We are a small-town, multigenerational EcoVillage on 7.5 acres in Port Townsend, WA, a historic seaport of 10,000 residents. We have a core group of a 42 active participants: 30 adults and 12 children, most of whom live on site. All the residential sites have houses completed, but we occasionally have rental units available.
Residents share ample common gardens, fields, woods, a large 3,600 square foot shop/art/recreation center. We have extensive food gardens, and are currently building our Common House, which should be finished in 2024. We use some of our best land to grow food using permaculture, restorative agriculture principles, and other organic methods, and may develop cottage industries. We embrace and seek diversity and are especially glad for the broad range of ages present among us.
We share meals and celebrate solstice and other diverse earth and life cycle days together. Fun and connecting activities happen often – recent examples: crafting time, singing gatherings, gifting circle, food preserving, as well as ongoing garden and construction work.
Structured as a Home Owners Association, most of our members own their own lots and the homes they built on them, and thus have access to mortgages, federal tax deductions and tax credits for renewable energy and energy efficiency initiatives. HOA members collectively own a large 2-kitchen home with 4 bedrooms and one of the lots on which there are 3 tiny houses.
We offer tours once a month prior to our monthly community meeting on the second Sunday of each month, and can sometimes arrange for a tour on another date. Email us to arrange a visit!
We are a 34-unit cohousing community located within walking distance of a lovely Sierra Nevada Foothill town. Over six of our 10 acres are dedicated to open space. The community was initiated by architects Katie McCamant and Chuck Durrett in 2002; the first residents moved in in 2005.
We are 85 people altogether: 59 adult members, 26 kid/young adult members. This includes many elder members (55+), 10 single adult households, and 16 households with kids.
Our community has many sustainable features, including photovoltaic solar for every home and the common house, sustainably forested lumber in the construction of buildings, passive cooling (air conditioning only in the common house), and hydronic heating systems for very energy-efficient, healthy homes.
Wise Acres is a cohousing community of nine member households. We are comprised of teachers, programmers, artists, farmers, cooks, entrepreneurs, and craftspeople. We are children, adults, elders, and pets.
Each member household owns title to a 1/3-acre lot, as well as an equal share in the 13-acre forested greenbelt, large and abundant organic garden, orchard, hot tub, sauna, community house, etc.
We also have several rental options – a yurt, 2 1-bedroom attached apartments, 1 2-bedroom detached ADU, the more options currently under development. Please contact us to see what might be available currently.
The group shares dinners twice each week, regular meetings, and spontaneous trips to local mountains, movies, beaches, etc. There are no required political or spiritual affiliations. We are individuals and families inspired by the riches gained by committing ourselves to actively participate in community.
This distinctive condominium cohousing neighborhood near Bremerton, Washington, offers quality reasonably-priced living an hour away by ferry from Seattle.
Meadow Wood is reminiscent of a New England village, nestled in a gently sloping pasture, bordered by a creek, surrounded by tall trees and nature trails. Yet it is located on a bus line and is less than 10 minutes from the Bremerton and Silverdale urban centers.
The layout of the site balances a desire for personal privacy with the social dynamics of a friendly, inter-generational community. We’re dedicated to bringing out the best in each other, through active listening, mutual respect, an appreciation of differences, and honest caring. Community decisions are made by consensus. There is no single leader, no pooled income, or other required communal practices. Residents either own their units, or rent from others who do. We are committed to an equitable stewardship of the land and resources, with a commitment to uphold the dignity of each person.
New Brighton Cohousing is an owner-occupied townhouse community, located at 6010-6034 Soquel Drive in Aptos, California, less than one mile from the beach. It was was established in the fall of 2007 when we purchased a townhouse complex.
Currently we are a community of 17 adult members, 5 children, 3 cats and 2 dogs. About half the community works or has worked in social services and the other half in education, the sciences, healthcare, and planning. Our ages range from 2 months to 81. We enjoy each other’s company and share a common interest in living responsibly.
The property consists of 11 individually owned 2-story townhomes in 3 buildings, and one 1600-square-foot common house, all situated around a central courtyard. Our common house has a kitchen, indoor and outdoor dining areas, a children’s room, and two guest rooms.
Community amenities include two group meals per week, two guest rooms, dining and meeting spaces, indoor and outdoor children’s play areas, and a small community garden and orchard.
Our community is designed, owned, and managed by the residents. Membership requires participation in meal preparation once a month, active participation on a committee and an affinity group as well as participation in quarterly community-wide work parties. As much as possible, we do the maintenance and upkeep of the property ourselves.
Yulupa Cohousing is a 29-unit cohousing community set on 1.7 acres in Santa Rosa, California, located an hour north of San Francisco in beautiful Sonoma County. We moved in during July 2005. We frequently have turnover, so contact us if you’re looking to buy or rent in this area. Units include studios, one, two and three bedrooms, and one large four-bedroom high rise unit!.
We are a diverse, intergenerational community. Our values include:
* Diversity and Acceptance
* Learning, Growth and Innovation
* Communication
* Environmental and Ecological Consciousness
* Spirit of Place
* Privacy
* Larger Community
These values are manifested through social and work activities, shared meals, encouraging creative expression, committee participation, consensus decision-making and open hearts. We seek to provide mutual support, inspiration, warmth, and openness to each member in a way that nourishes many generations.
Yulupa Cohousing was designed by architect Michael Black, who designed two other cohousing communities in northern California. This is his most colorful, playful, and innovative design. Our green features include solar panels for the Common House, bike sheds, radiant floor heating, energy efficient windows, and passive cooling from concrete flooring on ground floors.
Common areas include a large common house with kitchen, dining room/multipurpose room, kids’ room, laundry room, and library/movie room. Also on the property are a guest room, exercise room and a workshop. A garden area is on site, and people sign up to garden in a plot. We have monthly garden work days and take pride in our many fruit trees, landscaping and gardens. We were honored to be part of the 2020 Eco-friendly Garden Tour in Sonoma County. Check out the video of our sustainable gardening practices on our website!
Our community is a friendly place where there is always something going on – birthday celebrations, game and movie nights, readers’ theatre, book group, community meals and more.
Please visit our website for an introductory video and to view floor plans, read current member bios, our values statement, and more.
River Rock Commons is a cohousing development of 34 homes and a 2500-square-foot common house, located in the “Old Town” area of Fort Collins, Colorado, next to a large city park.
Local amenities include Lee Martinez Park, on 50+ acres with tennis and basketball courts, softball fields, playground, picnic areas, and a working demonstration farm. The Cache la Poudre River borders the park, with natural areas, trails, and wildlife. The Historic Downtown District is five blocks away, with restaurants, shops, galleries, museum, post office, city and county buildings, public library, Lincoln Center performing arts center, and TransFort transit hub. We are 11 blocks from Colorado State University and within one hour of Poudre Canyon, Arapaho & Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee Grasslands, Lory State Park, Horsetooth Mountain Park, Horsetooth Reservoir, Cache La Poudre Wilderness Area, Comanche Peak Wilderness Area, Rocky Mountain National Park, and Denver.
Oak Creek Commons is a cohousing community dedicated to creating a sense of community through joint activities and meals. Our homes are on 4.4 acres, with adjoining 10 acres of California oak woodlands. We have thriving gardens and an orchard. Community members built a children’s play structure and contributed to building a workshop. We have common meals two days a week, as well as Saturday-morning bagels and TGIF parties. In addition to enjoying pool and spa, we have big meals for Thanksgiving and solstice and have a (more or less!) fabulous 4th of July parade.
Many members are highly active in local sustainability and other green efforts, and some are politically active locally. We welcome having more children in the community.
Paso Robles, the site of Oak Creek Commons, is a charming and growing town of 29,000 in the heart of the Central Coast wine country (as in the movie “Sideways”). We have bright clear sunny days most of the year. We are midway between San Francisco and Los Angeles and 30 minutes from Pacific beaches on the coast. There are great bicycling and hiking opportunities nearby, as well as a large amateur arts community, good musical opportunities, and many interesting activities year-round, such as antique car shows, wine and olive festivals, a country fair, etc. Our community is surrounded by a countryside of gorgeous rolling hills with vineyards, oaks, wild grasses, and a springtime wildflower heaven nearby. We are 27 miles from the “big city” of San Luis Obispo, a charming college town (California Polytechnic) with fun shops and bistros.
Higher Ground is comprised of 39 single-family homes on seven acres about three miles east of downtown Bend. The community was planned to provide maximum open space for meadows, play areas, pond, trails, and vegetable garden. Our common house was the original farmhouse on this property, and we completed a large new dining/kitchen/recreation addition. People choosing to buy or rent these homes are interested in a socially supportive environment for themselves and their families. Many homes have been constructed with innovative environmentally responsible building materials. We share general maintenance responsibilities, and find this to be a valuable component in building community. We also take conflict resolution seriously and periodically provide positive opportunities for personal growth.
Cobb Hill (www.cobbhill.org) is a community of people who are exploring ways to live that are ecologically, materially, and socially sustainable. Built in 2001, our community comprises 23 energy-efficient homes, a working farm and dairy and a number of member-owned agricultural enterprises: award-winning cheese, frozen yogurt, mushrooms, maple syrup, and sheep. Our 260-acre property includes a large common house, barns, hiking and cross-country ski trails, a managed forest, pastures, sugar bush and gardens. Homes feature solar hot water, passive-solar orientation, green building design, a central wood-burning system, and high-speed internet.
Our community is intergenerational, with ages ranging from babies to 80s. Kids love having a playing field, their own art area, acres and acres of woods to explore, and the opportunity to learn about farming through 4H. Adults have fun here too, with frequent community dinners and lots of social events: open mikes, an annual prom, special dinners, singing, campfires, and frequent impromptu gatherings. Our decision-making is by consensus, and we have a very strong informal mutual support system (we take care of each other). A few of our residents are retired; the rest practice a variety of professions including forestry, sustainability nonprofits, homemaking, medicine, farming, cheesemaking and high tech. Serious about trying to live more sustainably, both in our infrastructure and in our lifestyle, we look for members who share our interests and intentions and who will be active participants in community life.
Cobb Hill Cohousing is located just 20 minutes from Dartmouth College and from one of New England’s premier medical centers. This is a vibrant area where the arts flourish and outdoor recreational opportunities abound. Excellent schools and a healthy, safe environment make it a great place to raise children. Here are some links showing the wide range of opportunities in our local area: hop.dartmouth.edu, northernstage.org, dailyuv.com, vitalcommunities.org, uppervalleyfood.coop, uvtrails.org, osher.dartmouth.edu.
-Altair currently consists of seven families who have invested in the project, five other member families. (up to House #10 committed on paper). We follow the traditional Cohousing model, but are more of an EcoVillage. We are looking to build 29 town houses and duplexes, two- and three-bedroom units. We have purchased an 8 acre site in Kimberton village and have purchased homes adjacent to the open land to ensure we have access. The Township wrote an Overlay Ordinance that will allow us to build a sustainable ecovillage – cluster homes, Common House, pedestrian walkways, remote parking, and reduced parking. We are looking to submit our site plan for approval early in 2024, and hope to break ground Winter of 2024.
-We generally hold two meetings a month – a Social and a Members business meeting (usually third Sunday). We are soliciting new members and friends to help with the pre-approval costs. Members intending to live in the EcoVillage can invest as a Managing Member, their funds capitalized and earning a modest ROI, applied toward the cost of their home.
-Our goal is to build certified Passive Houses with close to net-zero energy heating and cooling. We will also use the Green Building Council’s SITES v2 Guidelines for ecological low-impact development.
-We anticipate having another Getting-it-Built workshop in the Spring of 2024. We have had design retreats for the site, Common House, and housing designs, and will have another design workshop to finalize the landscaping of the site in Jan or Feb 2024. We have contacted banks and foundations to help with the funding.
-We will be an age-restricted community, with 20% of the homes’ head of household under 55. We have an experienced developer, architect, Passive House consultant, mechanical/electrical engineer, and an energy consultant for the EV’s and solar energy work. We are finalizing a land planner. Our Construction Manager will build the project. We have a PA registered non-profit to create a funding stream to support various initiatives (ecology, electric cars, etc.)
-At the moment, we are taking reservations. You can visit our website or contact us by email or phone.
Our community is a part of downtown Cotati, California (population 6,700). We are a typical cohousing community in that we are not organized around any particular religious, economic, political, or lifestyle focus, other than our intention to create a neighborhood that by its physical design and social structure facilitates community.
Our community houses 30 families (including singles, couples with and without children, and single parents) in townhouse-style attached homes. Our common house includes a kitchen, dining room, guest rooms, children’s room, and a workshop.
We’re a little different from many cohousing communities in that we were required by the city of Cotati to include 6700 square feet of retail space as part of our development. We decided to keep ownership of this retail space as a community. We now live next door to a handful of small businesses, which are locally owned.
Community dinners and workdays are a part of our lives. Our key policy decisions are made by consensus, and we meet once monthly for two-hour business and community-development meetings.
Our group formed out of the old Acacia Cohousing Group in Santa Rosa, California, a group which started meeting in November of 1994. The current group came together in the late summer/early fall of 1998, and in January 2000 we found a 2.3 acre parcel of land in downtown Cotati. With the help of the Cohousing Company (Nevada City, California), and our developer, Wonderland Hill (Boulder, Colorado), construction was completed and residents began moving into their new homes in 2003.
Hundredfold Farm is a 14-household rural cohousing community in the Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, area. The members of this multi-generational community are learning together as they explore the art of living in a sustainable way. The cohousing model is characterized by private dwellings, clustered housing, pedestrian-friendly design, and extensive common facilities. We promote sustainability with organic community gardens, active and passive solar components in our energy-efficient homes, and an innovative wastewater treatment facility that recycles water to our homes.
.
Some goals of Hundredfold Farm:
• To function together in a rich, supportive manner so that everyone will flourish.
• To provide an alternative to the loneliness that pervades our individualistic society.
• To own and manage the common land jointly while owning our own private homes.
• To cluster the homes in order to reduce the impact on open space and agricultural land.
• To produce a significant amount of our own wholesome and healthy food using sustainable practices.
• To be a community of tolerance, open to everyone regardless of age, income, ethnicity, sexuality, or family situation.
Site features:
• An interlacing of native woodland, fields, pond, walking paths, and hills.
• The upper plateau of our 80-acre property offers a 180-degree view of the surrounding area.
• Community organic garden plot on site since 2001.
• Existing eight-room, two-bath historic common house with a second-story wrap-around veranda overlooking the pond.
• Our vision for the site includes gazebo, sauna, meditation spots, treehouse, and other communal gathering spaces.
• One hour from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
• One and a half hours from Baltimore and Washington, DC, metro areas.
• Within a one-hour drive of 10 college and university campuses.
.
Single-family homes and eco-site plan:
• High quality, energy-efficient single-family homes.
• A village concept of the 14 homes balancing the need for privacy with opportunities for spontaneous social interaction.
• A pedestrian greenway between the homes that can be used by emergency vehicles if need be.
• Two convenient parking areas located at the perimeter of the housing cluster.
• All homes are of passive solar design. with PV and solar hot water.
• Innovative community wastewater treatment and recycling system.
The mission of Bellingham Cohousing is to work together to create a diverse multigenerational neighborhood of 33 homes on the historic Donovan Farm site. We intend to be supportive of one another, share resources, and strive to be stewards of the land. We aspire to collaborate with the larger Bellingham community to build housing for mixed-income households.
Bellingham Cohousing is a living situation that requires considerable neighbor participation. Bellingham Cohousing residents dedicate as much as 20 hours per month attending committee meetings, planning meals and community activities, and working on community projects.
Although Bellingham Cohousing is a supportive community, it is not designed or intended to be an environment for individuals needing therapeutic levels of attention or care.
Bellingham Cohousing offers many opportunities for neighbors to develop and foster a sense of community through:
Optional common meals several times a week
Working together on projects around the site and in groups and committees
Managing our community together through consensus-based decision-making
Community-wide celebrations of major life events: Already we have had 2 weddings and fantastic birthday celebrations
And…casual discussions, book groups, salon-style discussions, a regular mid-morning coffee klatch, barbecues and potlucks, performances and talent shows, impromptu dinner concerts, and other shared activities ranging from shopping expeditions to sea kayaking and backcountry skiing
Arcadia is a pedestrian-oriented residential cohousing community on 16 acres of wooded land. Thirty-three individually owned homes are clustered on five acres around a centrally located common house. The remaining land held in common includes woods, pond, stream, organic gardens, outdoor play spaces, and the common house with kitchen, dining area, guest rooms, playroom, office, laundry room, and storage areas. The majority of homes have a passive solar design and the common areas are handicapped accessible. We are located near rural areas about three miles from the towns of Carrboro and Chapel Hill.
This is a diverse, multigenerational, cohousing community of caring neighbors in a tranquil, safe environment one mile from downtown Prescott, Arizona. Northern Arizona’s only cohousing community.
Cascadia Commons Cohousing is a community of 26 homes and a common house located in a pleasant suburb six miles southwest of the center of Portland, Oregon. We were self-developed over the period beginning with our incorporation as an LLC in 1995 (after a couple of years as a talking group). Construction was completed in 2001. We continue to develop as an “second-generation” community.
We occupy 2.9 acres of land, of which approximately half is legally designated wetlands and wetlands buffer that is required to be maintained in a natural state. Our homes are a mix of renovated townhouses, and newly constructed flats and townhouses. We are a quarter of a mile from good bus service to the center of Portland, a 35-minute ride. It takes about 10-15 minutes by car.
Our current residents range in age from 3 to 85. We are a mix of singles, single moms, couples, and families. We are ecumenical as to religion, or lack thereof, philosophy, sexual orientation, dietary preferences, and, at least in principle, politics. We share green values of caring for the earth and its creatures.
We are egalitarian in our governance, using consensus decision making, with provision for breaking impasses, as required by Oregon’s condominium law.
Wasatch Commons balances the traditional advantages of home ownership with the benefits of shared common facilities and ongoing connections with our neighbors. Our community consists of 26 clustered townhouses located on 4.5 beautiful acres near downtown Salt Lake City. Members cooperate to maintain the land and collectively perform the common chores. Most community members own their homes; and a few homes are rented. Go to our Facebook Page to learn about availability or tours. We participate in the annual Cohousing Open House each April. e-mail us at wasatchcommons@gmail.com to learn more.
