I've lived/worked in housing cooperatives for the past 8 years so I can speak to that.
What other people are saying here is dead on. In this instance it's better than a private landlord, but we are still subject to pressures from our capitalistic system and therefore can't afford do do things like offer free housing.
The org is dedicated to democratic ownership/management of housing and has tried to expand several times, but for the past 20 years hasn't succeeded in permanent expansion beyond its original properties.
Part of that is the dominance of private landlords and large developers building large apartment buildings. Part of it is high turnover inhibiting long-term planning at the organizational level. Part of it is that we don't accumulate much surplus money to fund such things; most gets out back into maintaining the ancient houses, or into granting temporary rent relief for residents that fall on hard times.
Finally, our org is fairly small (<50 people and < 20 per house), so at times individual personality clashes and petty conflicts can make things difficult, especially since everything is tied into people's day-to-day living conditions at home.
Ultimately I've coming out of it with the following views:
In my utopia we have decommodified housing, of course.
In the current capitalistic world, cooperative ownership/management of apartment buildings and/or collections of individual dwellings is better than private landlord/company status quo in that it allows sharing of funds and resources (like tools) and allows everyone a voice in decision making. Orgs larger than ours allow for more flexibility in labor/time/financial commitments from the members: 1/50 people unable to pay or do chores or not be an asshole is less disruptive than 1/10, etc.
I've lived/worked in housing cooperatives for the past 8 years so I can speak to that.
What other people are saying here is dead on. In this instance it's better than a private landlord, but we are still subject to pressures from our capitalistic system and therefore can't afford do do things like offer free housing.
The org is dedicated to democratic ownership/management of housing and has tried to expand several times, but for the past 20 years hasn't succeeded in permanent expansion beyond its original properties.
Part of that is the dominance of private landlords and large developers building large apartment buildings. Part of it is high turnover inhibiting long-term planning at the organizational level. Part of it is that we don't accumulate much surplus money to fund such things; most gets out back into maintaining the ancient houses, or into granting temporary rent relief for residents that fall on hard times.
Finally, our org is fairly small (<50 people and < 20 per house), so at times individual personality clashes and petty conflicts can make things difficult, especially since everything is tied into people's day-to-day living conditions at home.
Ultimately I've coming out of it with the following views: In my utopia we have decommodified housing, of course. In the current capitalistic world, cooperative ownership/management of apartment buildings and/or collections of individual dwellings is better than private landlord/company status quo in that it allows sharing of funds and resources (like tools) and allows everyone a voice in decision making. Orgs larger than ours allow for more flexibility in labor/time/financial commitments from the members: 1/50 people unable to pay or do chores or not be an asshole is less disruptive than 1/10, etc.