needs don't happen to be what we
have available. What has happened is that the homes we have sold have either
gone to another member already living in the community or one of the
"hangers on" that we already know. There used to be another group trying to
build cohousing downtown, and it fell apart for complicated reasons. We have
been cannibalizing those members, and have just sold a third house to one of
the former members of that group.

The committee also is in charge of orienting new members and finding a buddy
for them. The buddy helps with any questions the newbie might have and is a
sort of cultural informant so that they get up to speed on our history and
customs. It helps to have someone who they can go to, so that they don't
feel stupid for asking everybody alot of questions.

Another task before the committee is outreach. They haven't done alot with
this yet,(as I said, we've been a little slack because it has been so easy
to sell units so far) but will eventually be coordinating efforts with
another coho group that is located out in the suburbs in terms of marketing.
The hope is that a coordinated effort will yield more members for both
groups, since those not interested in city life will be referred to the
other group and vice versa.

My suggestions would be these: a website really gets alot of response, and I
think every group should have one. You should have either a person or a
committee in charge of membership and marketing so that sellers feel
supported in their endeavor. That way they are much less likely to sell to
just anybody out of desperation. There also needs to be an understanding
from the start that people will do their best to find good cohousers for the
homes should they sell. (Perhaps one of the questions you might ask
prospective members before they are allowed to join?)

One thing I forgot. A former member, who was never quite clear on the whole
thing, tried to sell with a realtor with disastrous consequences. She ended
up selling for far less than the house was worth, and not to anybody her
real estate agent found. It was another member of the defunct group.

--
Liz Stevenson
Southside Park Cohousing
Sacramento, California
----------
>From: "Hans Tilstra" <tilstra [at] smartchat.net.au>
>To: Multiple recipients of list <cohousing-l [at] freedom2.mtn.org>
>Subject: Re: "Like Minded People"
>Date: Sun, Jul 16, 2000, 1:18 PM
>

> Gary Yontef (Gestalt theory) once pointed out that language is inherently
> inexact, contrasting it with what people do. It's good communication
> practice to check out with the actual person using the term what they mean
> by it. Interesting conversations are often closer to the "vaguely
> significant" rather than the "specifically irrelevant".
>
> ;-) Hans
>
>