Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Cohousing investors and securities law

[Kathryn McCamant (kmccamant]

Dear Jim,

I don't think most cohousing groups are trying to "avoid" securities
laws.... Much the opposite. I know for a fact that your community, PDX
Commons, has engaged a well respected real estate attorney to advise your
group on exactly what they need to do to make sure they meet the
requirements of securities laws in Oregon. That being said, cohousing
communities tend to be small groups that are very involved in the project
they are investing in....likely much more involved than your typical real
estate investor. In CA, there is an exception from the requirement to
register a public securities offering if you have 35 or less non acredited
investors. This works well for most cohousing groups.

I do recommend doing all you can to avoid the costs of paying an attorney
to write up a public securities offering to explain to you, the cohousing
community members, that real estate development is risky. You can save a
lot of money by just being very clear with people before they join to make
sure that they understand that real estate development comes with lots of
inherent risks and that they could lose all there money. Nothing under the
radar there. 

And, of course, every community should consult an attorney that knows
their states laws,as they tend to be a little different state to state.

Respectfully, 


Katie 

-- 
Kathryn McCamant, President, Architect
CoHousing Partners, LLC
241 Commercial Street
Nevada City, CA 95959
T.530.478.1970  C.916.798.4755
www.cohousingpartners.com







On 1/6/15 1:36 PM, "Jim Swenson" <swensonian [at] gmail.com> wrote:

>
>Can someone point me to the legal theory that allows contributions
>from initial cohousing equity members to avoid state and federal
>securities regulations?  I've done a lot of searching in the
>cohousing-L archives and found precious little talk - probably for
>good reason.  But, with the amount we are investing in our project, we
>are not quite comfortable with the "just don't say anything - fly
>under the radar" approach. I'd appreciate any thoughts either directly
>to me or to the list.
>Thanks.
>Jim Swenson
>PDX Commons Cohousing
>Now 50% subscribed
>pdxcommons.com
>swensonian [at] gmail.com
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