Cohousing is a concept of housing that was pioneered in Denmark, coming to the United States in 1988 with the publication of a book by Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett entitled "Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves".
Simply stated, cohousing offers an end to the isolation of the single family suburban home. Balancing community and personal privacy, cohousing offers a chance to create a modern village in an urban or rural setting. Residents own their own homes and share common land and buildings for scheduled or impromptu meals, socializing, cooperative work, and recreation.
Cohousing is an increasingly popular form of housing in both Europe and North America, because it addresses and alleviates many of the demands and pressures of modern life – everything from day care to aging at home is easier with the help of your neighbors. Today there are more than 100 completed cohousing developments in the United States and another 100 under development.
Typical Features
Participatory Process: Residents participate in the planning and design process for the housing development, and are responsible as a group for final decisions. The land is developed by the residents themselves.
Deliberate Neighborhood Design: The physical design encourages a strong sense of community. Housing is clustered, leaving much of the land in shared open space. Individual housing units are small, because some features such as guest rooms, laundry facilities, and full-featured kitchens, recreation and exercise areas, etc. are available to all in the common house. However, individual units may include some or all of the above as decided by the equity members. Cars are parked at the periphery of the pedestrian friendly development, with residents using carts, electric vehicles, bicycles, etc. Vehicle access for moving heavy items, etc, is still provided to all units.
Extensive Common Facilities: An integral part of the community, common areas are designed for daily use, to supplement private living areas.
Complete Resident Management: Residents manage the development, making decisions of common concerns at community meetings.
Non-hierarchical Structure: Responsibility for making decisions is shared by the community's adults.
Separate Income Sources: Community residents are independent financially.
