Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Development Phase

[R Philip Dowds (rpdowds]

I certainly agree that the most of us in cohousing are here, in part, because 
we aspire to an ideal of knowing our neighbors, and caring about them.  It is 
not improbable or undesirable that this will sometimes translate into a 
reciprocity of assistance that is not customary for a typical neighborhood 
street.

But we are now long past the special difficulty of bridge loan financing that 
comes with trying to build a new house without selling the old house.  Our 
problems today our different ones.

One is that we clearly have households of greatly differing financial 
flexibility.  Hey, this is Cambridge, Massachusetts — one of the most 
expensive-to-live-in cities in America.  It will always be a financial 
challenge for young families with (or hoping for) babies to come live with us.  
And one of our repressed secrets is:  Some of our current households imagined 
that cohousing would be "inexpensive" relative to the alternatives — but this 
is not really the case.  They now find that — somewhat similar to those who 
first benefited from, but were eventually punished by, subprime mortgages — 
their housing budget is over-stretched, and their ability to contribute further 
to community resources is really not all that great.

At the bedrock of Difficult Conversations we arrive at sex and money — in our 
case, of course, it's money.  For some reason, I hoped that our public, 
communal ability to talk openly about the really hard stuff would be better 
than that of other small groups of which I've been part.  So far, this is not 
yet been the case.

On the other hand, this year we blessed a Harvard team putatively expert in 
conflict resolution doing a case study project with us.  Maybe that will pry 
something loose.

RPD

On Sep 22, 2011, at 12:47 PM, Sharon Villines wrote:

> 
> 
> On 21 Sep 2011, at 8:52 PM, R Philip Dowds wrote:
> 
>> 
>> At Cornerstone, some individuals and groups are financially supportive of 
>> other individuals — although the details of this are mostly, and 
>> appropriately, kept out of public view.  Fine by me, and yet ... I am 
>> personally uncomfortable with this sort of person-to-person subsidy.
> 
> It isn't a subsidy — its a loan with all the proper papers signed. 
> Development in cohousing is not the same as walking out, looking at a house, 
> selling yours, and buying a new one that the bank can have appraised. 
> Cohousing is not a secured loan until it is built and the money has to be 
> there before that even begins to happen.
> 
> People may have to put in $20,000 before they have sold their house or when 
> they are young and don't have $20,000. Many people only have money in 
> retirement accounts where it is not available for withdrawal in large sums. 
> There are all kinds of situations where a private loan or even a joint 
> purchase allows a household to invest when they can't write a check tomorrow.
> 
> The day we had to have 33 contracts attached to checks for 10% of the 
> purchase price was announced with 48 hours notice. If we hadn't been able to 
> get all the checks by 6:00 on Wednesday, we would have lost the land. I 
> personally couldn't get funds out of my mutual fund that fast. A member 
> loaned me the money. The treasurer handled the paper work. Others did similar 
> things. Not everyone has parents who can loan them money.
> 
>> So what it boils down to is that some friends of so-and-so make private 
>> deals of support — ones which usually involve a return on investment.  It is 
>> not clear to me what this has to do with cohousing. 
> 
> In cohousing the group is investing in a group venture — a real estate 
> project and a living situation where they have or expect to develop 
> relationships. It's a time full of idealism and hope but also intense 
> interdependency. You have to hit that 70-75% target on time or no one wins. 
> It's all or nothing. You need that household with minimal funds but long term 
> viability or no one gets anything.
> 
> Since move-in we have had other instances of helping people buy. Two renters 
> were helped by other members to figure out how to buy — the financial 
> ramifications and tax benefits — and found a friend who was willing to handle 
> their mortgage on the support of other homeowners. I don't know if they 
> cosigned the loan or not. The two renters bought the unit complete with a 
> renter who had been renting the second bedroom 3 nights a week.
> 
> Another household needed to "move up" to a larger unit. I don't know the 
> details but the selling household helped them in someway — probably selling 
> at a lower price and holding a second mortgage since they were retiring and 
> didn't need the money for a new purchase. Monthly income was what they needed.
> 
> These are private arrangements but can happen in cohousing because people 
> know each other and "we know where you live." No one is moving out in the 
> middle of the night without anyone knowing about it!
> 
> Sharon
> ----
> Sharon Villines
> Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
> http://www.takomavillage.org
> 
> 
> 
> 
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