We have 92 rural acres with 27 clustered lots, surrounded by protected woods and fields. Singles, couples, children, and seniors live in 27 individually designed homes with traditional New England village architecture. For current houses for sale or rent go to our website (www.twoecho.org) and click on “Houses.” The Common House opened June 2005. We are located 15 minutes from downtown Brunswick and Bowdoin College.
Pathways Co-Housing community, located on a 40-acre wooded site, is a short bike ride away from Northampton, MA. It is a place where members’ lives are enriched through the regular sharing of time, celebrations, meals and designated facilities. Semi-private back yards have easy access to walking trails and to Rocky Hill Cohousing, a 5-minute walk through the woods.
Solar panels are sprinkled on some of the roofs and all homes carry the ENERGY STAR label. Our common house offers a place to gather for dining, sharing common interests, ping pong and game night, dancing and parties, and community meetings. The two guestrooms are often used by extended family and visitors.
Kindness, simplicity, and respect for the values and needs of others are our guidelines. We seek to create and maintain a nurturing environment for children that fosters independence and respect for others. We wholeheartedly embrace the diversity of our immediate community and extended community; we endeavor to include and fully support a diverse range of cultures, religions, ages, genders, sexual preferences, classes, and family constellations. We maintain our land and facilities in an environmentally sound fashion, have a community garden, and use consensus as the primary mode of decision-making.
Nomad Cohousing is an 11-unit urban community on a one-acre site, two miles from downtown Boulder. Our common dining area is attached to a community playhouse, the Nomad Theater.. We are adjacent to a small shopping center (market, restaurants, liquor store, cafe, and cleaners), and within a couple of minutes walk of the foothills and Boulder Mountain open space. We are a block from a major bus route.
We are a diverse community, we value difference, We aspire to be aware and respond to our overt and covert biases.
New View Cohousing is a multi-generational neighborhood of 24 households located in Acton, Massachusetts. We share a community building, acres of beautiful open space, and a commitment to living together as a community. The connections and support we have created where we live complement our private lives and our involvement with the larger world.
We are a unique, small community located just outside Minneapolis near lakes and shopping. We value diversity, and have varying incomes. Our 15 households currently include people of ages 7 through 80, singles and couples, with and without children.
Occupations include computer programmers, artists, teachers, therapists, caregivers, scientists, architect, piano teacher, executive director, gardener, and more. Our traditions include parties, campfires, sing-alongs, game nights, house concerts, benefit auction, solstice celebration, etc. Community meals and “co-chats” (spontaneous conversations) are the glue that hold the community together. We self-manage, and value working together.
The community has an abundance of common space, including a large living room, library, kitchen, dining room, three-season porch, four working fireplaces, exercise room, wood shop, laundry room, children’s playroom, and office. Outdoor common space includes lawns with picnic areas, a play area, a vegetable garden, and an acre of woods. The grounds are lovingly landscaped; we often see deer and wild turkeys roaming through our property.
Homes include eight retrofit coop apartments in an American Colonial mansion and seven townhomes built for the community. The two buildings are connected by a tunnel, which removes the weather as an obstacle to getting together. Home size ranges roughly from 400 to 1600 sq ft.
Our community grows from working together and shared experience.
Cambridge Cohousing is a community designed and developed housing project in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We are a group of people of diverse ages, backgrounds, abilities, professions, and lifestyles. We are committed to creating a neighborly and cooperative community in which we know and care about one another. Children can play safely, surrounded by neighbors, and residents know that caring friends are close by. We are committed to the vitality, convenience, and diversity that is Cambridge.
Highline Crossing began forming in 1991 and our community-designed homes were completed in stages between 1995 and 1997.
20+ years have given us time for the trees to grow and for us to grow some of our own traditions. We have put our own spin on an eclectic mix of holiday and celebratory events like our annual OktoberFest, St. Patrick’s Day, and Christmas Eve dinners, our annual Art & Talent Show, and more. Regular events include community meals or potlucks, workdays throughout the year, and of course, community and team meetings!
We are devoted to the principles of participation, shared decision-making, and the development of respectful relationships with our neighbors. We are also dedicated to sustainability – environmental and human. Highline Crossing combines some of the best features of urban living with an old-fashioned sense of neighborhood
Amenities include a community garden with individual garden plots, common gathering areas, and guest quarters in the Common House.
Highline Crossing also offers immediate access to the Highline Canal Trail system (over 70 miles of foot/bike/horse trails, just across a footbridge). There is a wide variety of cultural and sporting activities locally. The community is less than a mile from the light-rail system with easy access to downtown Denver.
Links:
http://www.facebook.com/highlinecrossing
http://www.highlinecrossing.org/
The Los Angeles Eco-Village Intentional Community (LAEV-IC) is a 40-member group within a two-block neighborhood of about 500 people in central Los Angeles. Started as a project of the nonprofit Cooperative Resources & Services Project (CRSP) after the 1992 civil uprisings, our vision is to reinvent how we live in the city. We do this by demonstrating higher quality living patterns at lower environmental impacts while striving to connect the social, economic and ecological systems of our neighborhood.
Those interested in becoming members are required to demonstrate their commitment to more ecological and cooperative living patterns over time. We are a diverse and activist community.
We are organized into the 45 unit Urban Soil/Tierra Urbana limited equity housing cooperative and the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust. We acquired our two buildings and the land from our nonprofit founding organization, CRSP, in 2012. We continue the eco-retrofitting of our buildings started by CRSP in the mid to late 1990s. Recently CRSP acquired a quarter acre property in the north end of our neighborhood which it plans to redevelop into a state of the art car-free mixed use cohousing project.
The community is rich in resources, including an organic produce and bulk foods co-op, an art studio, tool shop, Time Bank, sewing studio, several organic gardens and community meeting spaces, both indoor and out, bicycle shop, plus several home-based business activities. We host a variety of events which also serve the broader neighborhood and the general public.
The LAEV-IC meets weekly and establishes priorities and policies for the buildings, the intentional community, and the neighborhood. Regular community veggie dinners and work parties open to other neighbors, friends, and relatives help glue the community together.
The very dense neighborhood is three miles from downtown Los Angeles, with many public and private schools, colleges, and universities nearby. We are also rich in public transit and bicycle culture, with many green-business development opportunities for those with entrepreneurial spirit.
Several members live and work in the neighborhood. Many are actively involved in social, ecological, and planning issues in the city. The Community and neighborhood are child-friendly.
The downside of the neighborhood is that there is still way too much traffic and pollution.
We provide regular tours, urban-sustainable-community workshops, public talks on a variety of related topics, and affordable accommodations for short stays.
Links:
Los Angeles Eco-Village:
Upcoming events, brochure, practices, photos, bios, links, etc
Urban Soil:
Meeting notes, food co-op, land trust, bylaws, policies, procedures, nuts and bolts of our community
Burlington Cohousing East Village is a lovely community in the heart of the city. We are an example of one path to a sustainable future that includes affordable living, decreased automobile dependence, and harmonious sharing of resources along with ample opportunities for privacy. We nurture people and the natural environment.
Our location is within walking distance from downtown Burlington, the University of Vermont, Fletcher Allen Health Care, and the City of Winooski. It is convenient to live here without a car, although it is OK to have one or share one with a neighbor.
We are a relatively new community; construction was complete in November 2007.
There are 32 private homes in a variety of building types. We have “flats” in a large building with indoor access to our common house, townhouses, a duplex, and two detached single-family homes. All facilities are wheelchair accessible. We are a mixed-income community. Nine of our living units have down payment grants for income-eligible folks; the remaining units are for market rate buyers.
It’s important that you go to our own website: www.bcoho.org
We have a community building for optional group meals (every other day)and many other activities. A large outdoor area is used for outdoor play, socializing, and gardening. The land borders on a conserved natural area with hiking trails through a mature forest.
The residents manage community governance and tasks. Everyone is expected to participate actively. Please contact us to learn more. You should also check our “real” website at www.bcoho.org.
Links:
Burlington Cohousing East Village:
Lots of photos and detailed information
Burlington wins national 1st place award – using Burlington Cohousing East Village as an example of their work.
Cherry Hill Cohousing set out to create a living environment that encourages a strong sense of community, supports our need for privacy, makes life affordable, and provides a secure and enriched setting for children and adults. We have a place where people know their neighbors in a meaningful way, a neighborhood where different traditions and values are respected, and where we can all have a sense of security and belonging. Even after so many years together, we are still a work in progress, continuing to get better and better at living our values and goals.
Our group purchased a 23-acre meadow site in North Amherst where we built 32 units and a large common house, moving in June – September 1994. We built a clustered mix of single, duplex, and triplex buildings on seven of those acres. The rest is field and woods, surrounded by town lands.
Residents own their own homes, as well as a share of the land and the common house. The common house is a place for weeklhy community dinners, meetings, entertainment, and other public and private functions. It includes a large kitchen/dining room, children’s playroom, guest rooms, laundry facilities, library, sauna, exercise room, and recycling center.
We have optional (but well-attended) dinners two nights a week, gardens, play and work spaces, hiking trails, and other shared amenities chosen by residents that have social and economic advantages.
The community is a short walk from a municipal lake; a recreation park with tennis, swimming, and playing fields; a small shopping center; a library; the university; and public transportation.
Muir Commons was the first cohousing community newly constructed in the United States and was modeled after communities in Denmark. After several years of planning, ground breaking took place on November 1990 with the residents moving in during the summer of 1991. Most of the homes were constructed as affordable housing.
Located in the beautiful region of New York’s Finger Lakes, EcoVillage at Ithaca has three thriving cohousing neighborhoods. The village features cooperative dining in the common houses, a swimming pond, neighborhood community gardens, hiking trails, play spaces, eighty-five energy efficient homes, a common house with 15 apartments, all in a multigenerational village-scale community.
The pedestrian village is surrounded by woods and open meadows. We have a 10-acre organic fruit and vegetable farm on site that provides produce for residents as well as the wider Ithaca area, and a 5-acre CSA berry farm that has delicious organic u-pick berries. We also host a 10 acre teaching farm, the Groundswell Incubator Farm, which offers support for beginning, low-income farmers.
Our goal is to build a replicable model of a cooperative, environmentally sensitive village that can also serve as a demonstration site for teaching principles of sustainability and permaculture.
Our nonprofit educational organization, THRIVE, is affiliated with the Center for Transformative Action at Cornell University. In addition to giving tours to over 500 visitors a year, our developing educational program provides hands-on training in community life, building sustainable communities, and green building techniques for building and planning professionals. We have helped to initiate and contribute to a sustainability movement in our locality that is bringing about profound changes in the region.
EcoVillage is located on 170 acres, two miles from downtown Ithaca, and three miles from Cornell University and Ithaca College. Ninety percent of the land is preserved as green space for organic agriculture and wildlife habitat. For more information about EVI, read Liz Walker’s book, “EcoVillage at Ithaca: Pioneering a Sustainable Culture,” New Society Publishers, 2005. It is available from our website.
Mosaic Commons is a cohousing community sharing land with Camelot Cohousing in Berlin, Massachusetts. (Both communities together are “Sawyer Hill Ecovillage.”) Construction was completed in summer of 2009. Available sales & rentals are at http://mosaic-commons.org/forsale
Mosaic Commons includes 34 townhouses and flats, ranging from 1 to 4 bedrooms in size.
Our guiding principles include a commitment to creating a supportive, diverse community; affordability; and environmental consciousness. Our homes are superinsulated, meet many LEED standards, and are built with as many low-toxicity sustainable materials as possible.
We’re committed to open, green space. Almost 30 acres of our land is preserved as conservation land. Clustered duplex and triplex buildings leave most of our remaining 35 acres as open space.
Our community includes ages ranging from 1 to 73; people of many spiritual and ethnic backgrounds; gay, straight and bisexual members; singles, couples and families.
Our Vision & Values
* A Vibrant, Dynamic and Sharing Community
* A Green, Lasting Community
* A Diverse and Inclusive Community
* A Community of Many Voices
* A Supportive and Healthy Community
Berlin is a small mostly rural town of about 2600 residents, conveniently located between Worcester and Boston.
Links:
Mosaic Commons: Available Homes
commons.org/photos’>Mosaic Commons: Photos>
Completed in 1996, Valley Oaks Village is 28 homes on approximately five acres, plus 3 associated adjacent neighbors. We have six different floor plans and unit sizes, attached in varied configurations in a large oval, with a central Common House, lawn, garden, and pool. All are linked by pathways through a park-like setting of oaks and sycamores.
We are located near 3,600 acre Bidwell Park, which serves as a protected bikeway used by many residents to bicycle to and from work and school.
We have an active social calendar with events planned throughout the year. We share evening meals about twice a week and residents take an active role in planning and maintaining the community.
Other amenities include a workshop, arts and crafts room, bike sheds, orchard, gazebos, and tree house. The Common House includes a kitchen, multipurpose dining room, laundry, lounge, game room, and guest quarters (with shower).
Environmental design features include highly insulated homes, solar electric panels and solar hot water for the common areas, drought-tolerant landscape with drip irrigation, recycling and compost areas, storm water swales for ground-water recharge and (soon) EV charging stations.
For residential/membership info, email suevovcohousing@gmail.com or see our web site at https://www.chicocohousing.org/
We are an intentional neighborhood organizing effort in an existing, racially mixed city neighborhood two miles from downtown Minneapolis. We have cohousing-like goals and are currently inactive as a cohousing community but are active as a block club.
Occasionally houses become available. Write to Fred for details.
We have come together to live in cohousing because we believe that people living in community live richer and happier lives. We value the cooperative process of operating our community. In today’s world, many neighborhoods do not serve the supportive function that they did in previous generations. An intentional, collaborative community can contribute to an individual’s sense of belonging and their ability to contribute to the well-being of others and society as a whole.
Structured as a condominium, our 32 units, from one-bedroom apartments to 3- or 4-bedroom two-story apartments and townhouses, are owner-occupied. There are very rare rental opportunities, usually sharing a unit with others. All pricing is in line with the Cambridge real estate market.
We are located in a diverse neighborhood with easy access to public transportation, stores, and open spaces such as Linear Park which adjoins our property and provides for both pedestrians and bikers. The community design maximizes open shared space, including gardens for both flowers and veggies, a playground structure, a large yard for play space and community events, and a patio with grills for shared outdoor meals. Our common house offers a large dining room with a well-equipped kitchen for community dinners as well as large meetings and social events. The building also houses a den, a kids’ playroom, an arts & crafts room, an exercise room, a workshop with shared tools, and 13 apartments.
The community is fully visitable/accessible for mobility disabled persons, both residents, and visitors. All residences have level entries and, in multiple-story units, an accessible powder room on the first floor. All doors are wide enough to accommodate wheelchairs.
The physical design encourages spontaneous interaction. Besides regular resident-prepared community meals, we create community through shared activities, work, play, and celebrations. Learning and teaching skills between members, especially across generations, is encouraged. Interdependence and mutual assistance are an integral part of daily life. Many of us are involved in the neighborhood as well as the wider community. We use consensus as our mode of decision-making.
The community promotes cultural, racial, and economic diversity through a broad outreach, the inclusion of four city affordable units, and a welcoming attitude. We have families with children, singles, couples, and empty nesters.
Cohousing allows for a lighter, less consumer-oriented lifestyle. Economies of scale abound, including the sharing of tools, child care, and guest rooms. We recycle, compost, conserve water, have solar panels and EV chargers, and try to be as environmentally responsible as we can.
Milagro Cohousing is a multigenerational neighborhood of 28 households clustered on eight of our 43 acres in the Tucson Mountains. Our mission is to create community living which values consensus decision making in a nurturing environment, encouraging the contribution and growth of each individual. We value living in an environmentally friendly way that is sustainable.
We are a suburban cohousing community nested in 4 acres of lush, forested wildlife setting, with a creek and evergreen firs. Trillium Hollow is located minutes from downtown Portland, within walking and biking distance of mass transit, parks, schools (Beaverton school district), shops, and medical facilities.
Our community includes 28 self-sufficient apartments (studios, one-, two-, three-, or four-bedroom units) with one stand-alone unit, all 29 owned as condominiums. Our common facilities including a 3,600-sq-ft Common House with three guest rooms and generous dining/meeting spaces; indoor and outdoor play areas for children; a workshop; hot tub; 24/7 internet; community laundry facilities; native-plant landscaping; and organic community garden.
Our shared community life at Trillium is active: Members gather frequently for meals, work parties, celebrations, and social activities. Our regular celebrations include Winter Solstice, Talent/No Talent Show, Founders’ Day, summer bash and Halloween. We are a caring, supportive, consensus-based community, seeking to live lightly on the land, working cooperatively with our surrounding neighbors, valuing participation in our community, and living simply.
Our vision is to create and live in a community that fosters harmony with each other, the larger community, and nature.
We have used an ecologically sensitive building and site design that preserves the land’s natural beauty. We have an intergenerational, friendly atmosphere that is safe for children and conducive to visiting with neighbors. There is a large community building, called a common house, for optional shared meals (four nights a week), and other activities. We are located ten minutes from downtown Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Swan’s Market Cohousing is an urban co-housing community with 20 units, located in the preserved and retrofitted 1917 Swan’s Market building in the historic Old Oakland neighborhood. It is North America’s 50th Cohousing community, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is an award-winning innovative mixed-used historic-preservation project, restoring an abandoned old market building.
In addition to our Cohousing community, Swan’s Market includes affordable rental apartments, retail stores, restaurants, professional offices, public courtyard and is the former home of the Museum of Children’s Art.
All the traditional components of Cohousing are active here, including common meals 3x/week, monthly work parties, and neighbors helping neighbors. Participation and engagement in the community is high, with residents sharing food from our community garden, tools, time, friendship, resources, and skills. Located in the heart of thriving Old Oakland, Swan’s Market Cohousing is 2 blocks from BART, 15 minutes from downtown San Francisco or downtown Berkeley by BART, has a Walkability Score of 98/100 and just about every service you can imagine within a few blocks, including the Farmers Market on Washington & 9th Streets each Friday. Though urban, our outdoor space – “Swan’s Way” – is generously planted with fruit trees, vegetables, and artful patio gardens. Our outdoor table is a community gathering spot.
