Learn more about cohousing

Cohousing Association of the United States

If you're interested in learning more about cohousing, we recommend you explore the web site of the Cohousing Association of the United States. It's an excellent collection of resources on the history of the movement, what it's like to live in a cohousing community, financing the project, the decision-making process, and more.

Creating Cohousing: Building Sustainable Communities

Architects Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett, the couple credited with starting the cohousing movement in this country, have written Creating Cohousing: Building Sustainable Communities. Now in its second edition, this illustrated manual combines nuts-and-bolts practical considerations and design ideas with extensive case studies of dozens of diverse communities in Europe and North America. The Iowa City Public Library has a copy of this book as well as several others on the subject.

Video resources

Courtney Martin, author of The New Better Off, Reinventing the American Dream, was the keynote speaker at the 2019 National Cohousing Conference. Drawing from her personal experiences living in cohousing with her family, Martin talked about three forms of sacred abundance people find when living in community. Take a moment to watch this inspirational young cohousing advocate.

Building Community with Cohousing was produced by the Canadian Cohousing Network. It's an entertaining, informative, and inspiring look the cohousing movement in Canada. In it filmmakers Dan Gagnon and Regan Payne interview cohousing residents from three completed communities in southwestern British Columbia Canada: Windsong, Cranberry Commons, and Roberts Creek.

What's cohousing like? Find out in this video made by kids living in cohousing.

What is a home? This deceptively simple three-minute video done by Turtlebox Productions of the Belterra Community presents the basic concepts of cohousing in a nutshell.

Podcast

Shuva Rahim, host of the podcast, Untrained Wisdom, interviews Prairie Hill residents John and Val Bowman about their experiences in cohousing. Listen to them here.

Articles

In an article in The Atlantic ("The Hot New Millennial Housing Trend Is a Repeat of the Middle Ages," September 26, 2016) columnist Ilana E. Strauss tells how cohousing and other 21st-century housing choices mark a return to how humans have been making their homes for thousands of years.