Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Construction Loans

[Dick Margulis (dick]

On 1/31/2020 12:21 PM, Dean smith via Cohousing-L wrote:

> There was a suggestion (ok, I make it) in one of the workshops at last spring’s 
> Cohousing Conference in Portland, OR, that the movement could benefit from federally 
> guaranteed construction loans.  In much of Europe, governments give grants to start-up 
> cohousing projects.  The idea was that we lobby HUD to establish funds to at least guarantee 
> loans.  There would need to be some basic requirements to qualify for guaranteed loans 
> (Cohousing.org <http://cohousing.org/> might be able to help with that).  This would 
> relieve confusion within banks about how to deal with cohousing loan requests.  What do 
> people thing?  Ideas?  Downsides?  Upsides?

A hard lesson learned about accepting government involvement: Budget for 
twice the highest estimated construction cost, because red tape will eat 
up half of whatever you borrow.