Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: site location/size and children (was Households to Adults Ratios)

[Eileen McCourt (emccourt]

The experience we have had at Oak Creek Commons, where we own our land and have 24 of 36 households on board, is that it is much easier to attract families when more is know about the home prices (farther into the project as the costs shape up) and when the horizon is in view.  The beginning of the project required a very high risk tolerance, as well as equity investment of 100K+ from several members.  The families with children we are attracting at last (and we want more families with children, too) are, in general, (and there are exceptions), buying their first home and working hard to scrape together the money needed.

 

Another issue for families is location.  Our project is located in the Central Coast area of California.  The job opportunities are not like the urban centers of Los Angeles and the Bay Area, from where 17 of the 24 member households hail.  Early on we concentrated our recruiting in the Bay Area, because we were following the money to keep the project alive, and because local Central Coast recruiting efforts were not very successful, which I again attribute the level of risk early on.   The folks from these two urban areas are couples and individuals who are planning to retire, single women over 50, empty nesters, and a few younger folks, but none of these households have children living at home. 

 

I think these people (of whom I am one) are making a fundamentally different choice to move 200 miles away to a completely different economy, than are local families who are already integrated into the local economy.  Now we are concentrating our marketing and recruiting efforts on the local area, and focusing on family and kids events to get the word out.  The local marketing effort is geared to attracting families with children.  All of the member families with children are from the local area.  These people are already working in the local economy and will not have to think about how to live on a much lower income when they move into Oak Creek Commons.  The 3 families with kids that we have attracted are increasing the draw for other families.  

 

So, all this leads me to say that families tend to come later in the project cycle, after the location is selected, and closer to construction, when the risk is lower.

--eileen

Eileen McCourt
emccourt@mindspring,com
Oak Creek Commons
Cohousing in Paso Robles, CA
http://www.oakcreekcommons.org

-----Original Message-----
From: cohousing-l-admin [at] cohousing.org [mailto:cohousing-l-admin [at] cohousing.org]On Behalf Of C2pattee [at] aol.com
Sent: Saturday, April 28, 2001 6:20 AM
To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
Subject: [C-L]_site location/size and children (was Households to Adults Ratios)

here's my question - do you see a relationship between your location/site
size and the number of children in the community?  i ask because our greater
hartford, connecticut cohousing group has just two families with children,
and would like to attract more.  we are presently looking for a site, and its
size and location have mostly been related to economics and geographic
preference.  anybody got any opinions on the relationship between site
location and size, and attracting families with children?

Christine Pattee
Greater Hartford CT Cohousing
c2pattee [at] aol.com

In a message dated 4/27/01 1:01:54 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
cohousing-l-request [at] cohousing.org writes: