About us
Welcome! East Bay Cohousing is for people interested in intentional communities and creating ways of meeting our daily needs for shelter and livelihood through cooperative long-term relationships among peers.
We are a big tent for all manner of self-governing member-led "collaborative housing" communities, including housing cooperatives, student coops, collective and co-living households, as well as co-housing neighborhoods, urban and rural eco-villages, faith-based or service oriented, moshads, kibbutzes and income sharing communes! EBCOHO Members come from every county in the Bay Area, and other parts of the US and the world.
Check out the EBCOHO calendar and events descriptions, past and present, to see the range of events we produce or curate from among our members, friends, partners, friends, and movement allies for a more just, sustainable, and flourishing world. Look for socials, orientations, workshops, discussions, slide shows, movie nights, open houses, work-days, trainings, tours, and conferences.
Explore the Discussion Forums to post and search for openings, forming groups, call-outs from Members, and other features.
Orientations for newcomers are usually offered every 4-6 weeks. This is where you can explore current and long-term opportunities to join a community, ask lots of questions, share who you are and your dreams, and start meeting like-minded people. If you are a do-it-yourself learner or explore the big picture, you'll get lots of useful resources.
Joining EBCOHO also makes you part of Cohousing California. At http://www.CalCoho.org you will find other regional networks, a combined calendar of events, links to forming and existing communities we know, and links to our partners, networks we belong to, and groups we consider allies around the world.
Use the Suggest a Meetup feature if you'd like to see a particular topic addressed, or if you've got something you are hosting. Events we personally host (Cohousing Coaches Raines & Betsy, that is), almost always include ample time for members to share their personal visions, skills and experiences.
EBCOHO is not usually a quick route to cheap housing, although members do share openings and offers, and we do list and refer members to openings in established intentional communities, both rental and ownership, in the Bay Area and beyond.
Thousands of Bay Area residents already live in safe and stable collaborative housing situations sharing life experiences and living expenses, decision-making, and ownership. Across the US and the world, millions more of people are living more sustainably, more democratically, more cooperatively, and more cost effectively, out of the booms and busts of predatory real estate markets.
If you want to know your neighbors well, have a better life by sharing more, and live more peacefully and lightly on the planet then please join us!
MORE.... about the sponsors and hosts of East Bay Cohousing.
This work is self-funded by the organizers, with a depth of knowledge and commitment that makes it unusual among Meetups (at least we think so!).
Thank you to Supporting Members and our Coaching Clients for helping defray some of the expenses of this labor of love. We thank you with a free orientation, and discounts to future events hosted by us and some of our sponsors/partners. You can track income and expenses on the Money page.
EBCOHO and Cohousing California are projects of Raines Cohen and Betsy Morris and our business partnership, Planning for Sustainable Communities. Each of us has lived in multiple cooperative living situations in the Bay Area before moving in together to Berkeley Cohousing, where we have been members since 2003. Raines has been deeply involved in technology user groups, tech for the social good, journalism and database consulting; Betsy has a PhD, a Masters in city and regional planning, and 20 years experience as a community development and research consultant. Both of us love organizing events that put people first, offer quality resources, and open up new doors and windows to the world that supports our visions and values.
As Cohousing Coaches and project consultants, we provide technical assistance and personalized support for individual members, forming groups, and existing communities. We connect a wide variety of kindred spirits and resources. Please find out more at http://cohousingcoaches.com, or http://www.AgingInCommunity.com/
You can visit our main site at https://www.ebcoho.org/
Sponsors
Upcoming events
8
- Network event
East Bay Cohousing Crawl (in-person) - National Cohousing Month
Several Cohousing Communities in Oakland, Richmond, Pleasant Hill and Berkeley (placeholder, don't use map), 1 Ogawa Plaza, Oakland, CA, US53 attendees from 5 groupsCome see what it looks like to live in cohousing neighborhoods in the East Bay on a self-guided tour, part of East Bay Housing Organization's (EBHO) Affordable Housing Month in the East Bay and National Cohousing Month.
RSVP on this page, via East Bay Cohousing's website here, or text CRAWL to +19252815643 to RSVP
Open times and locations will be posted on the East Bay Cohousing (EBCOHO) website. You will be able to add all open houses to your calendar, or click on them to add them individually.
Please only visit during the listed hours.
- Visit sustainable intentional communities in the Berkeley-Oakland-Pleasant Hill area.
- See how they blend privacy and community, with individual homes plus a Common House.
- Get a taste of what it's like to dine together, with regular common meals.
- Learn about each community's unique design, how it came together, and the innovative approaches to affordability, diversity, inclusion, and sustainability each embodies.
- Find out how to learn about current and future openings in these communities and new ones in formation in the area and beyond.
Led by East Bay Cohousing, the regional umbrella network for cooperative community living. .
Communities on the crawl will be announced
You can pick and choose throughout the day and find your own way by carpool/rideshare, BART, and/or bike (at your own risk).
BYO transportation.
54 attendees from this group 
Pleasant Hill Cohousing (Northern CA-SF East Bay) Tour (in person!)
