Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: 1 Bedroom unit at Cornerstone

[Diana Carroll (dianaecarroll]

To be fair, this is not a cohousing issue.  Cornerstone is located in a
very popular neighborhood in the very expensive Boston, MA metro area. I
did a quickie search for one-bedroom condos nearby and $550k is fairly
typical (on the high end of average). This IS unsustainable...it's a HUGE
issue in the Boston metro area, that everyone is aware of. But it doesn't
reflect cohousing per se being expensive. :(

It's why we (Mosaic Commons, Berlin, MA) developed out in the boonies -- no
way people most our group could have afforded to acquire land closer to
Boston.

(Not that WE are affordable either, other than our few mandated subsidized
units. Sigh.)

D



On Tue, Jan 28, 2020 at 11:16 AM Sharon Villines via Cohousing-L <
cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:

> > We are pleased to announce that the lovely one-bedroom apartment at
> Cornerstone Village Cohousing is on the market at a lower price: $555,000.
> This 575-square foot apartment is on the first floor.
>
> No reflection on Cornerstone at all, but this is an example of why I chose
> “Sustainable Cohousing” as the name for the effort to focus on the
> development of low-cost cohousing.
>
> These prices are not sustainable for at least half of the kinds of people
> we attracted to cohousing 10-20 years ago.
>
> I am working on a blog post now on income levels in the US. _Half_ the
> population earns _less_ than an average income of $30,000 per person
> annually. That is derived from indirect figures which I will explain, but
> even if these figures are off a few thousand on the low side, cohousing as
> we know it is not sustainable.
>
> This price is $965 per square foot. To purchase this apartment would
> require an annual income of $1,397,000 using the guideline of 2.5 x the
> price of the house to qualify for a mortgage. Or someone has to have a lot
> of money just sitting around. And probably rich parents. If my calculations
> are off—very possible—please let me know.
>
> A $30,000 income would qualify for a $75,000 mortgage.
>
> Since utilities and services are paid with additional monthly condo fees,
> adjusting the price to give credit for cohousing extras is not very
> relevant.
>
> This is expensive. Yes, it is Boston. These are Manhattan prices — though
> Cornerstone is much nicer than this apartment for $555,000 in Manhattan
> would be.
>
> Think about it.
>
> Sharon
> ——
> Sharon Villines, Washington DC
> SustainableCohousing.org
> _________________________________________________________________
> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
> http://L.cohousing.org/info
>
>
>
>