Community amenities include a 3,500 square foot common house with large kitchen and dining area, kids’ play room, exercise room, laundry, workshop, community garden, guest room, large patio for dining/entertaining. We value our three community meals a week and residents commit to participating in cooking rotations, as well as additional tasks necessary to support the maintenance and self-management of our community.
Berkeley Cohousing, on Sacramento Street in the West Berkeley neighborhood (zip code 94702) near Strawberry Creek, was a family farm dating back to near 1900, with a farmer’s daughter’s cottage added. When the Coop Supermarket (formerly Andronico’s) on University Avenue was built in the 1950s, several small houses were moved to the property, and rented out.
Berkeley Cohousing now consists of 15 units (14 plus one “associate member” household nextdoor) — mainly cottages and duplexes — scattered around a green, that also helps filter and buffer runoff from the parking lot on rooftops.
The group has a “limited equity” arrangement with the city that limits price appreciation to area median income growth plus capital improvements, for 30 years from each resale; buyers have to earn less than 120 or 150 percent of area median income. As a result, prices are now around 50 percent below market, and turnover is very low, running about 1 unit resold every 8-10 years; the seller can select the buyer, subject to the above restrictions.
Half the founders still live in the community, after 18 years.
We have a dozen children living in the community, with the largest cluster around 8-12 years old, and the youngest less than a year.
We have occasional work parties and building projects. We celebrate everyone’s birthdays together. The Common House is used for many events such as movie nights, Balkan folk music concerts, housecleaner training, family get-togethers, bookkeeper training meetings, to name a few.
Children are a big part of the community. Parents share childcare, carpools and parenting life. Older kids babysit, mow the lawn and wash cars.
Community members have supported each other through a long development process, and through births, marriages, graduations, great adventures, illnesses, and death.
We would love to have neighbors who are familiar with cohousing principles and are choosing this lifestyle, are financially independent with a stable income; who value our three community meals a week and are willing to participate in cooking and cleaning rotations; who are willing to participate in our monthly general meetings and work on a committee.
Berkeley Cohousing does not maintain a waiting list, but invites interested people to come on regularly scheduled tours.
We are a cohousing community of 19 families occupying 18 detached residences (17 single-family units and 1 duplex). We are located a quarter mile from the Vashon town center. Vashon is an island in Puget Sound, and is about 40 minutes (by a combined bus or car and ferry trip) from downtown Seattle.
We enjoy organic gardening, spontaneous potlucks and gatherings, commemorating our thirty year history, and tending our beautiful 13 acres.
We live on 40 forested acres in south Snohomish County, about 25 miles northeast from Seattle. Sharingwood is a lot-development cohousing model, where members buy lots and build their own homes to meet individual budgets and tastes. There is a mixture of owners and rental spaces and while most homes are pretty middle-class standard we have a small number of alternative dwellings including a cob/straw bale home. We share meals on a regular and ongoing basis and have a bulk food purchasing program that is available to residents.
We use a variety of decision-making approaches, although consensus is the goal on most issues. We empower small groups to make specific decisions that do not really require the input of the entire membership.
In addition to a monthly meeting, we have found that sharing circles can play an important role in nurturing a deeper sense of trust within the community. Here members find an opportunity to come together and share honestly and openly in a safe space.
Initiated by individuals, people do things together like yoga, meditation, sharing resources, organic gardening, work parties, campfires, playfield, concerts, and children’s activities.
The enchanting nature of the native forests and the many trails that surround the community define a village-like setting. Wilderness to some, sanctuary to others, for most it offers a comforting contrast to our workaday world.
Community owned assets : a 23-acre forested greenbelt which wraps around the community on three sides with trails, a campground, a stream, and an active beaver dam; playgrounds and a playfield; productive community gardens and fruit trees.
Touchstone is a neighborhood of 46 households built on six acres in Scio Township. Ann Arbor is unique in having 3 cohousing communities on the same block. This allows for expanded community and greater sharing of resources. Touchstone is a community created and sustained by its residents with the intention of sharing the joys and challenges of life and appreciating each individual. Decisions are made using consensus. For more information, call Robin at (734) 274-9110 or email: info@annarborcohousing.org. Our website: www.touchstonecohousing.org.
Duwamish Cohousing (formerly Ciel Cohousing) is an urban cohousing community in West Seattle, about 10 minutes from downtown. We moved into our homes in June 2000. Our neighborhood is primarily made up of fully equipped duplex townhomes owned as condominiums and generous common facilities including large kitchen and dining spaces; two indoor and two outdoor child play areas; a woodshop; an excerize room; a laundry; an office; a sunroom/living room; sunny decks and patios; native plant landscaping; and several community gardens. Our homes line pedestrian pathways and courtyards that are all handicapped accessible. Our 2.7 acres of land are located in a multicultural neighborhood. Some of our values include working cooperatively with our surrounding neighbors, using consensus, resolving conflicts using Restorative Justice, sharing work and social activities, environmental preservation, and building support and neighborliness among ourselves.
We are a close-knit community of people who care about each other, support each other, and have fun together. We are blessed to live in a peaceful and beautiful place. Our close connection with nature means we enjoy plenty of outdoor recreation and organic food grown on our own land. Strong community relationships, low stress, playing outside, and eating local organic food add up to an exceptionally healthy lifestyle.
Although we are an established 24 home community (completed in 2000), we are currently developing a second phase of 14 homes (expected to be completed in 2025) so that also makes us a forming community. Check out our website for lots more information.
We own 360 acres in southwest Colorado (Durango/Bayfield area), of which 67 acres is irrigated pastureland, where community members keep horses, llamas, and cattle. We enjoy a rural lifestyle – peace and quiet, close to nature, unlimited nearby recreational opportunities in the mountains and red rock canyons (including 7 miles of trails on our land), star-filled night skies, free from crime and traffic, clean mountain air, and organic food grown right here on our own land. Our rural location also means that Heartwood is a very close-knit community and an amazing place to raise kids.
Because we have high speed internet available (50 Mbps) and a great little regional airport just 25 minutes away, many Heartwood members work remotely from home.
The neighborhood and homes are designed so we can easily enjoy privacy or community socializing when we choose. Kids are safe, loved, and well supported.
We help each other in times of hardship or need. We celebrate with each other in times of joy.
We share the value of environmental stewardship. All of our homes are very well built, passive solar, and energy efficient – many of them feature strawbale or straw-clay construction. They are clustered on just a few acres, leaving over 95% of our land in open space. We share resources to minimize our environmental footprint. All of our farming and gardening is organic. We have many passive and active (photovoltaic) solar systems, with more being added almost every year.
We live in a nearly perfect four-season climate with 300+ days of sunshine per year. Although our summers are warm and sunny, our dry mountain air means that our homes don’t need air conditioners. We keep our windows open throughout the spring, summer, and fall. The fresh air is another way we’re able to stay more closely connected with nature and lead a healthier lifestyle.
We share many wonderful amenities: approximately 350 acres of open space, 7 miles of trails, 67 acres of irrigated pastureland, gorgeous common house, village green, kids play structure, woodworking shop, gardening tools, greenhouse, raised bed gardens, henhouse, laundry facilities, exercise room, library, free box, guest rooms, ping pong and foosball tables, play field, tennis and pickleball court, basketball court, barns and stables, tractor, yurt, hot tub, sledding hill, bonfire circle, and more.
We are located at an elevation of 7100’ in the Four Corners region, about 20 minutes east of Durango and 3 minutes west of Bayfield. We are surrounded by gorgeous uncrowded public lands. The San Juan Mountains are just north of us boasting Colorado’s biggest concentration of 14,000’ peaks and its largest wilderness area. West of us is the Colorado Plateau, which contains the red rock canyons of Mesa Verde, Canyonlands, Arches, Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef, Zion, and Grand Canyon National Parks. There are more wilderness adventures within 5 hours of Heartwood than you could fit into a lifetime.
We’ve packed a lot of information into our website. Please take a look around and virtually explore Heartwood Cohousing. If you like what you see, click on the “GET IN TOUCH” link to stay connected via our “Heartwood Happenings” and “Phase 2 Update” newsletters.
Whether your goals are the deep connection of community, a healthier and more peaceful rural lifestyle, an active outdoor lifestyle that includes world-class hiking, road and mountain biking, skiing, kayaking and rafting, weekend family camping trips to the desert or the high mountain wilderness, or an evening of excellent food and entertainment in nearby Durango or Bayfield, Heartwood is a great place to live, love, put down roots, raise your family, grow together, prosper, and change the world – one neighborhood at a time.
We are a suburban cohousing community on 2.2 acres in Pleasant Hill, California, (near Walnut Creek, east of San Francisco). We have 32 self-sufficient townhouse-style units along with a common house (kitchen/dining room, sitting room, laundry, and kids’ room), workshop, organic garden, kiln, pool, and hot tub. We used energy efficient green building features in our original design and added photovoltaic solar panels after move-in. A hiking/biking trail, an elementary school, and various shops are all nearby. We moved in fall 2001.
East Lake Commons is a cohousing community located five miles (eight minutes) from downtown Atlanta, and several miles southeast of the Little Five Points neighborhood. Completed in 2001, it includes 67 townhomes with 12 rental apartments attached, a 4500-sq-ft common house with a classroom, office, playroom, media room, woodworking room, workout room, and guest rooms. A playing field and children’s playground surround the common house. About half of the 20-acre site is dedicated to housing and parking on the perimeter; the remainder includes natural woodlands, wildlife corridor, and an organic garden with beehives, blueberry groves, and a spring-fed pond. Homes are clustered around pedestrian courtyards and walkways.
Children can run and play with their friends in a safe and nurturing environment; teenagers have supportive role models; and seniors are actively integrated into the community. We are an intergenerational community with diverse religious, ethnic, cultural, and racial backgrounds, and differently-abled. What binds us together is knowing and caring about our neighbors.
We manage the community ourselves using a consensus-like decision-making process. A backup voting procedure is also in place. Core community values include sustainability, visitability, diversity, affordability, and community. (“Visitability” means each townhome has a zero-step entrance and includes a bedroom and bathroom on the main floor to accommodate those with mobility challenges.)
We are an urban cohousing community with 27 units. Residents range in age from one year to the 80s, with adults and children. Decisions are made by modified consensus. We share meals and celebrations, and share in the upkeep of the property. We hold monthly community/business meetings and team meetings as needed.
Coho Ecovillage is a 34-unit cohousing community, a mile and a half from downtown Corvallis, and close to public transportation and numerous bike and walking paths. Clustered on 6.8 acres and surrounded by trees and meadows, the units are a mix of flats and townhouses, all designed to support friendly interactions between neighbors. A large common house with a unique solar art installation is the gathering place for meetings, vegetarian meals, and recreational activities.
Members of Coho Ecovillage are committed to living lightly on the land, embracing diversity and sharing with one another in mutual trust, respect, and support. All learn to listen carefully, use nonviolent communication, and make decisions by consensus.
Since moving into our community beginning October 2007, and we’ve been busy doing landscaping, building compost piles, planting gardens and an orchard, and getting to know each other better.
Our residents range in age from infants to grandparents–currently there are 105 folks in our community (two thirds live on-site; one-third who live off-site are Friends of CoHo, Associate Members, or Non-Resident owners). The overall adult to kid balance is about 3 to 1. We are a mix of income levels, abilities, and family composition. Twenty-six of our 34 townhouses and flats are handicap visitable, and all downstairs flats meet ADA-accessibility standards.
If you are interested, visit our website and/or come for a tour. We would love to hear from you.
Our community lies in the charming rural village of Charlotte, Vermont. We are 14 miles from Burlington, which has a lively downtown pedestrian mall, the University of Vermont, a regional teaching hospital, and an international airport. Middlebury, home of Middlebury College, is 30 minutes south. Montreal is a two-hour drive north. Lake Champlain and Charlotte beach is just four miles away. Excellent public and private schools serve the community.
We enjoy occasional potluck dinners, work together on keeping our community beautiful, and have lots of fun. We help each other with childcare, meals, and all sorts of projects. We are committed to living in a thoughtful way that promotes environmental sustainability and healthy community relationships.
Village Cohousing Community is an urban infill community, built on a half city block in Madison, Wisconsin. We are located within easy walking, biking, and bussing distance of the University of Wisconsin, downtown Madison, two hospitals, and several areas of small shops, eateries, studios and parks.
About a third of our 38 members are original residents who moved in in 1999. Our ages span several generations, running from 8 to 90 years old.
Affordable CoHousing with Homesteading Focus
NOTE: As of fall 2024, we have 8 home-sites left. If you think we might be a good fit and are interested to learn more, please fill out this form here and we will be in touch with you! –> https://tally.so/r/3yEMD6
NOTE: We CANNOT accommodate requests for overnight accommodations or camping. Additionally, we do not offer volunteer or intern opportunities.
We are currently seeking new members to make their home in the beautiful Finger Lakes area of New York. We are a group of people from various walks of life building a sustainable neighborhood on 120 acres in Danby, New York, just outside of Ithaca.
We are currently eighteen households living in private homes at White Hawk with additional homes under construction and more in the pipeline. When completed, we will have 30 homes sitting on approximately 10 of our 120 acres of farm, field, and forest. All new residents must plan on leasing a lot from the community and building their own home. The fee to lease a lot is $40,000. Homes can typically be built for about $180/ s.f. and up.
We have monthly meetings, use consensus decision-making, and encourage creativity and joyful neighborhood life as we strive to work respectfully with the land to meet as many of our needs as possible. We aim to make our community affordable to all.
Members are free to design their own homes, and are not constrained to a few models selected by a developer. We provide economical and sustainable suggestions for those who would prefer more guidance. Any build style that meets town code, up to and including natural building such as straw bale, cob, cordwood, Earthship or dome would be welcome. The lots are in a circular form around our common circle and a planned common house.
Our community represents a diversity of ages and ethnic backgrounds. We look forward to welcoming new skills, ideas and talents, with the goal of passing down a thriving and resilient village to our children and their children. We envision a homesteading village in which as many of our needs as possible are met right here on our land. We are moving in that direction through personal and community gardens, permaculture projects, an orchard, animal husbandry (over the years we’ve had chickens, ducks, rabbits, horses, pigs, turkeys, sheep, guinea hens and bees) and respectfully using the natural resources we have on the land (through such activities as maple tapping, hunting and wild plant foraging).
Recreating on the land is important to us as well. We have three ponds, a few miles of trails, woods, a playground for the kids, streams to splash in, community garden, and a fire-pit.
We are “on the grid” with electric, gas, phone and internet, but some residents are moving toward off-grid independence. We encourage home-based businesses and bartering between residents to build local resilience.
Just a stone throw away from the charm of Ithaca, White Hawk is an amazing & supportive community for children and adults to grow, learn, and explore together!
Solterra is a cohousing community nestled in a semirural area close to Duke University and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. We enjoy Durham city services and excellent nearby public and private schools.
Our 20 acres are open and wooded, and adjoin 100 wooded acres recently made into a park, so our community is immune from adjacent development. Homes are single-family and privately owned. Each home is car-accessible. Members share common lands, paths, play spaces, a common house, roads, a large dog park, and a large common garden.
Our members come from every part of the country and range in age from small children to senior citizens. Our interests are broad, and our consensus form of management includes committees to oversee all phases of development and Solterra social life.
We share meals most Sunday and Tuesday evenings. Eating choices vary from meat-eating to vegan, and our common meals reflect this. There are 37 resident families currently.
The Commons on the Alameda is a pueblo-style cohousing community on 4.5 acres at the edge of the city of Santa Fe. Construction began in 1991 and the last homes were completed in 1997. Our common house is adjacent to our main plaza. Our 28 homes cluster around four beautifully landscaped smaller courtyards that we call “placitas”.
We eat communal organic meals on Mondays and Thursdays using local and organic produce as much as possible. Residents participate in the cooking and cleaning up for one meal per month; the remainder of their eight hour per month service commitment involves various endeavors including landscape maintenance, newsletter production, and childcare. Committee chairs (kitchen, guest room, grounds, etc) orchestrate much of the nitty-gritty. We have two community meetings per month–one to discuss and make consensus-based decisions regarding business items and the other to share on a more personal level. Every fall we host our community celebration for the greater community with tree planting, cider making, entertainment, green chili stew, and dancing. We have an orchard area with a chicken coop, fire circle, and a basketball hoop.
Several residents have home businesses. Many of our homeowners have rental rooms or efficiency units available. The community has three rooms available for guests of residents. We have about eighty residents, with approximately 25% of residents being children. The community remains focused on youngsters with cooperative childcare that provides childcare for meeting times and other community events. There are also play areas throughout the property.
RoseWind is a cohousing community within a liberal small town of 9000 on the NE corner of the Olympic Peninsula. Seattle is about 3 hours away. Our views are pastoral, yet we are minutes from everything in town, including a good food co-op, farmers’ market, seasonal festivals, many music and arts activities, boating, and generally the sort of culture you’d find in a college town. The climate is moderate.
Our 24 households include a range of ages and many lifestyles. There’s abundant music, food, social interaction, and of course the shared work of caring for our common areas. Our attractive community hall is used often, for meetings, shared meals 1-2 times a week, parties, workshops, rehearsals, slide shows, concerts, and meetings. We know our neighbors and help each other out in many ways.
Neither “mainstream” nor far-out, we do our best to learn to live more sustainably by sharing, raising organic fruits and vegetables, and individually making informed environmental choices. Organizationally, we have learned a lot in 30+ years of consensus-based decision making. The extra time it takes to decide things is outweighed by the satisfaction of finding win-win solutions.
Fully built, the way to join at this point is via resales, which are posted on our website www.rosewind.org. It is advisable to get to know us ahead of time, though, to be able to make an informed choice if a resale comes up. Check us out!
Please visit our website https://pacificacohousing.com/ for a full description.
Songaia CoHousing Community – An Overview
By Libby Carr, Songaia Membership Coordinator
The Songaia Neighborhood is located about 20 miles north and slightly to the east of Seattle. It is composed of 17 homes (6 duplexes and 5 shared homes), which are surrounded by a small forest, organic gardens, orchards, commons and a meadow, plus more.
Our multi-generational community was established in 1993 and has grown since that time; we currently have 50 residents. About a year ago, a 25 home development was built right next to us on the other side of our private road. Fortunately, several of our members went in together and purchased two of the new houses. This is the primary way we have expanded the Songaia footprint into what we are now calling the Greater Neighborhood of Songaia and the Songaia Next Door Neighbors community.
We also have a Non-Residential Associates program where people who want to relate to Songaia can do so by coming to dinners, participating in work projects and attending celebrations and other special events. By doing so, they participate in the life of our community without having to actually live on site.
Our community is active; we gather for five shared meals per week and celebrate, work, and pursue learning together. As a result of these many connections, we have grown to be a strong web of friends and neighbors. We have an ethical commitment to hearing all voices in our community and therefore, use a modified consensus decision-making process and rotational leadership. As a community, we endeavor to create a space that is a supportive environment for people of all ages, backgrounds and interests.
Our desire for sustainability inspires us to share resources and skills whenever possible. Members and associates (including non-residents) have access to our extensive facilities and land. The common house includes eating and meeting spaces, two guest rooms, laundry facilities, a playroom for children and more. Our barn has a greenhouse, food pantries, tool shop (woodworking, electrical, auto), ceramics studio and storage. The land is about a total 14 acres comprised of the above mentioned buildings, plus a small forest, wetlands, several organic gardens, two orchards, a food forest on the neighboring development, a central commons area, a meadow, a chicken coop for 20 chicken and a goat pens for 3 goats who earn their keep by eating the invasive blackberries.
We also aim to connect with local, regional and national communities. Because of our work to create self-sustaining food sources on our property, we have become involved in the local permaculture and organic agricultural movements. Our community is also devoted to education; we host a vibrant internship program that attracts volunteers from around the world through WWOOF, and also Bastyr University and the University of Washington-Bothell. Songaia has provided land and support for the Rites of Passage Journeys program which conducts programs for youth moving towards adulthood as well as supportive nature experiences for all ages making a variety of life transitions.
The Mariposa Group is about deep friendship along with physical and financial security—our land is paid for. Houses are being paid for as they are built. We are developing ways in which time, personal energy, and financial resources can brought together so as to minimize the personal risk that any individual may experience in the areas of physical and financial security.
We focus on personal and interpersonal resonance, comfort and self-esteem, and emphasize and practice methods of self-knowledge, meditation, truly deep friendship, intimacy, interpersonal communication, and interaction that promote respect, comfort, and trust between individuals, such that relationships have their basis in these qualities.
We value freedom for higher levels of Personal & Spiritual development interacting together in a loving, down to earth expression. We explore, develop, and promote ways of joyfully enhancing fully free personal development; in short, to create a community space where there is more opportunity for people in a loving, supportive, free, and responsible environment to truly and fully enjoy life.
It’s about manifesting “Love, Truth, & Joy” in our community environment and making a contribution to the world at the same time.
Takoma Village is a multi-generational cohousing community made up of 43 privately owned townhouses and flats. Our numbers fluctuate, but the community usually includes 60 to 65 adults and 10 to 15 children. Residents range in age from infants to octogenarians. Typical of most cohousing communities, we represent many interests and occupations. We have members from many ethnic, religious, and cultural traditions; residents of differing sexual orientations; and neighbors with varying levels of ability. We’re a mix of omnivores, vegetarians, and vegans who nevertheless enjoy sharing meals together.
Breaking bread together is one of the main ways we build social bonds, so participation in community meals is expected. We have meals together several times a week, including monthly potlucks, occasional brunches, summer cookouts, and delicious holiday feasts. Workers share lunch together on work days.
We are largely self-managed. At Takoma Village, each adult is expected to join one or more of our many teams and contribute six hours per month to carrying out the tasks of managing our finances, coordinating social activities, keeping the building in good repair, and landscaping the grounds. Efforts may include working on team projects or completing gardening, cleaning, or maintenance tasks on community work days, which are scheduled about once a month.
We are legally structured as a condominium, but we function non-hierarchically. We make major decisions together by consensus, taking the time to listen to and discuss each other’s concerns until we find creative solutions that work for everyone. We discuss and deliberate in membership meetings, which are held monthly. Less sweeping decisions may be made by a team after informing the community and addressing any concerns that are raised.
The 3,800 square foot common house is the social hub of our community. The central feature is a large dining room that is also used for meetings and parties. The attached kitchen is fully equipped for cooking community meals and preparing for parties and special events. It’s common to find children playing dress-up in the playroom, someone watching TV in the living room, or folks reading or chatting in the sunroom or fireplace nook. The common house also has several spaces with shared equipment, such as the office, laundry room, exercise room, and workshop. Two guest rooms are available to reserve.
Outdoors, we share spaces for grilling, gardening, and play. The paved piazza includes an area for grilling and eating al fresco and a tot lot for toddler play. Elsewhere on the property are several raised-bed gardens used for growing herbs and vegetables. A grassy fenced area at the rear of the property provides space for a hammock, a two-story fort, a sandbox, a tether ball, and running and romping by humans and dogs alike.
We encourage environmentally responsible living. From the beginning, we incorporated features designed to conserve energy and used green products in the construction of our homes. All 43 homes and the common house use geothermal heating and cooling. In 2015, we installed solar panels on our rooftops, which provide power for the common spaces and generate enough electricity to return some to the grid. Takoma Village is an infill development, densely built on only 1.4 acres of previously-vacant land between a small commercial area and an established residential neighborhood. Our location near Metro and bus lines allows many of us to commute by public transit, while cyclists use the dedicated bike lanes nearby.
The homes at Takoma Village are a mix of 20 flats and 23 townhouses. The flats have one or two bedrooms and are located at ground level or are accessible by elevator. The two-story townhouses have two to four bedrooms. The homes range in size from 658 to 1,921 square feet of living space and usually have an open floor plan designed to make the compact dwellings feel light and airy. Most homes have an outdoor seating area in the front and a balcony or small deck in the back. Each household has one assigned parking space in the lot at the rear of the property.
We welcome new residents who are well-informed about Takoma Village and eager to become active participants in the community. You are invited to participate in our tours, meetings, social events, and work days in order to learn more about us. Please contact us (welcome@takomavillage.org) to request a schedule. You can also sign up for our email notification list by sending a blank email to TakomaVillageNotifications+subscribe@groups.io. You’ll be among the first to be alerted when a homeowner announces their home is for sale or rent and you’ll be kept informed of the dates for our quarterly tours.
Hearthstone Cohousing is an urban, multi-generational cohousing community located in northwest Denver, Colorado. We have 33 townhomes, a common house and shared green areas. We are within walking distance of many locally owned businesses including a grocery store, restaurants, coffee houses, and bookstores, as well as public transportation. We are a 10-minute drive or 30 minute bike ride from downtown Denver. Please visit our website (http://hearthstonecohousing.com) for more information.
Cohousing community close to downtown Colorado Springs, CO. 34 dwelling units in 15 buildings plus a common house and another building with storage, fitness center and wood/hobby shop, all on 4 acres.
Two Acre Wood Cohousing is a community in the traditional cohousing mold. We are generally politically progressive, environmentally conscious and interested in learning to live together in a supportive, loving community with lots of room for individual differences. We have no official philosophy.
We moved into our brand-new homes in the summer of 1999. Two date, four units have changed hands as of mid 2023. (Two of them twice)
We don’t have any rentals, but sometimes have house sitting opportunities. We maintaining a list of people who might be interested in purchasing or renting a unit should one become available. To be added to the waiting list, please complete this form: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TAWWaitingList
Thanks
Zephyr Valley Community Cooperative is a vibrant rural cohousing intentional community. Currently we have 8 households with 14 adults and 6 children living on 500 acres of farm and woodlands in the beautiful bluff country of SE Minnesota. The land, bought by the Coop in 1994 and cooperatively owned, has restored wetlands, pastures, woodland, bluff lands, high grass meadows, ponds, creeks and a trout stream. Approximately one hundred acres are farmed organically, currently in pasture, hay & prairie flower plantings. We have a large barn, several outbuildings and a community center (for community meals, parties, meetings, guests, etc.) as well as a spring-fed swimming pond, a soccer/baseball field, and trails for walking and skiing. Decisions about the land and community are made by consensus, all other decisions are individual ones. There are seven individually owned homes and one small apartment that is owned by the community. Homes are occasionally available and it is possible to build on approved building sites. Winona, Rushford, and La Crosse are all within a 30-minute drive, offering six college campuses, an arts community, and a family-friendly environment. This is a wonderful place to live and a great place for children to grow up with an intimate knowledge of the natural world. Whether you are interested in small-scale, organic farming and gardening or just living in a rural community, your interest is welcomed. Please email us to arrange a visit.
Nyland is a cohousing community of 42 private homes in a rural setting outside Boulder, Colorado, with an expansive view of the Rocky Mountains. Our community consists of approximately 140 residents with varied backgrounds, careers, ages, and views. Yet, we all share the same desire to live near neighbors we know in a small neighborhood. We offer each other support and friendship, while respecting our needs for privacy. Our common vision is a physically and emotionally safe community where children play on the pedways, neighbors lend each other a hand, and nature coexists peacefully in our open spaces.
Westwood is an intentional community in Asheville, North Carolina, nestled in a walkable neighborhood and wooded setting with 24 clustered dwellings and a common house in the center of the community. The buildings have central radiant-floor heating, a hot-water system with solar collectors on the common-house roof, and landscaping according to permaculture principles.
Newberry Place is an urban cohousing community overlooking downtown Grand Rapids, Michigan, with 23 units on 1.1 acres.
Eno Commons is a community of 22 houses clustered together on 11 acres in Durham, North Carolina. Our homes are either 1483 or 1974 square feet, with passive solar design and energy efficient geo-thermal heating and cooling. Homes are individually owned, but we share a common house (and common meals once or twice a week), a workshop, a playground, an organic vegetable garden, and lots of green space. We have neighbors at a variety of ages, with lots of opportunity for socializing, project work, and community building.
A community of 13 townhomes existing since 2007. The property includes a “common house” and garden. The homes are passive solar and have other green building features. The members acted as their own developer, entailing considerable commitment of time and money. Homes are affordable for our area.
Located one mile from downtown Ashland near parks, schools, and a bike path, this is in-town housing in a small town. We started with several families with young children, as well as single and older members and have a new crop of young children along with older kids, parents and single adults. Values statement and other tidbits are available on our website,.
Homes range from one to four bedrooms and all have small private yards. All homes have many south-facing windows, passive ventilation, radiant heat, and superior insulation. Many fruit trees and herbs are in the landscaping.
We worked on this project for four and a half years. Since we acted as our own developer, all members contributed substantial time to the project. We practice facilitation and group process skills and are committed to practices of clear communications, caring about each other, and having fun.
As a small community, we place a premium on getting to know people before they become members. In the event a home goes up for sale, we maintain a list of interested buyers for sellers to use. We seem to have homes for sale on a fairly regular basis as folks come and go from the Ashland area.
Links:
http://
Ashland Cohousing Community:
information, bios, etc – soon to be updated
Built on one acre within North Boulder’s Holiday Neighborhood, Silver Sage is between 28th and Broadway, north of Yarmouth on 16th and Yellow Pine. Silver Sage has sixteen duplexes and attached homes, a community center, and a common green with internal sidewalks and landscaping.
We are especially proud of our community center, the physical hub of Silver Sage. As residents, we have contributed to the design of this center. The community house includes a gourmet kitchen, a large dining area, a guest room, craft room, media room, exercise and meditation rooms. and a large artist coop shared by 5 artists Our spacious deck has exceptional views of the Flatirons.
The private homes of Silver Sage are thoughtfully designed, upscale, and built with the latest sustainable features. Each includes a well-equipped kitchen, living area, bedrooms and baths, as well as outside decks, porches or sitting areas. Legally, Silver Sage is governed as a condominium association.
Eastern Village is a 56-unit cohousing community in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, just a few blocks from the Silver Spring metro.
The first organizing meetings were held in late 2002, with 40 members on board within five months. Move-in started in October 2004.
Our building is a gut rehab of an abandoned 1950s-era office building in a formerly scruffy part of downtown Silver Spring. The building incorporates a number of green building features (solar panels-as of 2023, ground-source heat-pump system, high-efficiency central hot water, etc.), and is LEED Silver certified.
EVC is legally structured as condominiums. Units range from one-bedroom flats to three-bedroom lofts.
We are a community of people dedicated to creating a place where resources are shared, the Earth is respected, diversity is welcomed, children play together in safety, growth is nurtured, and living in community enriches our lives. Our core values and vision help to provide a common foundation for our decisions and our relationships with each other.
Around 95 people live at Sunward Cohousing, from wee ones to octogenarians. We have singles and couples, families with children, empty-nesters, and shared homes. We have a diversity of backgrounds, occupations, spiritual and secular paths, and sexual orientations.
In our years together on the land since 1998, we have experienced births, deaths, weddings, partings, joys, sorrows, members joining and departing, and much more. Many of us were drawn to Sunward for the sense of community and for the opportunity to live more lightly on the land. We steward 20 beautiful acres of woods, prairie, ponds, one quarter of which contains our clustered private homes and common house.
Winslow Cohousing is located on Bainbridge Island in Puget Sound, 35 minutes west of downtown Seattle by Washington State ferry. Tours are scheduled at mutually convenient times. Email Lori at info@winslowcohousing.org to set up a tour.
We are organized as a stock cooperative with 30 dwelling units and a common house on nearly 6 acres with woods and gardens, within walking/biking distance of schools, shops, library, and medical offices. Unit types range from studios to four bedrooms. All units are self-sufficient, with kitchens, dining areas, living rooms, bedrooms, and bathrooms. The group formed in 1989, started construction in 1991, and moved in early in 1992. We are a multi-generational, caring, supportive, consensus-based community, seeking to live lightly on the land, valuing participation in our community and meals together, which are available five nights a week using organic food that we grow. Our woods are in a conservation easement.
We have created a neighborhood that recaptures the essence of community, a human environment that fosters interconnectedness, safety, growth, and meaningful life. The physical environment serves the needs and enhances the well-being of the individuals and the community. We wish to live in harmonious relationship to our place on the earth.
Our cohousing neighborhood includes 28 homes (mostly duplexes) clustered around a common house. There are also five “associate member” (privately owned) houses built along the road leading into Rocky Hill Cohousing.
We own 28 acres and occupy nine; the remainder is forested.
Links:
http://rockyhillcohousing.org/
http://www.rockyhillcohousing.org/
Fair Oaks EcoHousing is a cohousing neighborhood of 30 families in Fair Oaks, eighteen miles east of Sacramento, California. The homes were completed in June 2020.
Our vision is for an inclusive, earth-friendly community that fosters supportive relationships based on respect, cooperation, and fun. We own 3.7 acres of land in Fair Oaks. The site is close to the American River Parkway, Fair Oaks Village, Sacramento Waldorf School, Rudolf Steiner College, and Bannister Park. We worked with award-winning architect Chuck Durrett of McCamant & Durrett Architects and development consultant Katie McCamant of CoHousing Solutions.
For more information, please visit our website at www.FairOaksEcoHousing.org.and/or contact Marty Maskall by email or phone. We’d love to have you join us!
ElderSpirit Community is a cohousing community for mixed income elders (55 and over) located on 3.7 acres alongside the Virginia Creeper Trail in Abingdon, Virginia. Its distinctive intentions are mutual support through the aging process and late-life spirituality. Members believe that spiritual growth is the primary work of those in the later stages of life. Agreeing that freedom of religion is fundamental, we encourage one another in the search for meaning and commitment to the spiritual path of our choice. Through face-to-face relationships, we offer and receive support, express our needs and convictions, listen carefully to each other, and strive to act responsibly, considering our good, the good of the other, and the good of the community.
Thirteen of the cluster homes belong to owners; sixteen apartment homes are for renters, who must qualify as low-to-moderate income. The Common House is used for meals, meetings, entertainment and gatherings of all kinds. There are laundry facilities in the Common House. The Spirit House is a special place for prayer, meditation, and celebrations. Each member serves on at least one committee. Monthly meetings of the Member Association are run by consensus. Visitors who are interested in our community are welcomed. To learn more, visit our website www.elderspirit.org.
Retreats and workshops are available for groups who have similar goals. For more information on retreats, contact Monica Appleby at 276-698-3289 or write monica_appleby@yahoo.com. Dene Peterson addresses groups and meets with individuals who want to build cohousing communities in other locations. She can be reached at denepete.elderspirit@gmail.com
Daybreak Cohousing is a multigenerational 30-unit development in the Overlook neighborhood of Portland, Oregon.
Daybreak’s homes are connected by an outside walkway that lets us interact easily. Daybreak’s campus is two-thirds of an acre centered around a fifty-year-old silver maple which serves as the community’s anchor.
Our complex consists of four multi-story buildings, three with residential units, and one large Common House with four residential units on top—all with maximum solar exposure. The condominium units are 1 to 3 bedrooms and range from 650 to 1,200 square feet. A circular lawn, gardens and children’s play area fills the central courtyard. Gardens and street trees on the east, south and west invite interaction with the neighborhood.
We develop warm connections by sharing meals, relaxing or celebrating events, participating in workdays and on teams, and making decisions together.
*As of June, ’23, we have no units available for sale or for rent. When we do have any availabilities, we’ll put them on our web site, www.woodardlanecoho.org.
Our loving and vibrant community has been living together for 11 years. We share meals, conversations, helping hands, babysitting, song circles and the joy of connection. We are tucked into the edge of a ravine, within walking distance of downtown Olympia, but in a lovely older neighborhood.
In 2016, we completed the 2nd and final phase of our construction project, which expanded us from 11 to 18 units. The approximately 50 members range in age from 1 to 88.
Our site is on Olympia’s West Side, just 1.6 miles from downtown, and 6 blocks from the beloved Westside Olympia food coop. Part of our land is a green belt provided by a deep ravine sculpted by a year-round stream that enters Puget Sound several blocks away. We currently have a large vegetable garden and play areas for the kids. All of our homes surround a Center Green where we gather to talk, walk our dogs, ride bikes and scooters, and enjoy the sunshine.
Our legal structure is a condominium with a Steering Board made up of two members from each of the working committees – Building Maintenance, Grounds, Administration, and Community Life.
Rocky Corner is the first cohousing neighborhood in Connecticut and the only one in the Tristate area of CT/NY/NJ. We are presently building on our 33-acre former dairy farm in the town of Bethany. With a beautiful New England setting, yet only about five miles north of New Haven, this is an inclusive, multi-generational community, valuing diversity of culture and background. Many homes are spoken for, but we have all sizes available (1,2 and 3 bedrooms). Move in is planned for 2020.
Caring deeply about the health of the planet we are committed to green building and living sustainably. With Centerbrook Architects we have cooperatively designed 30 passive solar, single family homes. These are clustered near the 4,500 square foot common house for shared meals, leisure, and work space. We were chosen to receive a large grant from the state of Connecticut to help make some of our homes “affordable” (below market rate).
Working with Appleseed Permaculture to make the best use of the farmland and watershed, we are creating a landscape of flowers, berries, orchards, annual vegetables, pasture, wild flowers, paths and ponds. We have planned a community garden of 20’x40′ plots for residents to grow a substantial amount of food and a greenhouse for an extended growing season.
The site plan is people-centered, with cars on the perimeter yet conveniently accessible to each unit.
Valuing participation, we have adopted sociocracy as our organizational and decision-making model, and have trained with John Buck, Sociocracy for All and Diana Leafe Christian.
The homes range in size from one bedroom to three bedroom. Universal design makes them perfect of people with physical disabilities and for aging in place.
At this time we have affordable and market rate homes of all sizes for sale. Please contact us if you are interested in purchasing a home or for more information about Rocky Corner Cohousing.
Rocky Corner — a great place for families, for singles, for aging in place; a safe, cooperative, supportive community.
Nubanusit Neighborhood & Farm is a cohousing community in Peterborough, New Hampshire, located in the Monadnock region of the Granite State, just 90-minutes from Boston. Our neighborhood consists of 29 environmentally-designed homes; a spacious Common House; professional office space in a renovated historic farmstead; an organic farm; woodlands with walking trails; and a pond for swimming and skating. The neighborhood is located on 113 acres along Nubanusit Brook, about a one-mile walk (sidewalks) from the center of town, a thriving community made famous by playwright Thornton Wilder’s ‘Our Town’ written while he was a Fellow at the nearby MacDowell Colony
We are 29 households aged from baby to 90+ years. We work from home, commute, and are retired. We attend public, private and home-school. We own our homes and rent. We value sustainability, community, farming, re;ationships and living lightly on the earth.
A single-family home in our neighborhood is LEED Platinum certified (US Green Building Council); All of the buildings are constructed to the same rigorous environmental standards and use less than half the energy of typical houses. Our architect-designed, New England farmhouse-style homes have front porches and are sided with red cedar shingles. Each home is super-insulated with triple-glazed windows, infrastructure for solar hot-water collectors, and natural, nontoxic materials chosen for quality and durability. The entire neighborhood is heated by a central wood-pellet fired heat plant.
Hardwood and tile floors are used throughout the homes; the interiors are light, airy, and spacious. Single-family and Duplex units have first floors featuring a kitchen and open-concept living/dining room with a full mudroom entry and half bath/laundry room. Single family homes have a first floor master bedroom and full bath. Duplex second floors have a master bedroom, full bath, and additional bedroom(s). First floor quad units have open concept kitchen/dining/living room and large bedroom and sunroom. Upper quad units have main level open concept kitchen/dining/living room and 3/4 bath and bedroom/office, and master bedroom and full bath on upstairs level. Private living spaces have views of woods, farm fields, or the river. We are a pedestrian-friendly neighborhood, with vehicles limited to the parking area at the periphery.
Our farm includes fields for pasture, hay, vegetables, and fruits. There is also an apiary, layer chickens, pigs (seasonally), horses and occasional cows.
Peterborough is a quintessential New England town located in a nature-lover’s region of mountains, ponds, rivers, and picturesque villages. Our town is a vibrant arts and cultural center, and is home to the world-renowned MacDowell Artists Colony. We have good public schools, as well as Waldorf and other private daycare, preschool, elementary, and high schools.
Links:
Nubi Cohousing News/Blog:
Recent events, photos and videos from the neighborhood.
Nubi Facebook Page
Nubanusit Neighborhood & Farm
We are creating an interested persons list for our cohousing community as we have all of our lots bought. In particular we are looking for young families to make our community more intergenerational within the city limits of Gainesville, FL. We own a 4.75 acre property where we have built 19 of our eventual 24 homes (only 2 lots have not begun construction) with an extensive common house, gardens, fruit trees, a playground, a pool, and a large dining hall that doubles for a dance floor. Groundbreaking was on February 3rd, 2017.
Tamarack Knoll is a rural cohousing community eight miles west of Fairbanks and two miles from the University of Alaska. We have nine resident adults and four children. The individual cabins/small homes are privately owned, and the land, commons building, and improvements are held in common through a nonprofit corporation / condominium legal structure.
We share evening meals, and have a water source at a commons building (shower, bath, washing machine, and communal kitchen). Our community is very rural, though not remote, in the boreal forest. We have gravel driveway access to the commons building, and foot trails to the individual units. We keep about 95 percent of our 80 acres in green space. We are on an extensive network of multiple-use ski and dogsledding trails.
We have some ongoing construction, but the community has been functioning since 2004. A number of us are involved in research through the University of Alaska, Fairbanks; and several of us are in public service. We are active in environmental organizations, conservation, and wilderness preservation. We are very engaged in outdoor and wilderness activities.
Sand River is a participatory community of active elders. We are grounded in the principles of conscious aging, decision making by modified consensus with supermajority voting, environmental stewardship, and a connection to Place. Our community’s LEED-certified design features energy-efficient homes and common house as well as a permaculture landscape and permeable paths. Our 2400-square-foot solar-powered common house includes a large kitchen, dining-and-meeting area, sitting-and-media area with fireplace, as well as a library, office, guest room, and laundry. There are three EV-plugin charging stations, with two currently in use, as well as a community tool shed.
Our northern New Mexico location affords mountain hiking as well as nearby walking–cycling trails—with the Arroyo Chamiso Urban Trail just across the community’s adjoining arroyo. Santa Fe offers an abundance of restaurants, galleries, libraries, grocery stores, medical services, gyms, and low-cost public transportation.
As an elder community, we want to be good neighbors by supporting one another socially and logistically. However, we are not an assisted living or nursing facility. Each member is responsible for themselves.
We welcome active elders who seek a cooperative life style and are willing share in the work and play called for to be a vibrant, safe, and happy community.
While our homes and the common house are ADA-certified, the gravel road surrounding the common house does not offer easy accessibility for wheel chairs.
Sand River, as a LEED* community, benefits from the following sustainable design features: universal design, permeable paths and trails, accessible public transportation, community open space, water-saving features, rainwater harvesting, native plants and trees, passive solar orientation, in-floor radiant heat, healthy indoor air quality, Energy-Star qualified, 30% more energy efficient than non-LEED construction, low-E windows, blown-in cellulose insulation, and photovoltaic-ready hookups.
*LEED-certified buildings save money and resources, and have a positive impact on the health of occupants, while promoting renewable, clean energy.
Please check our website for COVID-related updates. https://www.sandriver.org/faqs.html
Putney Commons (www.putneycommonsvt.com) is a small, owner developed, intentional community located in Putney, Vermont. Six homes were completed in 2009, and a seventh was built in 2014. Our eighth and ninth dwellings were completed in 2022 and 2023.
The 9 units are surrounded by field, garden, hills and woods. We are currently a community of 12 individuals and are open to families, couples, and single persons of all ages. We share a vision for being good stewards of the land and supporting one another in living greener and healthier lifestyles.
The six original houses were built in two clusters of three semi-detached homes. They are single-story, on slabs, have no attics, are super-insulated and boast a Five Plus Star Energy rating. They range from 1100 to 1475 sq. ft. and are clustered on the north end of a 3.5 acre field. Each has a garage with a small storage unit. The seventh home stands alone.
Interior designs vary greatly, based on owner-designed preferences. Five homes have photo voltaic panels; one household has a share in a local solar farm.
Members meet monthly to discuss business and living concerns. We make decisions by consensus. We have no common house and eat independently, but we enjoy sharing pot luck dinners and occasional work days. Our $255 monthly owner’s association fee covers common element expenses, e.g., mowing, plowing, sanding, trash, insurance, land maintenance and an operating reserve fund. Legally we are a condominium association.
Our 11.4 acres of land are secluded and private; they include fields, woodlands, a bit of Sacketts Brook, a common fenced-in vegetable garden with individual plots available to interested members and several neighbors, and walking trails. Amazingly, we are also right in the heart of Putney village, across the street from the post office and behind the first row of houses. We are within easy walking distance of senior exercises/art classes/monthly senior lunches at the Putney Community Cares barn, medical offices, post office, bank, library, food coop, general store, gas station/auto repair, as well as rich cultural institutions.
Our nearest neighbor is the Putney Community Center, which houses a community foodshelf. A seasonal farmers’ market is within walking distance of the town center, and many restaurants /eateries are within half a mile. Nearby, the Connecticut River and Putney Mountain offer hikers, bikers, rowers, kayakers, and swimmers many opportunities for enjoyment. Putney has three private schools and Landmark College, as well as a strong public elementary school. Many community-based events are held throughout the year, including a village-wide community supper held on the second Friday of each month.
We are located ten miles north of Brattleboro just half a mile from I-91, exit 4.
26 shareholders representing singles, couples, and families, owns a beautiful 115 acre property, gardens, forest and meadow with waterfront on Post Pond. We run Loch Lyme Lodge, the 22-cabin based hospitality business we purchased as part of the parcel on which we also hope to build a 24 unit, multi-age, intentional cohousing neighborhood, one mile from Lyme and 10 miles from Hanover, NH. Lyme is a rural community 10 miles north of Hanover, home of Dartmouth College, a vibrant college town with an excellent tertiary care medical center. Lyme’s zoning will allow us to build only 4 primary homes on the 97 acres we have set aside for residential use. We are regrouping to see if there is any way Lyme will allow us to build. Our original design was for a mix of two to or four bedroom homes and 6-8 apodments/homes integrated into the common house and three or four (4) additional homes built as ADU’s (accessory dwelling units). We are now also exploring assisted living/end of life care as part of the plan. Our goal is an attractive, comfortable, environmentally intelligent neighborhood in which one can live, raise a family and live long into retirement, aging in your own home within an inter-generational community.
Our website begins with this paragraph: “Did you ever wish you had a big rambling house on a pond with fruit trees and gardens?…Do you fondly remember your days in college or graduate school and miss the group dinners with stimulating conversation?…Does the idea of living comfortably for less than it costs to live on your own appeal to you?.”
Links:
http://
http://www.LochLymeLodge.com:
Loch Lyme Lodge, Our hospitality business and place for wonderful weddings and retreats
http://www.PinnacleProject.info
We are committed to collaboration, good communication, consensus-oriented decision making, and respect for each other.
We have a 9-unit apartment complex built around a charming courtyard. Our common house in under construction. For now, we have a community workshop, and we gather in our lovely courtyard to eat, chat, and make s’mores in the fire pit. We’re in the Fruitvale district of Oakland, a few blocks below Hwy 580. Members have been moving in, as the previous tenants naturally move out over time. As of August 2023, 2 units are occupied by the tenants who are lovely neighbors but don’t choose to join the meals etc of the cohousing community. Six community members are living on site, and one nearby. We will have a one-bedroom apartments available for rent this fall.
Links:
http://
STOWE FARM COMMUNITY. We are a multi-generational rural co-housing community in Colrain, Massachusetts tucked into the beautiful hills of western Mass. There are currently 9 houses built, 1 house being built, and the last lot is available to complete our maximum capacity of eleven households. We also have many neighbors who are ‘social’ members (participate in gatherings, play dates, and other social activities).
Stowe Farm Community is rural with urban & university centers nearby. We have single family homes, which afford privacy within a supportive community. We are neighbors working together to improve the quality of our lives. Helping each other succeed makes our community thrive.
We help each other with child, pet, and farm animal care. Some of us work from home and some drive to our jobs. We currently raise chickens, ducks, pigs, turkeys, and goats. Many of us are enthusiastic about baking, cooking, brining, smoking, and fermenting food, especially food we grow and raise ourselves. We make bread, cheese, and charcuterie (specialty meats), and have plans to grow some ingredients to support our neighbor’s brewery.
We have a community truck, greenhouse, tractor, tree house, gardens, orchards, outbuildings, and other shared equipment and tools. Our common structure plans are evolving. We own individual lots in a 10 acre village, build our own homes and share the rest of the 80 acres which include play areas, arable farmland, a sparkling clean brook & river for swimming, pasture to raise animals, and conserved forest.
Stowe Farm Community provides a magnificent view down the North River valley to the Catamount Mountains. The views are spectacularly beautiful year round. Houses are clustered on a south-facing slope overlooking the West Branch of the North River and Stone Mountain.
We are 15 minutes from Shelburne Falls, MA; 20 minutes from Greenfield, MA; 45 minutes from Amherst and Northampton, MA as well as Brattleboro, VT. We are 20 minutes from Rte. 91; 3.5 hours from NYC. Small organic farms are taken seriously in western Mass, as well as music, art, social activism, and academics.
A special cohousing neighborhood in the Gold Country of the Sierra foothills in Grass Valley, California. The wooded site is on a hill bordered at the bottom by free-flowing Wolf Creek. Members enjoy both a paved trail and a single track woodland trail along the creek. We can walk to shopping, grocery stores, and restaurants. It is also a short walk or bike ride to historic downtown Grass Valley. Of the 7.9 acres total, one-third will be preserved as natural habitat.
We are a group who share a common vision of living in community. We include teachers, journalists, engineers, medical/dental professionals, nonprofit administrators, musicians, world travelers, bicyclists, kayakers, retirees, and more. We have no age restrictions and our members now range in age from their fifties to late eighties.
Wolf Creek Lodge houses 30 condominiums and enjoys the convenience of both above and underground parking and elevator access. Members enjoy a large, state-of-the-art kitchen and dining area for optional community meals, laundry and activity space, a beverage/coffee bar, and an inviting sitting area in the 4,000-foot common house. Outside amenities include a hot tub, Petanque court, a large terrace with barbecue, and inviting, environmentally appropriate landscaping.
The Lodge is self-managed by the entire group and decisions are made by consensus.
Environmental sustainability is a central value, taking into consideration everything from solar thermal panels, solar photovoltaic panels and electric vehicle charging stations at all 30 parking spaces. The lodge was built with sustainable, non-toxic building materials.
Construction began in the fall of 2010, and move-in began in October of 2012. Our friendly and diverse community welcomes visitors and new members. Homes become available from time to time. Check our website for currently available homes.
Please visit the Wolf Creek Lodge website to learn more about our community.
Belfast is a city of 7,000 people located in midcoast Maine between Camden and Bar Harbor. The city features an active waterfront and lively arts community and is the center of business, services, and government for the surrounding county. Traditional housing in the Belfast area falls into two main categories: in-town residential neighborhoods and rural, large-lot homesteads. Belfast Cohousing & Ecovillage is a community that combines the best elements of both types: located in a rural area with clustered housing and shared infrastructure, but working to preserve neighboring open land for wildlife, recreation, and farming, while fostering a close-knit, cooperative, and intentionally ecological way of life.
We are a group of roughly 70 people from many walks of life. We are business owners, educators, naturalists, gardeners, builders, farmers, health care providers, writers, musicians, and children. Our 42-acre community is located just two miles from Belfast’s downtown and harbor. We are within 1.5 miles of elementary, middle, and high schools, a YMCA, and grocery and retail stores.
All of our homes are highly energy-efficient, with triple-pane windows and doors, lots of insulation, and are oriented toward the sun. Two-thirds of the homes have solar systems, making them near net-zero for energy consumption. Personal garden plots are available, and we have a community orchard and high tunnel for winter greens. We also have a 3-acre worker share CSA farm on our property that is currently dormant, where neighbors have gathered to harvest veggies and maintain the land.
Our 4,000 sq ft common house has a living room, dining room, playroom, guest rooms, and root cellar. We enjoy weekly events including music, educational seminars, movies, games, potlucks and social gatherings.
Please visit our website for more information on visiting us or to learn more about the available homes. All the units are either owner-occupied or rented directly by the owner.
The Adawehi community has been together over 25 years. We have found that living in community, surrounded by loving people ensures ample opportunities to really get to know yourself, and embrace the diversity of others. All people come with a myriad of gifts to share with the world, but we also have an innate desire to immerse ourselves in environments that encourage us to learn and grow.
This is what Adawehi is about. From our organic grocery and greenhouses to our resale shops and labyrinth, we invite you to share your expressions and to explore the undiscovered parts of yourself. There are wonderful spiritual awareness classes onsite should you choose to embrace a deeper level of personal growth.
If you are ready to experience this new adventure, reach out to us through our https://adawehi.com website.
Clearwater Commons is an intergenerational residential community, with participants ranging from small children to elders. We began forming in June 2006 when a group of families purchased a 7.4-acre site on North Creek, 11 miles north of the Seattle, Washington, city limits. The site includes wetlands, wooded spaces, and a salmon stream. As of December 2020 all 16 homes are completed and occupied, a common shop, art studio, shed, garden and a 300sf passive guest house (currently rented).
The physical design of the community represents our underlying values of community and low-impact development. Pedestrian walkways, community gardens, benches, shared shop, tool and storage sheds, and play spaces reflect our desire to interact with neighbors through the natural course of our days.
The inspiration for this community grew from founding members’ involvement in The Clearwater School, located across the street. Our shared experience with the school encourages us to allow the structures for community meetings, gatherings, and events to evolve through our daily interactions, rather than follow a preset or mandated framework.
We take on a responsibility to act as stewards of our land—-restoring and enhancing the natural environment, including the stream, wetlands, habitat, and wildlife. We value relationships between individuals, families, and our environment, and promote a lifestyle that will sustain these relationships. We trust each family to make decisions that are aligned with our intent of sustainability and that balance individual autonomy and community needs. We expect that the specific commitments of our community will change over time, and we wish to avoid hard and fast rules. We value communication and discussion and take the time needed to voice, discuss, and understand diverse perspectives in order to reach informed and conscious decisions.
The Living Well Ecovillage is a mixed-use community/ecovillage focused on health/wellness, sustainability, service to the greater good, and honoring the sacred.
This is a 126-acre property bordered by about a mile of frontage on the Deep River on one side and almost a mile of frontage on Sandy Creek on the other side.
The community has a combination of private and shared spaces, a community garden, a Greenway/Railtrail along the Deep River, a neighborhood park, and 53 acres of natural area buffering the creek and river. The Living Well Earth Stewards (a separate nonprofit organization) offers a monthly Folk School.
The property is beautiful with mountain-like topography, the river, rock outcroppings, high areas, the creek, trails, beautiful woods, and abundant wild edible and medicinal plants.
Our community is located near major highway corridors, just two miles from Highway 64 in the town of Franklinville, North Carolina. This property has regional appeal and access, being only a 40 minute drive from Greensboro, 15 minutes from Asheboro and Siler City, and an hour and 15 minutes from RTP (Research Triangle Park), Raleigh, Durham, and Charlotte. We are centrally located between the mountains and ocean, and at the midpoint on the eastern seaboard between New York and Florida. We are also approximately a 6 hour drive from Washington, D.C. and Atlanta, Georgia.
Elderberry is situated on a 10 acres in scenic, rural Rougemont, North Carolina, approximately 30 minutes north of downtown Durham. Durham, the home of Duke University, provides many cultural and learning experiences. Durham is also known for its many outstanding restaurants, arts and festivals.
Elderberry provides a unique model for adults living simply and supporting one another as we grow older, continuing to enjoy the activities we love, with close neighbors and friends.
A cozy community of 18 individually-owned, energy-efficient, universally-designed homes (duplexes and quadraplexes) where members may interact, work on projects, eat and play together, as we choose, and pursue our unique interests and spiritual paths. A large common house for cooking, group meals, exercise, music, dance, crafts, special events, guests and other activities is situated in the center of the community surrounded by a courtyard with paths connecting homes.
As a rural community would imply, we have created community vegetable gardens and areas for animals with the intention of being mindful of protecting the ecological integrity of the land, with the goal of becoming an ecovillage, and as self reliant as possible.
Elderberry is a self-managed, consensus-based community where all members have equal voice in decisions. The community was founded by three members of a nearby intentional community and is self developed.
We are in a residential neighborhood 6 blocks from Castro Street (the main street of Mountain View) and downtown amenities (restaurants and sidewalk cafes, bookstores and other shops, the performing arts center and library); near CalTrain, the Light Rail, bus depot, and the weekly farmers’ market; adjacent to Landels Elementary School; and close to the Stevens Creek Trail (biking and walking).
Our 19 condominiums are quite large, ranging in size from 1360 to 2090 sq ft. In addition, we have 6,000 sq ft of shared indoor space. The common house (4000+ sq ft) has facilities for entertainment, exercise, group dining, and crafts. Parking is underground, with some charging stations for electric cars. We also have a workshop, bicycle and other storage spaces, a large outdoor patio, and shared green space. A historic farmhouse on the property has been restored, and has space for meetings and guests.
Our buildings are “green” and energy efficient, with universal design and elevator access to all floors. The units are very well insulated to minimize sound transmission and to minimize the need for heating or cooling, regardless of outside temperature. Our community has an organic garden, 20-tree fruit orchard, and flowers.
The project was designed by members of our cohousing community via design workshops led by architect Chuck Durrett. It has been endorsed by the Greenbelt Alliance for its sustainable features.
We are eight households of individually constructed homes surrounding a circle “green” within the larger 20+ acre community land. Our common house is a 1200 sq ft facility with laundry, kitchen, bathroom, guest room and office alcove. We are located in rural south Whidbey Island among cedars, meadows, and a creek; stewardship of our land is a community priority.
Valverde Commons, in the heart of Taos, New Mexico, is a senior (55+) cohousing community of 28 private home sites designed and operated by its residents. As a sustainable community, our homes are built with energy efficiency, water-saving features, and harmony with the local environment in mind. Our homes encircle the Commons, a central area rich in native plantings bordered by a circular path connecting neighbors who love to take advantage of opportunities to socialize.
Residents share a Common House that features a full kitchen, laundry facilities, a library, game collection, art displays, and meeting spaces. In addition, a Common Barn provides a complete woodworking shop, shared landscaping tools and equipment, and space for individual projects.
Valverde Commons is well situated in a stunningly beautiful natural setting within easy walking distance to the many venues for cultural and outdoor experiences that Taos offers. Sunset Park, adjacent to Valverde Commons, provides 5 acres of open space for the greater Taos community.
A Sustainable Cohousing Community
Valverde Commons was envisioned by long-time Taos residents, Bob and Isabella Draper, Stephen Rose and Barbara Zaring, who wanted to create an intentional community in their beloved town of Taos, New Mexico. They bought a 10-acre parcel within walking distance to Taos Plaza and, soon after, like-minded Taosenans joined the many potlucks and planning sessions. With zoning approvals obtained, roads, water, electricity, sewers, fiber optic cables and phone lines established the infrastructure of Valverde Commons in the fall of 2009. The first home was completed in 2010. Currently, Valverde Commons has twenty-seven private homes, a well-appointed 2,200-square-foot community house, and a barn, home to a professional quality woodworking shop.
Our Flavor of Cohousing
Cohousing is defined as an intentional community where residents actively participate in the design and management of their own neighborhood. Residents have their private spaces but make a commitment to look out for their neighbors’ well-being. Every cohousing community is different as each strikes its own balance between individual space and social contact. Contact the National Cohousing Association for more information.
The Valverde Commons Homeowners Association (VCHOA) utilizes majority rule in decision-making and empowers committees to make decisions within their purview. All Valverde Commons Association members (Commoners) are welcome to be on any committee. VCHOA facilitates monthly business meetings for discussion and community information and, when needed, vote on important issues.
Commoners have designed and built their own homes following HOA Covenant guidelines of aesthetics, sustainability, and stylistic elements that are harmonious with the northern New Mexico environment. Homeowners are responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of their private property. Nearly four acres of open space and two buildings, a 2,200-square-foot common house and 1,000-square-foot barn are shared in common. These buildings and the open space are maintained by all homeowners through their HOA fees and monthly work days.
Participation in all activities and meetings is optional.
Commoners commit to being respectful and generous neighbors, and are comfortable with letting relationships build organically.
Oakcreek Community was completed in 2012 and all 24 of our 1- and 2-bedroom homes have been sold and occupied for 5 years.
As of November 2019, we are fully occupied. We maintain a group mailing for quarterly newsletters, and within that group an Interested List. Please contact us if you would like to be included on either list, if you seek a tour of the community, or would like to take the opportunity to speak with one of our Public Relations team members.
This senior cohousing neighborhood is for adults 55+. We have a beautiful 7+ acre-treed-lot in the center of Stillwater in close proximity to retail and health facilities. Oklahoma State University and all of the academic, sport, and cultural activities of a major university are within 1 mile of the property. Walking/biking trails and Boomer Lake are within 1/4 mile. Our homeowners are a mix of retired and not-retired, singles and couples. Visit our website to meet the newest senior cohousing community and the first in Oklahoma! Better yet, come to visit Stillwater in beautiful north central Oklahoma and see why Oakcreek and Oklahoma are MORE than OK.
Check out our narrated Drone video of the community and surrounding area on our website (www.oakcreekstillwater.com). From HOME go to ABOUT US. You are sure to enjoy the drone as well as the other two videos of our community. While on our website you can learn more about us and learn of homes for sale by owners when they come available.
(Construction completed in July 2014, with all condo units sold. Please visit www.durhamcoho.com for more info and to sign up for communications.)
Durham Coho (The Durham Central Park Cohousing Community) is a group of individuals, couples and families who have created an urban, green, intentional cooperative housing community in downtown Durham, North Carolina (USNews “Best Places to Live”).
We are located within easy walking distance of the Farmers’ Market, the library, the YMCA, restaurants, stores, county senior center, parks, performing arts center, and theaters. We’re less than 2 miles Duke University and its famous Medical Center. Our four-story building of 24 urban condominiums designed for aging-in-place was completed in July 2014 with units of 850-1700 sq ft and with access to common dining room, kitchen, great room, meeting rooms, guest bedrooms, gardens, and rooftop patio.
As cool as our building is, our community of members is what makes Durham Coho truly special. Our lively and creative group includes medical, legal and financial professionals, scientists, teachers, academics, social workers, musicians, published authors, craftsmen and artists.
We’re an umbrella group seeking to foster the development of a number of ecovillages and cohousing communities in the New Jersey-New York-Philadelphia region.
We are a very diverse community in an incredibly dense neighborhood in Seattle – Capitol Hill. We have all of our 9 households with children between ages 5 and 19 years old and our adults range from early 40’s to early 70’s.
We have 9 units on 4500sf lot (smaller than the typical Seattle single family lot). Our property is located 3 blocks from light rail and has great bus access. We built with high Built-Green and LEED guidelines achieving as many high-performance sustainability metrics for energy and water usage as much as was financially feasible both now and planning for future upgrades.
We broke ground in late October, 2014 and took occupancy in March, 2016. Please note we are a unique hybrid model. All members pay $30,000 to join our LLC. The members built the apartment building and we are self-managed. We will pay market rate rents which will be kept artificially as stable as possible, rather than increasing with the market. This is intended to entice longevity. We are currently developing a vesting system. There has been no turn over since move in and none is anticipated. It’s unlikely we’ll have any openings but to be notified please join our mailing list on our website. That is where any short-term rentals or long-term residencies would be announced.
Urban cohousing in downtown Santa Cruz. An all-age community, contained in a 3-story LEED compatible building with underground parking. There are 19 units, 700-1400 square feet, plus a large common area and terrace. We commit to being a vibrant community, sharing meals 3 times a week, living in a location where we are far less dependent on cars since we can bike and walk to shops, restaurants, the beach and incredible hiking trails.
Richmond Cohousing is a multi-generational, urban cohousing community in Richmond, Virginia. Our solar-panel-topped, condo-style building has 19 single-level one-, two- and three-bedroom units on four floors. Common spaces include a large dining/meeting area, community kitchen, kids play room, guest space, workshop/storage area, and a 3000 square foot rooftop deck with views of downtown. Construction began March 2019 and members moved in late 2020 (yes, during the COVID-19 pandemic – that wasn’t in our initial visioning!).
Our community is in the Manchester neighborhood of Richmond. This historic area is just over the James River from downtown and walkable or bikable to many attractive features including a library, restaurants, playgrounds and pocket parks, a large farmer’s market, and outdoor activities at the river. Public transit and bike lines are expanding throughout the area and the site is less than 2 (easily bike-able) miles to the 50+ mile long Virginia Capital Trial walking/bike path.
While new to living together, Richmond Cohousing has been active for a number of years. We’ve sung, biked, played games, and volunteered together. We’ve eaten community dinners together. We’ve drafted agreements on the way we want to live together. We’ve honed our meeting format, and we’ve laughed together – a lot. Through it all, we’ve become a genuine community and are excited for others to join us with their own perspectives and personalities. Richmond Cohousing is looking to attract a diverse membership and welcomes singles, couples, families, those just starting out, and those wanting to age in place.
White Pine Cohousing is a six unit community on 41 acres of meadow and forest land located in rural central Vermont, just outside of Montpelier. The houses are clustered on the south side of the seven acre meadow to enhance solar exposure and maintain the open fields for gardens, wildlife and activities. We aim to create and maintain a residential community that both respects individual needs and expects member participation in managing the social and physical requirements of the community. We have village-like informal connections and use a consensus decision-making process. Our individually owned homes were built with environmentally sound construction, are super insulated, share a common heating system and have small ecological footprints.
We are a welcoming, urban community built in 2015 in the heart of Tennessee’s capital.
Our cohousing community includes 25 small homes and a Common House with members ranging in age from 3 to 80, including singles and couples. Our community strives to be multi-cultural, multi-generational, and diverse with families and children.
Homes:
Square footage 659-1,320
1- or 2-BR flats to 3-BR townhomes
Ext. design of brick and hardy plank
Energy-efficient
Super insulation
Solar-ready infrastructure
Homes offer a private courtyard and rain garden, decks and patios
Our Common House is located on the corner of Taylor and 5th Ave North, 37208. Its glass walls and wrap-around porch overlooks an old cottonwood tree, perfect for swinging and other playful activities. Inside we have a dining room, fully-equipped kitchen, a children’s playroom, a cozy living room, activity room, guest bedrooms, and a laundry room. Our courtyard and rain garden include edible landscaping with creative gardening along wall trellises and raised beds.
Located on the Cumberland River, Nashville is known for its music industry and is central to publishing, banking, health care and a large number of colleges and universities, including Vanderbilt University. The entrepreneurial spirit of the city draws a variety of multicultural groups. The nearby downtown area offers popular attractions, including The Frist Art Museum, Country Music Hall of Fame, the world-renowned Ryman Auditorium, Bicentennial Mall and Farmers Market. The natural rolling hills that surround Nashville are beautiful year-round and call to outdoor enthusiasts. Our community is located near the Greenway, which connects Nashville’s Warner Parks, Radnor Lake, and Shelby Bottoms. Rivers and tributaries offer opportunities for fishing and canoeing, and Old Hickory Lake and Percy Priest Lake offer boating and swimming.
Nashville was once rated by Forbes Magazine as third among growing cities because of our quality of life with low housing prices and a pro-business environment. According to the 2011 article, “A high quality of life, a vibrant culture and music scene with diverse population makes Nashville a desirable place to live.”
At times we have homes open for sale. Please go to our website, sign up for our newsletter, and/or contact us at: germantowncohousing.com
Units for Sale: 1) 3 bedroom 2 bath up/down . $525,000. Available August 2024.
2) 2 bedroom 1 bath flat. $425,000. Available Sept 2024
for Info call 907-399-2051
Ravens’ Roost is Anchorage’s first and only Cohousing neighborhood. It has a total of 35 homes. There are 32 owner occupied homes and 3 rental units owned by members of the community. Ravens’ Roost is set on 6 acres of land with large sections of native birch and spruce.
Uniques features of Ravens’ Roost include:
1. A large common house with kitchen, dining room, library, kids room, laundry room and 2 guest rooms.
2. A large workshop equipped with multiple building and wood-working tools, ski and bicycle maintenance areas, sewing/craft area, and exercise equipment.
3. Outside of the Common House are raised garden beds for personal use and community dinners. We have a kids fort & swings, a hoop house for extending the growing season and an orchard with apple and cherry trees planted in 2022. We also have a resident beekeeper.
4. The site is conveniently located in southeast Anchorage with easy access to arterial roads, yet still nestled in the foothills of the Chugach Mountain Range. We are close to shopping, restaurants, 2 Universities (UAA and APU), 3 hospitals, and lots of trails for mountain biking, hiking, walking, skiing (cross country and downhill) and snow boarding. A paved bike path connects to many other paved bike paths, making making Ravens’ Roost bike friendly and accessible to many parts of Anchorage by bike.
5. Ravens’ Roost is located within a two mile radius of a High School, three elementary schools and a Jr. High School. We have private and charter schools near by as well.
6. We are located across the road from Ruth Arcand Park with many paths for daily forest walks and xcross country skiing.
We currently have 35 households, many from Anchorage but others from Fairbanks, AK, the east coast, California and the Southwest. We are a multigenerational community from infants to seniors with diverse backgrounds. Detailed bios are available on our website. We are not actively seeking new neighbors but will waitlist interested people. Please contact us through our website: ravensroostcoho.org
PDX Commons is an urban cohousing condominium development in one of Portland’s great neighborhoods. This is a four-story new building situated around an enclosed garden courtyard and common house. There are 27 units (1, 2 and 3 bedrooms) ranging from 650-1250 square feet. The neighborhood includes grocery stores, trendy shops, popular restaurants, music venues and brewpubs. It’s the ultimate in walkability (95 Walk Score). We sit directly on the #15 bus line for excellent public transit. The Sunnyside Belmont neighborhood is a vibrant, dynamic place in the inner heart of Portland, constantly rated as one of the most livable cities in the US. Designed for active adults, we are a 55+ community. The units and building are designed for age-in-place and age-in-community. Many of our Commoners still work in their professions but are close to retirement. We are teachers, nurses, therapists, doctors, lawyers, developers, financial expert, consultants, environmental specialists with an international sommelier to sort out our wine choices. We are generally liberal leaning (as one might expect in Portland) though it is certainly not a requirement. Members began moving into the building in July, 2017. The project is currently sold out. A waiting list is available. Come check us out. pdxcommons.com
Welcoming new members! Join us in creating an urban cohousing community in the city of West Sacramento — voted the “Most Livable City in America, under 100,000 population” by the US Council of Mayors.
We have our permit and are under construction! We are building an energy efficient, 4-story, 35-condo cohousing project with an expected December 2023 move-in. A few one, two, and two-plus bedroom, fully equipped condos are still available to reserve. Floor plans available following site and Zoom information tours. Our design includes on-site parking, a native-plant garden, a bike/dog-washing area, and a spacious second level terrace. Residents share 5,800 sq ft of interior community space, including a large dining room with kitchen, guest rooms, craft and exercise rooms, coffee/wine nooks, and more.
Our property is part of a bikeable, walkable historic residential neighborhood two blocks from the Sacramento River (where one can birdwatch, boat, or explore the Riverwalk). We’re just minutes from Old Sacramento, the Golden 1 Center NBA arena, River Cats AAA baseball, museums, restaurants, pubs, shopping, Sacramento Amtrak (11 trains daily to the Bay Area), and 20 minutes from the Sacramento International Airport.
JOIN our diverse community of single/married and working/retired households. Help create your future neighborhood. Explorer status available for $100. Visit our website at washington-commons.org and follow us on Facebook. Want to talk to a real person? Call our outreach coordinator, Shelly Parks, at 425-308-0639.
UPDATE July 2024: a 1-BR, 1-BA unit is now AVAILABLE FOR SALE. For more information about the unit, please visit https://mailchi.mp/05d5551c6e69/bay-state-cohousing-10647297.
