We live in a society that over time has become increasingly individualistic, at least in the urban environment: everyone is concerned about their own lives and those of their immediate environment, but has been losing the sense of community and union with the rest of the people around us.

This tendency towards individualism is gradually becoming more noticeable, and over time alternative ways and models of life have emerged which, theoretically, attempt to generate community. An example of this is cohousing , which we will talk about throughout this article.

What is cohousing?

It is known as cohousing, or in Spanish covivienda, a a model or style of community that involves the creation of a self-managed community in which coexistence is centred on collectivity and cooperation with the rest of the members of the community.

Based on solidarity with the rest of the community and with an organization that functions in a democratic way, it is a type of organization that implies the generation of a sociocommunity support network and in which there is a great cohesion among the people who are part of it.

This type of community is usually configured around one or (more usually), multiple individual houses or buildings with different shared common areas where social and community life takes place. Each one of the users or inhabitants of a cohousing is an active part of this community, and has also the responsibility to participate in the management of it.

Although the name may make it seem otherwise, cohousing does not necessarily imply that everyone lives in the same house and without any kind of privacy: although there are cases in which they are built and cohabited in multi-family housing, each individual or family usually has their own house.

Each of the members of this community has its own personal and economic autonomy. However, sometimes in this type of society the economic system may tend to reduce or eliminate the idea of private property in order to favour the collective (although its economy is not shared), and trade based on the exchange or barter of services.

Main characteristics of cohousing

One of the main bases of cohousing is that it is based, as we have seen above, on solidarity and on the search for social cohesion and active participation in the community .

Another of these is sustainability, since the starting point is a design directly designed for the use that will be given to each of the spaces. In addition, it allows to give a use and to give back to life to little inhabited areas or in process of abandonment, since these communities can use these areas, remodel them and live in them (something that also allows to recover or to maintain alive the history of these places).

It is also usual that among the community spaces there are elements that allow the management and production of own resources, such as orchards .

In addition, as one of the most relevant bases of cohousing we can cite the way of organizing and making decisions. There is no hierarchical structure (although it is possible for an individual to take a leadership role in some aspect in which he or she decides to specialize).

The relationship to homes can be variable. The most common is that houses are not owned by the individual, but by the community, of which the user has a life usufruct, and are designed or adapted to the needs of the subject. In this sense, they have the advantage that they do not involve an economic expense as high as that which would be involved in maintaining one’s own home .

Last but not least, it allows for the reduction of problems such as loneliness and the need for care without having to lose independence at the individual level, while generating a collaborative culture and a common bond between the members of the society created.

Implantation in the elderly: cohousing senior

Cohousing is a trend that, although not particularly well known, is gradually becoming more popular. Its history is not so recent: Its most modern origins are in the 1960s, specifically in Denmark , from where it spread to the Nordic countries and the United States. Since then, different modalities have emerged, of which one of the most widespread at present (at least in Spain) is that related to the elderly.

In the senior cohousing, the inhabitants of the community are people over 55 years of age. The reason why the popularity of this type of community organization has increased in this sector is the existence of two of the most painful scourges that a large number of elderly people may have to face: loneliness and, in the case of people with few resources, poverty .

Many people resort to cohousing because it allows them to maintain an organization based on solidarity and social cohesion, in addition to greatly reducing the economic cost of maintaining a house or rent today.

And not only that: one of the social implications of this type of cohousing is that a paternalistic vision of old age is left aside, in which the old man himself was seen as a rather passive subject. Instead, the activity of the older person is promoted as someone with experience and the need to participate in the world around him, giving him responsibility and the possibility of exercising different types of social functions according to community needs.

Bibliographic references:

  • Banford, G. (2005). Cohousing for older people: Housing innovation in the Netherlands and Denmark. Australasian Journal on Ageing, 24 (1): 44-46.
  • George, V. (2006). Review of Sustainable community: Learning from the cohousing model. Community Development Journal, No. 41(3): 393-398.
  • McCamant, K. & Durrett, C. (1989). Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves. Berkeley, University of California Press.
  • Rosa Jiménez, C.L., Márquez Ballesteros, M.J., Navas Carrillo, D. (2017). Towards a new management and self-financing model for the regeneration of obsolete neighbourhoods. Cities, 20: 45-70.