Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Seeking potential co-owners

[Craig Ragland (craigragland]

See interspersed thoughts...

On Jan 10, 2008 6:55 PM, Marty Maskall <mmaskall [at] pacbell.net> wrote:
>
> Some of the interested people have mentioned the idea of sharing to me.  If 
> we can facilitate that, it helps us all.  So Joani -- what's the next step?

Engage in dialog like this... and join with others to make it real. If
you are seriously interested for yourself, rather than abstractly
interested in the idea for others, then you might...

- offer a portion of your cohousing home for sale
- ask the forming cohousing group you are a part of if is supported
within your group
- post online inquiries expressing your interest in buying a portion
of a cohousing home
- ask the cohousing community you want to "buy into" if they support it
- ask Coho/US to explicitly support the idea using its resources (and
suggest ways to make it so)

> -- Marty Maskall, Orangevale Cohousing, near Sacramento, California ( 
> www.OrangevaleCohousing.org)
>
> Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008   From: Joani Blank <joani [at] swansway.com>
>
> So I'm wondering if anyone has purchased a 2, 3 or more-bedroom unit
> in a cohousing community and owns it with another individual or
> couple as tenants in common.
>

I Googled "tenants in common" and cohousing and found a number of
references, including several cohousing groups that explicitly address
the idea in their FAQs, etc.

> If it appears that this is not happening or not happening much, I'm
> wondering if I should suggest that that Cohousing Association's
> website's Market Place Classified make available an ad category
> called something like.  "Seeking potential Co-owners" to help folks
> find others who might like to purchase a unit with them as Tenants in Common.

I like the idea. After we launch the new website (targeted for
1/31/08), it will be easier than ever for us to add new categories. So
I guess another possibility for the list above is to ask to place a
classified ad to find others.

> Does this seem feasible or am I overlooking some obvious reason why
> it's not a good idea?

I think its a great idea and I know I'm not alone. In our recent, Dec
2 Webinar on Financing Cohousing Projects, Katie McCamant shared her
curiosity about why tenants in common wasn't more common in cohousing.
She talked about what a natural fit shared housing and larger
cohousing units seemed to be.

> Joani Blank

Craig Ragland
Coho/US Exec. Dir.
www.cohousing.org