Bay State Cohousing is a multigenerational community in Malden, Massachusetts, an inner suburb of Boston. We are located at 368 Pleasant Street, a short walk from the Malden Center subway station (20 minutes to downtown Boston), schools, groceries, restaurants, and public parks. The Northern Strand Community Trail and Bike to the Sea pass nearby, and the Middlesex Fells (a 2,200-acre state park) is one mile away.
Working with our architects and consultants, we developed an energy-efficient 30-unit building for the site. Our community has 5,000 sq ft of shared common space, including kitchen, dining room, living room, meeting rooms, kids’ space, exercise room, art room, and soundproofed music room. The property also has a patio and yard for gathering and gardening, shared decks on the upper floors, and underground parking.
Update July 2024 — our youngest generation is growing, with the births of a baby boy in April and a baby girl in July!
Our new home has an award-winning, environmentally friendly design that reflects our commitment to sustainability and emphasizes beauty in both architecture and landscape. We value a balance between the private and the shared, with individually owned homes complemented by extensive common facilities and shared green space.
Our community spans four generations, including families, couples, and single people, with a wide variety of backgrounds and interests. During the development process — through thick, thin, and Covid — we evolved into a real community, growing in our capacity to support each other and keep us all growing. And finally in late 2022, after nearly a decade of planning and development, we moved in and began living in community!
If you’d like to learn more about us, please email us at baystatewebsite [at] gmail [dot] com.
At Emerson Commons near Charlottesville Virginia, we have designed a pedestrian-oriented multi-generational neighborhood where we cross paths with each other often. We can easily take the time to stop and chat. A beautiful club house allows us to have potlucks and neighborhood events togeth¬er. Neighbors co-manage the community and meet each other that way. A beautiful pool, walking trails by a creek, and multiple playgrounds give us further excuses to connect with our neighbors.
Emerson Commons is the first cohousing community in Central Virginia and is the first all-solar community in Virginia. All homes feature solar panels and each have a private backyard facing a forest. Rooftop terraces and decks provide views of the creek below for some homes and mountain views for others.
An 1890s farm house with an attached 1840s cabin has been renovated as the community club house. This extra space includes guest rooms that residents may reserve for out-of-town guests. Shared features such as shared lawnmowers, shared tools and space for storing bicycles and canoes will free up space in private homes and promotes a more sustainable lifestyle. Read more at the EmersonCommons.org web site.
Community Features: – 26 private homes surrounding a central green – community playground and car-free central area where kids can run free. Creeks on property. – large swimming pool with stone terrace – orchard, shared organic gardens and edible landscaping – 1890 farmhouse renovated as a club house – historic 1840s log cabin with fireplace – in charming town of Crozet – walkable to stores and restaurants – 19 minute commute to Charlottesville – 15 min to Shenandoah National Park and Appalachian trail.
Emerson Commons is well balanced intergenerationally. There are many families with children as well as folks who are retired or retiring and in between.
Phoenix Commons is a cohousing community for active adults aged 55+ located in Oakland’s Jingletown neighborhood along the estuary at the foot of the Park Street Bridge to Alameda. Open for residence since March, 2016, in 41 units built with universal design principles, Phoenix Commons was the vision for aging well in community.
We, the members of this intentional community, are learning on the job the principles of participation, collaboration and consensus decision-making while working together and through teams to address community needs and concerns in such areas as wellness promotion, facility and common space management, finance and legal, governance, landscaping, social and community engagement, and twice-weekly common meals.
Our members come from a wide variety of backgrounds and geographies, contributing their skills and talents to create a dynamic and socially engaged community. We have various reasons for choosing to live here, in community with others, as we age in place together. Many of our members still work full-time while others are active in a variety of recreational, cultural, social, civic and political advocacy activities. All are committed to building and sustaining our community and the social connectedness that has been associated with health and well-being in older adulthood.
A senior cohousing condominium development – for ages 55+.
We are 28 homes, a Common House, artist studio, woodworking shop and gardening facilities.
Our land was purchased in 2014; our contractor was hired in February 2016.
We began living together in October 2017.
• VILLAGE HILL COHOUSING (VHC) is an inclusive, multi-generational community with 28 homes located one mile from the vibrant downtown area of Northampton, Massachusetts, next to Smith College, and adjacent wooded conservation land.
• Healthy living, personal growth, mutual support and ecologically sustainable practices – together with personal privacy – are among the major benefits Village Hill Cohousing offers.
• Walking and bike paths, plus nearby bus routes, make VHC the perfect location for eco-minded families and individuals who want to live lightly on the land in a forward-thinking larger community. Many of the current Members have worked with project developer Sunwood Builders and Fitch Architects to cooperatively design the community.
About Village Hill Cohousing:
The entire infrastructure of the Village Hill Cohousing site will be energy-efficient construction, balancing a greatly reduced ecological impact with sustainability and livability.
Core values:
• Compassionate living, sustainability, community and connection
• Working towards building a diverse, multi-generational community
• Energy-efficient homes and common house
• Green space, gardens and beautiful views, surrounded by protected conservation land
Features of VHC:
• Variety of unit sizes, types and prices
• A short walk or bike ride to downtown Northampton
• Close to restaurants, entertainment, arts, music, education (hub of the “Five-College” area)
• Close to bike rail trails, hiking, snowshoe and cross-country ski trails, waterways, and many rich opportunities for outdoor activities
• Local bus line stop and rail trail spur are in the neighborhood
• Bus and Amtrak service to major cities; 45-minute drive to Bradley International Airport
• Centrally located in New England: about 4.0 hours to New York City, less than 2 hours to Boston
About Northampton:
A city of 30,000 people, Northampton is a unique and special blend of urban and rural, historic and contemporary, intellectual, artsy, athletic, and entrepreneurial energy. The Pioneer Valley hosts five colleges and universities.
For more information, visit:
http://villagehillcohousing.org
http://www.northampton-k12.us
http://www.explorenorthampton.com
http://www.visitnorthampton.net
http://www.northamptonma.gov
If our shared values of compassionate living, sustainability, community and connection resonate with you, we look forward to speaking with you.
16 families have joined to share and care for 10 acres of forest and meadow at the edge of Langley town on South Whidbey Island, walkable to Salish Sea shore (Puget Sound) and one hour north of downtown Seattle including fifteen minute ferry ride. Each family income qualifies at medium or low income level to own a 2000 sq. ft. lot (plus their equal share of the remaining 10 acres) on which to design/build their own home, under 975 sq.ft. There are 12 homes built and inhabited, 2 more homes in building phase and the Common house currently being designd. Homes and lots will remain perpetually affordable.
The Aria Cohousing Community is built on a commitment to one another and to the community beyond. Cohousing is a type of intentional, collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their community. The Aria Cohousing Community includes a shared kitchen, community room, dining room, sunroom/library, laundry room and outdoor spaces. The former Marycrest convent at the heart of the larger Aria Denver was redeveloped into a 28-unit inter-generational cohousing community. Eight of the 28 units are designated as affordable. We believe that living together, sharing meals, engaging in meaningful activities together, and helping each other with life’s burdens and joys is an important part of a life well lived.
A great group of friends have started a community house/co-op/intentional living community/big house.
Follow us @laserheights
Vision
A place that fosters personal and communal growth, creative expression, and fun and that serves as a community hub that fosters/inspires affordable, sustainable, and supportive living.
Mission
Enhancing our shared life experience and cultivating community by hosting events (including community events, workshops, health and wellness, parties), and offering community service, gardening, and composting.
Trying to decide if community life is for you, or want more general information?
A resource list is here:
https://athomehousing.org/resources/
Village Hearth Cohousing members began moving into our community in May 2020. Built on 15 beautiful wooded acres just 15 minutes from downtown Durham, NC, we have 28 accessible, single-level homes that we planned with the guidance of Katie McCamant and Charles Durrett. We are so pleased with the way our community has come together. Our members are committed to mutual support, and they bring a wide variety of skills and interests to share.
Village Hearth Cohousing is the first LGBT-focused 55+ cohousing community in the United States. Our members include LGBT couples and singles, straight couples and singles, still working and retirees (and our pets!)
We’ve eaten the food grown in our gardens, built things to enhance our homes and community in the woodworking shop, hiked, biked, and kayaked at the many nearby natural areas, stayed fit in the exercise room, meditated in our woods, and enjoyed each other’s company on our front porches and common house terrace.
For more information, visit our website, www.VillageHearthCohousing.com, or follow us on Facebook. Contact Pat or Margaret at VillageHearthCohousing@gmail.com to learn how to join our Resale Notification List.
Imagine living in an inclusive, intergenerational community in the Bay Area of California. Many choose Fremont for its wonderful Mediterranean climate, but there’s so much more to love. Wallet Hub ranks Fremont as the happiest city in the U.S. and as best city to raise a family.
Our future home offers:
Great schools
Plenty of work opportunities
Ideal climate
Award-winning water quality
Walkability
View of Mission Peak and Diablo Range
Hiking and biking trails nearby
Public transportation nearby
Proximity to San Francisco & the Silicon Valley
Our professional partners include Kathryn McCamant of Cohousing Solutions as our development consultant, Gunkel Architecture as our architect, Urban Development + Partners as our developer, and CoVision Consulting as a sales consultant.
Our design plans have received City approval, and now we are are looking to expand our group! If you enjoy the outdoors and friendly neighbors, Mission Peak Village might be for you. Our 32 homes range from 1-3 bedrooms and will feature a exercise room, quiet workspace, and workshop. We project to move in 2026-27.
We value community, sustainability, and engagement. Our community includes League of Women Voters members, former Peace Corps Volunteers, and environmental advocates. We enjoy the perfect balance of privacy and community, which is why we want to live among friends. If this interests you, become an Explorer and decide whether Mission Peak Village is the fit for YOU!
Progressive intergenerational co-housing community interested in environmental sustainability, social justice, community service and the arts. Located on five-acre semi-rural setting close-in to a historic college town in the wine country of NW Oregon with Mt. Hood view and abundant wildlife, 26 miles from Portland. Large, lovely historic common house newly refurbished with geothermal heating and cooling, plus energy efficient features. Established trees, landscaping, community art studio, orchard, garden, wood shop, chicken coops and outbuildings with easy access to wooded trails, and lots of open space for additional outdoor amenities, in addition to 9 free-standing cottages from 900 to 1400 sq. ft.
BRISTOL VILLAGE COHOUSING IN VERMONT
www.bristolcohousing.com
802-734-0798
LOCATION
• Located in the center of the village of Bristol, Vermont, 15 minutes from Middlebury College and 40 minutes from Burlington.
• Walking distance to shopping, restaurants, schools, library, town offices and performance space, public transportation and outdoor adventures.
• Situated on 2.45 acres, across from the town green
• Historic Italianate Common House was built in 1863. Received an award from Preservation Trust of Vermont for out contribution to the downtown streetscape.
• The homes are built to high performance energy efficiency standards.
We are a cooperative housing community with 8 households in a 3-story walk-up near Porter Square, Cambridge. Our urban location is ideal, convenient to shopping, good public schools, universities, public transportation, and bike lanes into Boston.
We come to this community as individuals with our own aspirations, values, and experiences. At the same time we recognize that the art of successful life in a cooperative community is dependent upon building healthy capacities for compromise. We seek to live in community, learning from each other, respecting our differences and resolving the inevitable conflicts that will arise from these differences. Kindness, compassion, and respect are the foundation for our interactions. We are committed to engaging in honest, direct, and respectful communication with each other.
Many of our members have been here for our history, since 1973, with new members bringing energy and commitment along the way. We’ve raised children together and now most of us are retired, enjoying grandchildren, family visits, travel and social occasions, as well as the cultural life of the city.
We share celebrations and support one another through losses. We gather for community events in our common room as well as our beautiful yard and gardens. We have off-street parking for one car per household. Many people stop on their walk to the “T” to smell our roses or choose a book from the Little Free Library.
Members own the building and land cooperatively, each household owning shares based on square footage. Shareholders rotate terms serving on the Board of Directors. We work together on committees and projects, including planning, maintenance, gardening, and social events. In our monthly meetings, we share perspectives and concerns, and make decisions by consensus.
Linden Cohousing is an intergenerational intentional community consisting of 45 one-to-three bedroom units in an urban neighborhood on the vibrant east side of Madison, Wisconsin. We welcome people of all racial, and economic backgrounds, all cognitive and physical abilities, and any sexual orientation. We are dedicated to creating a diverse, caring community through sharing material resources, common meals, celebrating our life events, and working and playing together. We care for the earth by promoting sustainable living practices. We hope to nurture connection and collaboration with our neighborhood and broader community.
A cohousing community of 30 households, welcoming and inclusive, using planet-friendly building materials and practices. Embraced by the beauty of rivers & mountains, and nestled in a culturally dynamic, small university town
Homes 904-1482sq ft. footprint, some with second floor loft and basement options.
Community members share ownership of:
• 4000 sq ft solar-powered Common House
• walking paths through our wooded 19-acre site
• community garden (and chicken coop)
• shared woodworking and tool shop
• bike & kayak and other storage
• recycling shed
Shepherd Village is ideal for empty nesters who are looking to downsize and simplify their lives in the Eastern Panhandle of WV while enjoying the gifts of intentional community. Shepherd Village is a 10 min drive to the MARC commuter train to Washington DC. The site is also a short walk from the heart of town, with its shops and restaurants, easy access to the Potomac River and many outdoor activities. Shepherd University offers a wide variety of cultural and educational opportunities, and hosts the nationally acclaimed Contemporary American Theatre Festival every summer.
Silver Leaf, an elder cohousing project, consists of a group of artistic, caring, and creative individuals committed to living cooperatively and harmoniously with our neighbors, the land, the environment, and the community at large. We are committed to live simply on a smaller footprint allowing time and resources for the pursuit of creative endeavors.
The project will consist of twelve small, universally designed/accessible homes, and common amenities to include an organic garden, native landscaping, a wood-burning bread oven, and a common house. The common house will include space for a kitchen, dining area, multi-purpose room for social and educational gatherings, guest room(s), creative art/work space, a shop, laundry room, and space for exercise and yoga.
Silver Leaf is located in Paonia, Colorado, a vibrant small town committed to organic farming and ranching, the arts, and spiritual, creative endeavors. Paonia is unspoiled and one of the most beautiful towns in Colorado.
We are a forming cohousing community in Houston Texas. We are under construction, building a 33-unit cohousing community. Our site is a walkable urban area inside Loop 610 with good access to public transportation.
Our membership ranges from retired corporate execs to young families with children and everything in between. We’re looking for enthusiastic future cohousers to join us in this adventure.
Our professional team includes:
Katie McCamant, development consultant
English & Associates (our local Houston expert) and Caddis Architects (our cohousing experts)
David Kelley, developer
Check us out:
o Visit our web site (https://www.cohousinghouston.com/) and subscribe to our newsletter to get monthly updates.
o Join our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/cohousinghouston/)
o Attend one of our many public information meetings every month on Zoom. Register here: https://www.cohousinghouston.com/events.
Or just drop us a line at info@cohousinghouston.com and we’ll give you a call.
We are the first senior cohousing community in New England! ^^^ Our first 7 households closed on and MOVED IN starting Valentines Day 2024!! ^^^ We expect the remaining 19 to move in starting this summer. ^^^ We have a lovely 2 bedroom walkout available NOW for reserving! ^^^ A few homes are below market rate or affordable units, which we are actively engaged in building community with before kicking off the qualification process SOON. ^^^ Our community is in Littleton MA, a small farming town which is also on the commuter rail line to Boston. So we check the boxes for both small town and suburb! ^^^ We have wide-ranging interests and talents – gardening, woodworking, bicycling, cooking, kayaking, quilting and other fiber arts, yoga, singing and playing an orchestra-full of instruments, traveling, and the list goes on… ^^^ We are working fulltime or part time or are blissfully retired. ^^^ We are mostly long-time residents of other towns in the area, and have welcomed several ‘outlanders’ to the group. ^^^ Our original founders and core group have been together for several years and it’s been rather remarkably stable as forming cohousing goes, so we know each other well and are absolutely committed to bringing forth this vision. ^^^ Our biggest success story so far has been in community building among our participants, and we think that has much to do with our governance framework, sociocracy. People are engaged, energized, finding new connections, and having fun together. ^^^ For four summers, the entire group has gone a weekend retreat to a lake in New Hampshire or the coast of Maine. Summer camp for seniors?
Age 50+ Cohousing
We are working with design/engineering and our conceptual site plan on this south-facing site in the Berkshires, MA is on the website under “Our Site”.
We are designing for 35 homes. Solar PV and solar hot water energy systems will be incorporated into the design.
The Land Is Free. You own it.
Community members choose the floor plan and exterior design.
Homes will range from 850 sf to 1650 sf depending on wants and needs.
Common house will be 4000-4500 sf (3 levels).
General consensus thus far is single-floor living with open floor plan all though all homes will have a full size basement.
I do have an escrow agreement for the initial deposit to become a member.
First in get to choose where they live on site.
Wild Sage Cohousing is a 34-home community in Boulder, Colorado. Construction was completed in 2004 in the new Holiday Neighborhood, an urban infill site in North Boulder. Many environmental features and materials were used in the construction of Wild Sage.
Cedar Cohousing is a forming community of 9 households. We are searching for an urban site in the Twin Cities, of Minneapolis and St Paul, or first ring suburbs. Our hope is to find a site for 30 -40 homes in a 3-4 story building close to some urban amenities – transit, library, shops. We want to be a multi generational community. We operate with Sociocracy principles. Our members like to bicycle, hike, garden, walk, plant prairies.
Cool Creek Cooperative Neighborhood is located just south of the village of Mesa, Colorado, on the north slope of Grand Mesa 33 miles east of Grand Junction. It is an area characterized by stunning natural beauty and diversity, fresh air, abundant water, and easy access to public land.
In 2012 a group of friends began discussing ideas for a neighborhood that embraced the qualities of the area but envisioned a different way of living there. A vision took shape that combined the best characteristics of rural living with the value of a highly functional community – natural beauty, environmental quality, and neighbors who care about the common good, sharing resources and working together so that everyone can live more simply and sustainably. This common vision led to a plan to create Cool Creek, a cooperative neighborhood that would offer a healthy balance between personal life and the benefits of community.
