At a time when housing is so expensive and such a big source of carbon emissions, it’s a shame that there is so little innovation around homes in Britain. I suspect this is largely due to the dominance of a handful of big companies in Britain’s housing market, which skews things towards one model – build estates of new homes and sell them as private dwellings.
One avenue to investigate is co-housing. It’s more common in Denmark, though still a minority interest, and since I’m in Denmark this week, it seemed like a good time to mention it.
Co-housing is a collaborative approach to home ownership, where homes are built as shared neighbourhoods from the start, rather than private buildings. Houses are often smaller, with shared facilities such as guest rooms, a laundry, or function rooms. Gardens and growing spaces are often shared. They can take a variety of forms, but they’re often built with sustainable living to the fore.
The UK’s best example is probably the LILAC development in Leeds, but there are a handful of others already established and several in development. You can find out more from the UK Co-housing Network.
The Earthbound Report 
We are in the process of designing the first co-housing project in Northern Ireland. We have the land and are almost ready to submit for planning.
Sorry and here is the link: https://www.portaferrycohousing.org/
Here’s the link: https://www.portaferrycohousing.org/
CO-housing is a very good model for tackling the Affordability Crisis in Housing across the “Anglosphere”
The problem is seen in The UK, Australia, USA, New Zealand, etc.
Home@ix Mind Map
https://webbrain.com/brainpage/brain/98FC8BC2-D290-31A1-0868-3987279717D8
I put together this document on CO Housing and a Community token called Loft Miles as an initial
basis for exploring Self Build/cooperative Housing communities.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w54zTQwWPguVEVGjJ8RYgzuivDTh8r4O/view?usp=sharing
this is the start of the section on co housing
UK Co-Housing,
A finance solution for Cannock Mill Cohousing
Some areas of financial risk for self-build cohousing we
have identified are:
Insufficient members
Members unable to meet financial commitments to
company (amount or timing)
Inability to raise external finance
Failure to acquire site at acceptable cost
Adverse changes in property values or building costs
Taxation
Third-party liability
Inadequate accounting records/compliance failures
Contractor insolvency
Planning not achieved or onerous planning conditions
Interest rate changes
In parallel with talking to other finance providers, we spotted and applied
for the Homes & Communities Agency (HCA) Builders Finance Fund in
May/June 2014 (and a related infrastructure fund – which eventually we
did not take forwards). On 8 September 2014 we were the only cohousing
company (and the only developer in Colchester) to be accepted by HCA
for the next stage (due diligence). The HCA Builders Finance Fund is now
replaced by the Home Building Fund. For more information
see https://homebuildingfund.campaign.gov.uk/
Home@ix is a full spectrum finance and construction procurement engine
we designed it to address the list of issues in Cannock Mill Housing surrounding “finance” risk and more besides
http://www.homeatix.net/