Looking down the back of the sofa...
Ideas and options for financing cohousing feasibility and developments
http://about.me/adrianashton
Why am I here?
• National reputation for #socent #coops #startup
• Train specialist enterprise advisors on financial planning
• Part of national programmes to support sector growth, acting as lead on finance
So you’ve got a great idea...?
• Grants and gifts• ‘Crowdfunding’• Commissions from HA, LA, etc
• ?SITR (up to 50% tax relief for supporters at this stage as investment would be unsecured – no property yet)
Grants Lead time
Restrictions on use
Cash-flow implications
Admin time/cost in monitoring & reporting
Risk of 'claw back'
Risk to credibility
A word of caution about grants...
Crowd funding
http://www.nesta.org.uk/blog/understanding-alternative-finance
Crowd funding
http://www.nesta.org.uk/blog/understanding-alternative-finance
How to find the pots of money?
• What have other people had success with?
• Who do you know? (and who do they know?)
• What are local priorities of wider bodies? (Council, LEP, etc – note to self: tell them the story about the Cambridge incubator)
So you need to build it...?
• Debt.– But comes in lots of flavours: loan, equity, loan
stock, community shares, quasi-equity, mortgage, bonds, ... Many of which could (in theory) offer tax relief for the investor
• Possibly some grant support (but would need to evidence specific criteria)
What’s been used in #cohousing before? (an incomplete list)
• Founder member using own savings/personal mortgage – Springhill Cohousing Community
• Founder members collectively invest personally - (Lancaster cohousing)
• Wider community ownership via #comshare – (various CLTs and housing #coops)
• Part support from Housing Association – (Threshold Centre in Dorset)
Where do we go from here..?
• Define what we’re happy to manage on what terms
• Swap stories with each other
• Don’t be afraid to experiment (student housing coops, Personal Budgets to support shared housing for people with long-term ill health,...)