The neighborhood is situated on a 9½ acre parcel of land. There are 10 private lots that collectively occupy approximately 2½ acres of the parcel. Adjacent to the house lots there is a common area of approximately 1½ acres where various shared resources (gardens, orchards, tools, multi-purpose building) will be located. The remainder of the land (~5½ acres) will be left as open land to be enjoyed by all residents. Mesa Creek runs through the property, creating a rich riparian area that provides a wonderful place to walk, cool off, and listen to the sounds of moving water and wildlife.
Cool Creek is surrounded by a diverse landscape that includes pasture lands, scrub woodlands, forests, wetlands and streams. The area is home to a wide variety of wildlife and relatively few people. From the neighborhood there are panoramic views in all directions, highlighted by Grand Mesa, Castle Rock, and the Roan Cliffs. The neighborhood is near the village of Mesa (walking distance), while also being close (a few minutes’ drive) to Powderhorn ski area and Grand Mesa, described as “the world’s largest flat top mountain”.
While Cool Creek offers many outstanding physical qualities and recreational opportunities, it offers something more vital and increasingly rare in today’s world – the opportunity to participate in a cooperative community, where neighbors work together and share resources so that each person can live more fully and sustainably.
We are an intentional cohousing community of 30 homes in beautiful Anacortes, WA (gateway to the San Juan Islands). Our first community members have moved in and as of Oct 31, 2022, we are expecting our last 15 homes to receive their Certificates of Occupancy in before the end of 2022. We expect to begin hosting monthly open houses in 2023, so please get on our mailing list if you would like to be informed of these dates.
Haystack Heights Cohousing formed around the opportunity to develop a beautiful three-acre property in the sought-after South Perry neighborhood of Spokane, Washington. The site is within walking distance of the neighborhood business district, a great grade school, bike trails, and parks. It is also on a bus line. Over the past 30 years the previous property owners restored the historic home existing on the property, and they also cultivated a large organic garden and orchard that we plan to preserve and expand.
We are creating an intergenerational village close to downtown Spokane. Shared community features, in addition to the common house and garden, will include a meditation hut, a greenhouse, a sauna, a hot tub, and a workshop, above which will sit a music room and teen hangout space. We will have clustered townhouses and flats to maximize efficiency, interaction, and green space. We plan to share skills and facilities where it makes sense, balanced with respectful privacy and independence where it is needed and desired. We strive for a decision-making and group process that is inclusive, as simple as possible, and flexible.
Please contact us if you have any questions! We are happy to provide site tours, and we go above and beyond to connect out-of-towners with this amazing space!
Ours will be an intentional neighborhood where we have people who we can celebrate with in good times and who we can count on in hard times. Combining the autonomy of private homes with the advantages of community living in a ‘’resident friendly” setting, we plan to create a socially and environmentally sustainable lifestyle, and cluster our homes around a Common House. Our founding members came together in 2016 to plan a multi-generational cohousing neighborhood within walking distance of Ridgway, Colorado. We intend to live cooperatively and sustainably, sharing resources as we care for each other and the environment.
Our home designs are completed, city approval and all environmental studies are done and we intent to begin preparing the site for construction summer of 2020. We have available five floor plans (728, 913, 1207, 1407 and 1628 square foot homes), ranging from 1-3 bedrooms. Current members are reserving their homes and participating in the neighborhood planning. Twelve of the available 26 units have already been claimed. Investing now, will save on the final cost of your home.
We welcome all ages, all backgrounds, all identifies and all beliefs grounded in community and friendship.
In 2013 a group of households came together for a potluck in Silverton, Oregon. Our purpose was to enjoy the great feast that we produced from our individual homes and to also talk about an idea that had surfaced for several of us; intentional community. That was the beginning of Evans Oaks. Since that time we have incorporated as an LLC (Evans Oaks), located and purchased a beautiful piece of land, and obtained approval from the City of Silverton for our project (including the necessary rezoning), completed all site and Right of way work and finished construction of our homes which we moved into during November and December of 2020.
Evans Oaks is an intentional community of private homes clustered around shared space. Each single family home has traditional amenities, including a private kitchen and small yard area. Our shared spaces feature a common house, which includes a kitchen and dining area, guest space and recreational spaces. We also have a workshop and garages with personal storage at both ends of the property. Shared outdoor space includes parking, walkways, open space, and gardens. Community members also share resources like tools, books, and recreational equipment. Households have independent incomes and private lives, but neighbors collaboratively plan and manage community activities and shared spaces.
For nearly 25 years the River School Farm has been developing beautiful gardens and recreation amenities along the banks of the Truckee river. Tom and Iris Stille have transferred ownership of the property to Dancing River Community LLC (DRC). They built several new duplex homes which have been sold. DRC is based on permaculture principals and biodynamic practices. Our intentional community is composed of 12 home sites located on more than an acre of land along the Truckee River. Our common grounds consist of river view terraces, amphitheater, pathways and a river beach. Garden areas include fruit trees, grape vines, edible and nectar producing flowers, culinary and medicinal herbs, and vegetable garden plots. Our common house includes a dance/yoga studio, guest room, bath room with shower, entertainment and meeting room as well as shaded out door patio spaces and summer outdoor food preparation area.
Join now. Move-in begins summer 2024.
Your cohousing dollars go further at Heartwood Commons-Tulsa. With only a few 2-bedroom homes left, now is the perfect time to dig in to find out if Heartwood Commons is the cohousing community for you. People are joining us from all over the country. We are told we are the least expensive cohousing community under construction in the country.
A little about us: Heartwood Commons in Tulsa, OK is a vibrant, progressive 55+ cohousing community in one of our country’s most livable cities. Tulsa features a small town feel with all the amenities of a larger city but without the hassles. Our Members are joining us from across the country and are attracted to an affordable, low cost of living and the friendly, progressive culture. Members are also looking forward to living on a beautiful site with friendly, engaged and proactive adults working together to create a welcoming community that values connection and sustainability, acceptance and diversity, health and wellness, and fun and support. Some of us are single, some married, some working, some retired. We come from many backgrounds and professions. Our common denominator is that we all share a desire to live in a neighborhood that fosters an active and supportive community lifestyle.
More about our available homes: Our private homes are all single story with no steps and feature an energy efficient deign that uses geothermal energy. Our available homes are 2-bedroom, 1 or 2-bath options (1,000 or 1,200 sq ft). The prices start at $438,900.
We are offering regularly scheduled Zoom events where you can meet us and learn more details about Heartwood Commons in Tulsa. We invite you to visit our event page on our website, sign up, and join us. We also offer site tours. If you happen to be in the area, please let us know.
We encourage you to call Suzy at 918-519-5298 or email heartwoodcommonstulsa@gmail.com. Suzy is happy to answer questions and share with you more details.
Check out our website at: https://www.heartwoodcommonstulsa.com/
Prairie Hill Cohousing, the first cohousing community in Iowa, welcomed its first four households in March 2018. By the first anniversary in 2019, more than half the 37 homes had been sold and the Common House had been completed. As of June 2023, all of our homes have been sold and moved into.
Prairie Hill Cohousing is a multigenerational Ecovillage on a nearly 8-acre infill site in a cosmopolitan city of 70,000. We are located on a bus line and near biking and walking trails about a mile from the University of Iowa and downtown Iowa City. Prairie Hill is adjacent to a small city park and near another large multifaceted city park. There are numerous restaurants and businesses to meet most of a person’s everyday needs within walking or biking distance of Prairie Hill.
Over four acres of our site is being used for gardens, prairie, orchard, and open space. We have been awarded state grants to support sustainable stormwater management practices on our site. As we continue to develop the open space and the land around our homes, we are following permaculture principles.
Committed to being a diverse, inclusive community, we are especially interested in attracting families with children. Current members range in age from 8 to 80. We include current and retired teachers, librarians, professors, a mediator, engineers, social workers, a landscape designer, a massage therapist, an editor, writers, a professional genealogist, and specialists in affordable housing.
Homes range from studio apartments in our Common House to two-story, two- or three-bedroom duplexes. Other homes are configured as four-plexes, single-story townhouses, and one-story duplexes. Our smallest homes are 515 square feet and the largest are 1,290 square feet. All homes are super-insulated and built to meet Energy Star and LEED certification standards. Many have installed solar panels on their roofs.
Iowa City ranks high in many national ratings of desirable communities, including 4th best place to live in America, according to the 2019 livability.org index. It has top-ranked public schools, a major research university and world-class university teaching hospital, a thriving arts and entertainment culture, free summer festivals, and Big Ten sports. It was the first UNESCO City of Literature in the country, home to the renowned Iowa Writers’ Workshop and excellent independent bookstores. Iowa City and the University of Iowa have silver ratings as a bicycle-friendly community and university, respectively according to the League of American Bicyclists. The city was the site for the first event in the 2019 World Cyclo-Cross World Cup series of international races.
Tres Placitas Del Rio is a small-scale cohousing community. We live in an urban neighborhood with a rural feel along a tree-lined river. We are 16 adults and 6 children in 11 households, with ages from 16 to 78. We have 11 houses plus a community ramada and plaza on 2.5 acres. Placement of houses along a driveway leaves a large open space with our community ramada and plaza, a play space, a vegetable garden, and a barn with nanny goats and hens. Pattern language, permaculture, and each member’s uniqueness shape and enrich our community. Homes are owner-designed and sometimes owner-built. We love children, animals, gardens, and creativity. An attitude of participation, resource consciousness and land stewardship is fostered.
We operate by listening to each other, discussing ideas, changes, and issues that surface. We pay attention to our dynamics and find the balance between community life and personal freedom. Our relationships are based on mutual respect between committed, caring, creative, and responsible individuals of all ages. We tend to engage actively in the social and political issues of our larger community and the planet. We are (extra)ordinary people from varied backgrounds living life in community without pretense. Tres Placitas is a strong base for a healthy life–a place to settle in and call it home.
Bull City Commons is a diverse urban cohousing community guided by kindness, respect, and mutual support. Together we are creating an oasis of individual and community well-being. Our 5-story cohousing condominium community in central Durham, NC, is within walking distance of a vital shopping district, a university campus and hospital, and public transit. Our indoor spaces are designed to be open and airy, blending with our woods-and-gardens environment, with indoor and outdoor spaces that support privacy, group activities, and neighborhood interaction. At Bull City Commons, we can truly be ourselves in this diverse and welcoming mid-sized city full of history, culture, and charming neighborhoods.
The residential cohousing community is the heart of Living Tree Alliance. Our approved plan is for seven residences, a common house and workshop on three of our 91acres of land. The village design is compact, accessible and ecologically oriented, balancing the dynamics of community engagement with the needs for personal space. The building design and construction is aesthetically inspiring, ecologically responsible and crafted with the help of skilled local tradesfolk. Our residential culture is oriented towards the observance of Jewish traditions, rituals and cycles while maintaining a spiritually inclusive consciousness
Creating A Cohousing Community
Sunnyside Village is a cohousing community in Marysville, 35 miles north of Seattle. The community has a strong focus on working together, environmental sustainability, and healthy living. The 5-acre village broke ground in September of 2023. To date, 28 of our 32 privately owned detached 2- and 3-bedroom cottages have sold. Community features include a shared multiuse common house, community workshop, greenhouse, organic garden, orchard, walking paths, and protected woodland. We actively invite families of all ages to join our community and promote intergenerational living. We celebrate diversity – all are welcome here.
Where Community Comes First
As a cohousing community we believe community comes first. We have each other’s backs. We know our neighbors and we help each other out. We are a community of safety and trust.
At Sunnyside Village each person has a voice. We discuss issues as a community to make decisions. Together, we create the community we want to be. We actively invite families of all ages to join our community and promote intergenerational living. We celebrate diversity – all are welcome here.
Building A Sustainable Cohousing Community
We are planning today for the community of tomorrow. We live modestly and use our resources efficiently. Sunnyside’s homes and shared common house are being built to the highest standards, sustainability, and energy efficiency. Our architects and developers specialize in building sustainable intentional communities:
• The homes will be Built Green Four Star Certified for sustainability and quality construction.
• The homes will have fire-resistant premium composite roofing shingles, engineered hardwood flooring, and fire-suppression sprinkler systems.
• The common house will be solar powered, and six electric charging stations will be located near easily accessible parking areas.
Creating A Balanced Life – Home and Work
Sunnyside Village Cohousing is being built to enhance balance between our work life and our home life. The community will offer the ability to work from home, to work from offices located in the common house, or to commute to work in nearby urban centers. Community social life will center around the multiuse common house, where we will have the opportunity to share meals, work on projects, or just visit.
In the Pacific Northwest, the natural environment is a big part of home life. Our community is located between the Salish Sea (Puget Sound) and the Cascade Mountains. The area includes a number of natural features including marine waters, tidelands, freshwater creeks and lakes, wetlands, rivers, and forests. Leisure and sport outdoor activities abound, including backpacking, boating, camping, day hiking, fishing, kayaking, kiteboarding, rowing, scrambling, skiing, snowshoeing, and swimming.
Learn More at SunnysideVillageCohousing.com
We’ve broken ground on a multigenerational cohousing community along the Rio Grande River in Albuquerque, NM! Our community features 25 beautiful, energy-efficient homes clustered around a shared open space, with a fully equipped common house and a range of community amenities. One three-bedroom townhome and one four-bedroom townhome are still available, priced at $545,500 and $619,500 respectively. Or you might be interested in our Wait Pool for unit sizes no longer available.
Click here to watch a video of our cohousing community: https://cohousingabq.org/video
Our land is on a quiet road with lots of families and kids. The neighborhood’s agricultural roots give it a rural feel, but the center of town is just a 3-minute drive away. Our community plans include play areas for kids, a shared farming area, a year-round greenhouse, an orchard, a workshop and electric vehicle charging.
We are diverse in age, background and identity, representing a mix of families with children, couples and singles. We range in age from 2 to 82, and there are 13 kids in our community so far. We have created a fun, caring culture among our group, regularly getting together for meals, camping trips and play dates by the river, in addition to collaborating on our community plans and supporting one another through life’s ups and downs.
In Albuquerque, there’s lots to keep us busy, from museums and galleries to nationally recognized wineries and breweries. With 310 sunny days per year, you can often find us outside—hiking, biking or skiing, or exploring the mountains, parks and historic sites all around the region. The Rio Grande that flows through the city center is a playground for kayakers, and miles of walking and cycling trails wind through its wooded banks.
Reach out to us or join an upcoming Meet & Greet to learn more about becoming a part of our community!
Email: neighbor@cohousingABQ.org
Phone: (505) 226-2802
Adams Creek Cohousing is a multi-generational community on a beautiful 2.4 acre wooded property in Hood River, OR. Adams Creek has year-round waterfalls and runs the length of the site. With close proximity to the natural beauty and recreational wonders of the Columbia River Gorge and Mt Hood, this location also allows for easy access to the charming downtown Hood River and close enough to take advantage of Portland’s city amenities. Community is more important than ever and our 25 households will offer a spacious common house, gardens, and many shared amenities.
Join us for an open house (virtual until we can meet in person) and see if Adams Creek Cohousing is for you.
We are a multi-generational community set in a beautifully landscaped avocado orchard on California’s Central Coast. We are midway between San Francisco and Los Angeles, just 20 minutes south of San Luis Obispo (home of California Polytechnic University). Just 2 miles from the Pacific Ocean, including the majestic Oceano Dunes, we’re surrounded by Central Coast’s wine country. While we live in a private, quiet, safe setting, our neighbor, Pismo Beach, is a bustling travel destination with fun-filled activities and stunning views of the ocean. Even the monarch butterflies love coming here every year.
Our 27 homes are passive solar designed, our Common House incorporates solar energy, and members are welcomed to participate in the community garden. (As a bonus, we are next door to a pesticide free farm overflowing with a variety of produce.) Members enjoy a yoga studio, workshop, trampoline, solar composter, playground, and a large Common House with guest rooms, big screen TV room, library, craft room, dining and kitchen areas.
Though it takes energy and time to maintain this beautiful land and keep up with the business needs of cohousing, we value play as much as work! We have common meals each week (including potlucks) and a variety of social gatherings throughout the year. Our time together tending the community is rewarding. After all, we’re nurturing connection and securing the future of our investment.
We welcome your visit to our beautiful home!
Cohousing is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the operation of their condominium complex. Cohousing provides the privacy we are accustomed to within community.
Cohousing residents commit to living as a community. The neighborhood’s physical design encourages both individual space and social contact. Private homes contain all the features of conventional homes, but residents also have access to extensive common facilities including open space, a playground, and a clubhouse (usually referred to as the common house).
Cohousing communities are designed as attached homes along streets and clustered around central courtyards. Communities have about 25 households. Because neighbors commit to a relationship with one another, cohousing communities use consensus as the basis for group decision-making.
The common house is the social center of a cohousing community. Common houses include a large dining room and kitchen, lounge, children’s space, and laundry room. The common house is a great place for dining, celebrations, and entertainment. Communities serve optional group meals in the common house several times a week. Regardless of the size of the community, there are many opportunities for casual meetings between neighbors, as well as for deliberate gatherings. Community members work together to care for the common property building a sense of cooperation, trust, and support.
Oak Park Commons Cohousing is pleased to announce that its 8 committed households have purchased a site at Carpenter and Madison Street and are moving quickly to complete the design and begin construction. There are 24 units in a 5-story building with 4500 square feet of Common Area (House). Construction has begun in May, 2024.
This 5th Floor Common Area includes a public kitchen, dining area, lounge, reading room, exercise room, children’s play area and outdoor terrace with garden. The group intends to include members of all ages from different professional, social, and ethnic backgrounds. The members meet monthly via Zoom as a Public Group to inform prospective members of the specifics of the progress of the community and the membership options. They meet separately as working committees to construct the membership, design, development, legal, and financial framework needed to complete the co-housing facility and community.
Only a few homes left!!! Started in April 2019, the Bozeman Cohousing group is working hard to bring cohousing to Montana. We are under construction and expect to start moving into homes summer of 2023! Our group is working with Cohousing Solutions, a group that brings a lot of expertise and experience. We are currently looking for committed individuals and families who would like to join us. If you are interested in learning more, please visit our website https://bozemancohousing.com
