Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Rental cohousing?

[R Philip Dowds (rphilipdowds]

Whoa, what a question.  I guess it depends on how you want to define 
“cohousing”.

One can certainly imagine a residential property where most or all tenants have 
signed up for the communitarian values of sharing, participation, empathy, 
reciprocity and equivalence — the values at the core of the cohousing 
enterprise.  (Imagine, Yes; instantiate, maybe not so easy.)

But if one also imagines that cohousing includes self-determination and 
self-management of the commons, it’s not immediately clear how to sync this 
with tenancy.  Who decides how and when to renovate the common house?  Who 
decides to add or retire amenities like photovoltaics or an irrigation system?  
Who screens for new tenants, how?  It’s hard to imagine a landlord delegating 
such powers and duties to the tenants.  What about the view, held by some, that 
legitimate cohousing properties must be self-developed by the future occupants, 
the "burning soul” founders who have the time and money to learn how to be 
developers?

Single family, condo, coop, ecovillage, cohousing, ownership, rental, limited 
equity, etc: There are many, many ways to configure the residential lifeway.  
Trying to agree on which can be labeled “cohousing” may be a fruitless task.

Thanks,
RPD

> On Jul 11, 2024, at 5:40 PM, Karen Gimnig Nemiah <gimnig [at] gmail.com> 
> wrote:
> 
> My memory is that in the past I have run across examples of all-rental
> cohousing communities somewhere in Europe.  Specifically I think I remember
> a community that was half owner-occupied and half rentals and maybe the
> landlord was a government agency related to affordable housing?
> 
> Does anyone know of the example I'm half-remembering and could point me to
> it?  Or any other single-landlord rental model.  To be clear, I'm not
> looking for examples where a handful of homeowners rent their homes - I
> know of lots of those.
> 
> Thanks for your help!
> 
> In Community,
> Karen Gimnig Nemiah
> 678-705-9007
> www.karengimnig.net
> Scheduling Calendar <https://calendar.app.google/xyZbYtyvgq4vfVpT9>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
> http://L.cohousing.org/info
> 
> 
>