Ultimate Coop Resource:
NASCO is the North American Students of Cooperation and has so many useful documents I don’t know what to do with them! They also host an annual housing coop conference in Ann Arbor, MI in November that I highly recommend attending. http://www.nasco.coop/resources
What is a Coop Anyhow?
Wikipedia provides a short description: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-operative_living_arrangements
All you got is text on this website! I want some fun videos!
A good thing that the Faire Bande A Part Housing Cooperative (Faire-Op) in Maine has made some highly enjoyable short films about life at their coop: http://householdmovie.org/coop
Coop Games!
Coopoly is modeled after the board game Life except the group is cooperatively starting a coop enterprise together (which could be a housing coop!). Lots of fun to be had and is available for purchase at a sliding scale at: http://store.toolboxfored.org/co-opoly-the-game-of-co-operatives/
Flame War is a card game designed by one of my coop heroes, Charlie DeTar, that is all about how emails are used in cooperatives and how they fail at communicating skillfully. Download the PDFs and print the cards yourself for free and enjoy this game while making jokes how each email card has never happened at your coop here: https://project.intertwinkles.org/projects/consensus/wiki/Flame_War
Consensus Decision Making:
I like how the Boulder Housing Coalition defines consensus and then talks about it. So instead of recreating the wheel I’m going to link to their page: http://boulderhousingcoalition.org/resources/consensus/
InterTwinkles is an online consensus making tool that helps make it easier for groups to skillfully brainstorm, propose, and decide online. I’ve found it extremely valuable when forming a coop and we didn’t live with each other yet and also using on a coop board I’ve served on. Both by Charlie DeTar, the game Flame War is the WHY email isn’t ideal and InterTwinkles is the HOW to still make progress between in person meetings without as much miss-communication! Check it out here: https://intertwinkles.org/
Tool for Groups
Group Works is an incredibly versatile tool for involving everyone in moving towards more skillfully working together. You can download it free to your Iphone/Ipad or buy a hard copy like I did because I’m old fashioned: http://groupworksdeck.org/
Attachment Theory for Adults
A way of thinking about and understanding how people work and the dynamics between people. By far the most useful tool I’ve learned for interacting with others. Many sources and books are available on the subject. Wikipedia has a page about it, but I don’t like it, and instead recommend reading Attached, the first book on my recommended reads.
Books:
Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment… by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller
Understanding how people work at a basic level is probably the most useful skill in a coop. This book does that. Although the dynamic explored in the book is romantic the principles hold true in all human relationships be that with housemates, co-workers, etc.
Walden Two by B.F. Skinner
The most epic and the original book about life in an all encompassing rural commune. It is a fictional story from the perspective of two ever debating professors and three interested young people. If you are into coop living you will assuredly cackle your way through this entire classic!
Living Together: A Year in the Life of a City Commune by Mike Weiss
The autobiography of a quintessential 70s age coop house from formation to dissolution. Stories are a great way to communicate experiences and lessons from them, much better than creating a web page full of bullet points! A fun and insightful read.
Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates by Annamarie Pluhar
Annamarie, a friend who lives in VT, does a great job going into the basics of how you go from living alone to a shared house. Great for empty nesters or anyone wanting to take the first step. Also check out her website: http://www.sharinghousing.com/
The Art of Communicating by Thich Nhat Hanh
I believe a heart based approach to communicating is essential to skillful communication. While Nonviolent Communication (NVC) and other systems or frameworks for communicating are great they fail when the participants are not being compassionate in their words and body language. This short book provides guidance on how to adopt compassionate communication habits.
Cooperative Skills Development
Co-operantics is a phenomenal collection of skills and systems for working with others cooperatively. While built for the worker coop audience it is still applicable to housing coops in many ways. It even has an online coop skills audit you can take! Check them out: http://www.cooperantics.coop/
Coop Development Assistance
Cooperative Development Institute (CDI) can help you start any type of coop venture you can think of! http://www.cdi.coop/
NASCO (again!) Development offers assistance to cooperative houses from creating your own legal organization to purchasing a property. http://www.nasco.coop/development
Coop Developers (these are group equity coops that you can join and become one of their new houses)
Look for one in your city! For example: Boston Community Cooperatives BCC.coop
NASCO Properties (I know, they do everything! They own properties across the country) http://www.nasco.coop/properties
Live in Boston? Want to learn more about coops here?
A website containing a listing of some of the coops in Boston and a FAQ on how to get connected to the community including joining a email alias that people use to post openings. BostonCoops.org
The coop housing Meetup.com group for Boston where coop crawls, educational events, discussions, potlucks, etc are occasionally posted. http://www.meetup.com/Boston-Coop-Assembly/