Co-housing: A Retirement Option for Baby Boomers?

Watch the television news and read the newspapers; and you'll see a lot of doom and gloom about Baby Boomers, the largest pre-retirement community in history, not being ready for retirement. This is a legitimate concern because Boomers are living longer than their parents and the social security system is on the verge of disaster.

Some financial pundits say that retirees will need at least $1 million to comfortably retire. The biggest expense for retirees is housing.

Communal living had been an idea that had its moment of popularity in the sixties, but it could very well catch on again for the Baby Boomer generation.

Berkeley, California architects Charles Durrett and Kathryn McCament have been credited with importing the concept of "cohousing" from Denmark to the United States in the 1980s.

The original Danish version of cohousing began in 1964 with architect Jan Gudmand-Hoyer and a group of his friends. By 1982, there were 22 owner-occupied cohousing communities in Denmark, some financed with government-sponsored loans. Ten of these communities included rental cohousing units for lower income people.

Currently, cohousing is a well-established housing option in Denmark.

The first American cohousing community, Muir Commons, began in Davis, California in 1991.

As of 2004, more than 5000 people were living in about "80 cohousing communities in more than 30 states." According to the Cohousing Association of the United States, some of these communities are 55-plus. Others are multi-generational. Both have advantages and disadvantages.

While cohousing may appear to be an attractive social and economic option, it may not be for everyone. These communities are pre-planned by their residents and can take two years or more of planning alone. To establish a co-housing group, one must find at least 15-20 people with common interests or goals; the time commitment necessary to plan the community; and the financial capability to buy a home or unit in a mutually agreed-upon area.