Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: how to meet rising expenses

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

On May 16, 2013, at 7:18 PM, S Fassnacht <fassnach [at] ssc.wisc.edu> wrote:

> We at Village Cohousing in Madison Wi are now in the process of trying to 
> come up with creative ways to meet the rising costs of maintaining our 
> community.  Our buildings are going on 14 years old and it seems like quite a 
> few things have needed repair or replacement in the past few years.  Coupled 
> with this are the rising costs of energy and services.  The way we have met 
> these additional expenses in the past has been to raise fees.  But we are an 
> economically diverse community, and there are some members who have made it 
> clear that they cannot afford another fee increase.  We are interested 
> learning if other communities are facing similar issues, and if so, how they 
> have dealt with them.


Yes to having the same issues and no to having solutions. We have good reserve 
funds to cover expenses for replacement and major maintenance but there seem to 
be more and more things that need to be done. On top of that, our property 
values have increased which means people moving in are young professionals who 
work 60 hours a week, go away on weekends, and generally have social lives 
outside the community. They are very active in a number of ways but are not 
willing/able/interested in taking on major projects like getting the buildings 
painted, resurfacing the parking lot, etc. These are jobs that require 
learning, bids, and oversight. 

Those who have done this since we moved in are tired and aging. Enough already! 
So people are interviewing management companies to do this for us. We've always 
had financial managers but not facilities management. The costs are great to 
have people do this. We are still waiting for bids to come in but the last 
management company charged $100 an hour for this -- and didn't supervise 
onsite. It's the onsite stuff that really has to be done well.

Frankly, my feeling is that the chickens are coming home to roost for not 
having an enforced workshare program so people would move in with different 
expectations. I'm not saying the new people are not working -- they take on a 
lot of work. Just not the big facilities maintenance jobs. 

It's only a few households that moved in 2-3 years after we were built who are 
empty holes in terms of work. 

Sharon
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Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org