Chances are if you grew up in a small town in New England in the 50s or 60s, the families on either side of your home were cousins and the ones next to them were second cousins. You probably flowed in and out of each other’s homes, shared transportation, tools, food from your gardens, clothing, and helped each other with errands and problems of various kinds. It was a natural way of life back then. There was not much stress and anxiety that accumulated because the neighborhood provided the antidotes. There was always someone available to lend a hand, a tool, an ear, or an hour or two of their time. Community events reinforced connections and sense of belonging. There was a spirit of working together to sustain families and the neighborhood.

As our blessed America evolved since the 1960s and 70s, the value of family and community diminished on several fronts. The industrial and technological eras created great job opportunities for young men and women, sometimes far away from their families and support systems. Many of those who stayed in their hometowns moved to the country for privacy, taking up the precious land that used to provide food for the community. We became a society of individuals who struggle in competition with their neighbors to fulfill the great American Dream that is based on our market economy – to own a house with a white picket fence in the suburbs or a house in the country with large acreage for privacy. With large corporate farms, big box stores, national and international banks and corporations eating up the small neighborhood enterprises that used to be the economic backbone and social fabric of our communities, we have eroded the sustainability of our lifestyles and our planet, and have set the course for our own demise. We find ourselves in the 21st century with many disenfranchised families, lonely single adults, empty-nesters, and struggling young families scattered all over the landscape of America. Many of today’s young families and aging adults live without the benefit of the support that used to be the domain of extended families and communities. We often hear that this generation of young people will be the first generation to be worse off than their parents. They are inheriting a “planet in peril,” a failed world economic system, never-ending religious conflicts and wars over the distribution of earth’s natural resources. 

President Obama is offering hope and dramatic changes for the future of our planet and our nation. His administration is developing policies and offering a stimulus package that will promote sustainability and responsibility. But even before Obama took office, there was a movement in this country that offered this hope, a movement that originated in Denmark and found its way to the United States in the 1980s – the co-housing movement. As a matter of fact, the movement is now so large that it has a national organization with a website and yearly conferences about co-housing. There are now over 120 completed co-housing communities in the United States and an equal number of communities in the development process.  

What is Co-housing?

Co-housing communities are similar to the old-fashioned neighborhoods with a spirit of working together and caring for each other. Co-housing communities are intentionally built as a collaborative approach to living sustainable lifestyles. They uniquely balance individual’s needs for privacy with their need for community. Families own regular homes and share resources, facilities, and common elements to create a more affordable and sustainable lifestyle. The concept started in Denmark in the 1960’s and was pioneered in the United States by Charles Durrett and Kate McDermott, architects who designed and built the first co-housing community in the United States in California in 1981. Since then, this couple helped design and build over 40 co-housing communities across the United States. They have become the gurus of co-housing in America, having written the first book about it in 1988, “Co-housing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves,” and being credited by the Oxford English Dictionary for coining the word "co-housing". 

Who Lives in Co-housing Communities?

Co-housing communities are usually intergenerational and provide a well-supported and safe environment for raising families. Although co-housing communities actively seek a diverse population, Graham Meltzer, in his 2007 book, “Sustainable Community: Learning from the co-housing model,” found that people who live in co-housing in North America are predominantly white, middle-class, well-educated professionals in their 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s. They are often referred to as “Cultural Creatives,” a term coined by sociologist Paul H. Ray and psychologist Sherry Ruth Anderson to describe a large segment in Western society that has developed beyond the standard paradigm of Modernists. They described two types of Cultural Creatives, both of whom fit the co-houser profile. The first group, the Core Cultural Creatives, is made up of well educated writers, artists, musicians, psychotherapists, feminists, alternative health care providers and other professionals who share a concern for their inner life and a strong passion for social activism. The second group they described is the “Green Cultural Creatives” who share the opinions of the Core group but have more conventional religious and world views that are more nebulous. They are the types of people who are attracted to co-housing communities because of their deep concern for the state of our world and are proactive in working toward solutions.   

In more recent years there has been much interest among the aging “baby boomer” generation for co-housing communities dedicated to “pro-active adults” or “seniors.” Charles Durrett, in his new book, Senior Co-housing: A Community Approach to Independent Living, said Senior Co-housing Communities use the same model as conventional co-housing, but do not have a common or specific ideology other than having a more practical, social home environment for aging. Within co-housing, seniors have the resources to live independently and have active social lives many years beyond what they could if they continued to live alone in their own homes.

