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About cohousing
This website aims provides links to cohousing initiatives in Melbourne and surrounds. Cohousing is a practical form of intentional community. Typically, other forms of intentional communities are The Sustainable Living Foundation has a growing range of resources for people interested in both cohousing and cooperative communities.
The cohousing concept started in Denmark when a group of dual income families were searching for better child care and a way to share evening meal preparation. Interest in this approach is based on the need to feel a part of the neighbourhood whilst retaining a clear sense of ownership and privacy. According to Meijering et al. ( 2007) cohousing does NOT aspire to communal levels of communes or a kibbutz, nor does it seek out people with similar religious or political views.
Cohousing in Melbourne
In Melbourne, support for people interested in cohousing has come from CERES, the Augustine Centre and more recently VicUrban. In 2000 members of Merri Cohousing invested heavily in development, only to be outbid in a property boom in the inner north of Melbourne. The Not Melrose Place group also attracted large numbers of interested people. In 2010 Urban Coup is in formation, whilst in Ecohousing Heidelberg (influenced by cohousing principles) offers rental housing for means-tested members of a cooperative.
Lessons learned
Ideally three success factors align:
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Success factor |
Key perspective to consider |
Lessons learned |
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(a) adequate funds |
From the perspective of a bank, is there a clear ownership of risk or do individual households opt out when land needs to be purchased? |
Analysis of successful projects (defined as those initiatives which actually get built) shows most cost savings are in day-to-day living, not the initial set-up costs.
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(b) compatible expectations of individual households |
From the perspective of a developer, is there a clear commitment to a contained list of variations or will individual households continue to seek customisations? |
Forming groups often recommend that interested people first read work by McCamant & Durrett and ScottHanson. Contact me if you have a forming group wants to borrow the cohousing library-in-a-box. Payment is in form of adding relevant books to the box so future forming groups can benefit as well.
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(c) agreement on timing |
From a group perspective, will all household be able to buy into the project at the same time? |
By developing a ranked list of dozens of potentially interested households, a systematic invitation in order of ranking can be triggered. This makes it more likely that the needed number of households ( research suggests optimal is between 12 and 20) can be found comparably quickly.
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Hans Tilstra, Melbourne, April 2010