Common Features of Co-housing Communities:

Co-housing communities have traditionally been defined by six common features.

1.  A Participatory Process. From its inception, the community is dreamed of, planned, designed, organized, and then maintained by its members. Usually a group of like-minded people get together and decide they want to live together so they can deepen their sense of connection with each other and provide support to each other in their life journey. From their vision they form a mission statement that focuses their intention for the community. Most mission statements emphasize the desire to live as a community in harmony with the environment.

2.  Neighborhood design. Co-housing communities are intentionally designed to encourage residents meeting casually in their day-to-day comings and goings. The homes are physically clustered along open green space with paths or walkways connecting the homes to a common house that is an extension of private homes. Garages and parking are typically placed on the periphery of the community, thus creating a pedestrian community that is safe for any outdoor activity.  

3.  Shared resources and facilities. The common house is the central focus of the community with shared facilities such as a large kitchen and dining/event room and various rooms for laundry, games, exercise, child-care, creative arts, healing arts, meditation, meetings, workshops, overnight guests, and even home offices. Tools and equipment are shared among the whole community rather than every household having one of their own. Rural communities preserve a large piece of property for wildlife, nature trails, community gardens, playground, and other interesting landscape features.

4.  Resident management. Co-housing residents work together to manage and maintain all aspects of their community. In the spirit of being good stewards for the planet, some adults in the community contribute a few hours of their time every week for the management and maintenance of the grounds and buildings. Others organize the social activities, and yet others mange the legal and financial affairs.  Everyone has a role that is equal in value.

5.  Non-hierarchical structure and decision-making. Another feature that makes co-housing unique is self-governance. There is no hierarchy of leadership or authority that governs; every member has an equal say in all aspects of development, management, maintenance, and growth of the community. Every member gets a chance to offer their opinions and ideas for resolving issues or turning ideas into reality. Although most co-housing communities are legally set up as condominium associations or homeowners’ associations, they are governed using a consensus process rather than the usual Roberts Rules of Order. Consensus is an egalitarian process in which issues are discussed until everyone in the community is comfortable with the outcomes and is willing to participate in their implementation.  Decisions are always based on what is best for the community as a whole.

6.  No shared community economy. Co-housing is a form of collaborative living that took the lessons learned from the failed commune movement of the 60’s to create a lifestyle that is truly sustainable. Communes eventually failed because of inequities in their shared economies and the lack of individual space. In co-housing communities, residents earn their own money like most Americans, and they live in their own homes, which are typically smaller than the “McMansions” of the American dream. 

For the 21st century, we might add a seventh important co-housing feature.  

7.  A commitment to live responsibly and sustainably. From the beginning of the movement in the 1980’s, Co-housers have been genuinely concerned about the environment and have made efforts to minimize their carbon footprint on the planet. In today’s environmental and economic crisis, building “green” sustainable homes and communities is no longer a luxury, but a necessity. New co-housing communities are paying even closer attention to these details. The technology is available to build “net-zero” homes which generate as much energy as they use. It is now possible to heat and cool homes without fossil fuels. Although the cost of installing alternative energy sources such as geothermal, solar, and wind power may be prohibitive for single family homes, these technologies can be installed in multi-family dwellings for a more affordable cost over the course of time. With no monthly fossil fuel bills, the cost of heating and cooling a home that uses geothermal, solar, and wind power over the course of 20 years is about one third the cost of heating and cooling a home with a conventional oil or natural gas system.

The Co-housing movement in America started in California in 1980 and has spread throughout the United States and Canada. There are currently 16 such communities in New England, with 15 more in the planning or building process. Maine has one completed community - Two Echo in Brunswick, one ready to start building – Greensward Hamlet in Buxton, and one in the planning stage - Belfast Eco-village in Belfast. While the current economy has slowed down the housing market and President Obama offers hope of things getting better, co-housing communities of the 21st century continue to be a model for drawing on the strength of community to living sustainably. 

Therein lies the hope for future generations.

Links: www.cohousing.org, www.greenswardhamlet.com, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Françoise Paradis Ed.D. is a psychologist by profession and a sociologist at heart. Her global worldview was strongly influenced by growing up in a large Franco-American family in northern Maine. Thus, in her work as a psychologist she focuses on enhancing the client’s community: their family life, social circle, support network, and living environment. It was a natural progression for her to initiate a “green” co-housing community in Buxton, Maine, at a time when our planet is in peril.