Pleasant Hill Cohousing, 2200-2272 Lisa Lane, Pleasant Hill, CA, USJoin a Rare in person community tour and open house of the San Francisco East Bay's biggest and most "suburban" cohousing neighborhood, Pleasant Hill Cohousing (PHCH), the first "new-build" intergenerational cohousing community in the region, the largest in the East Bay, and a lovely community.
RSVP here on MeetUp
This long-established cohousing neighborhood has been hosting this tour for decades, regardless of whether or not there are openings. The tour is the first step on the path to membership, helping potential neighbors learn more and pre-filter themselves by learning about the community and the next steps in the process.
Visit Pleasant Hill Cohousing's page on the region's group site, East Bay Cohousing, for more info, links, and current openings:
https://www.ebcoho.org/Pleasant_Hill/This event is part of the Cohousing Open network of regional MeetUp groups supporting forming and established communities and cohousing seekers. Learn more about how you can get involved at:
https://www.CohousingOpen.org/
## For more on other California communities visit: https://www.CalCoho.org/
Facts about PHCH:
There are 32 units, grouped in various configurations ranging from 2-6 homes per building. The buildings were constructed with wood framing, stucco outer walls, and corrugated metal roofing. The smallest units are 640 sq ft one-bedrooms; the largest are 1579 sq ft four-bedrooms.Each home has its own kitchen. The homes are owned individually as condominiums, with some rentals.
Common Areas
Our 3,835 sq ft Common House contains a kitchen, dining room ("great room"), sitting room, laundry, kids room, teens/older kids room, crafts room, guest rooms, and bathrooms.
The Common House is the only building in the project built with air conditioning. However, to minimize the use of air conditioning, the building also has a cooling tower with large fans that can be used in the evening to pull cooler air into the building and push hot air out.
Other common facilities include swimming pool, hot tub, play area, workshop, bike shed, organic garden, and granite boulders from the original site - both decorative and used by children for climbing.
Location
We're conveniently located near Highway 680 and public transportation, with easy access to Walnut Creek, shopping, and recreation.
Pleasant Hill, population 32,000, is located 30 miles east of San Francisco, 4 miles north of the I-680/Hwy 24 interchange. Mostly a residential community with scattered retail/commercial areas, it is bounded by the cities of Walnut Creek, Lafayette, Concord, and Martinez. In 2000, Pleasant Hill redeveloped its downtown to create a contemporary shopping district just blocks from the site. In addition, an abundance of good restaurants and shops are within easy driving distance. The city has good recreation programs for all ages and regional walking/biking trails traverse it.
Iron Horse Trail
A walking and biking trail - the Iron Horse Trail (so named because it's on the old Southern Pacific Railroad right-of-way) - runs alongside the site and connects to the Pleasant Hill BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) station (~1 mile) and downtown Walnut Creek (~4 miles). The 24-mile trail goes north-south from Concord to Dublin and connects to several other trails that traverse the county making for great biking opportunities.
A neighborhood park is located just the other side of Fair Oaks Elementary School adjacent to the site. Briones Regional Park and Mt. Diablo State Park are located nearby providing numerous opportunities for hiking and recreation. There are several health clubs in Pleasant Hill including the YMCA.
Diablo Valley Community College is located in Pleasant Hill, and there are several city and county adult education programs in the area.
There are farmers markets nearby in Walnut Creek (year-round). Several community members participate in a CSA farm, with a weekly delivery of locally grown organic fruits and veggies made even more convenient because we are the drop site.
4 attendees- Network event$25.00
Berkeley Cohousing (un)Common Meal - cook & dine in community
Berkeley Cohousing Common House, 2220 Sacramento St. #G, Berkeley, CA, US2 attendees from 6 groupsJoin Betsy Morris and Raines Cohen, Cohousing Coaches and EBCOHO organizers, with area community seekers and residents of an East Bay Cohousing neighborhood, to together prepare a community meal/BBQ at Berkeley Cohousing, now celebrating over three decades as a community, as part of National Cohousing Month and East Bay Housing Organization's (EBHO) Affordable Housing Month.
At an (un)Common Meal, we take over a cohousing Common House kitchen on an "off" night and prepare our own Common Meal together; some members of the community may join us to eat it. The shopping will already be done, but we'll get to cook and clean and learn together, discovering the joys and challenges of feeding a group of diverse humans with unique needs, and cleaning up afterwards.
We charge dinner guests to cover the cost of ingredients, but we are delighted to be able to offer this event FREE to recipients of SNAP/EBT food assistance, since we know this is a challenging time and we want to support you through it -- that's what community is all about.
You can pay in advance and confirm your spot via the East Bay Cohousing website.Schedule for the evening:
5-5:30 PM Cooks arrive and start prepping dinner, under the guidance of a community member (we take care of the meal planning & shopping in advance)
6 PM Cleaners arrive and get to visit a home or two.
6:30 PM Break to eat and share about our community living and searching experience
7:00 PM Cleaners start cleaning, cooks continue discussion
(cleaners can rejoin when they're done)8-8:30 PM Wrap-up and go home.
Note: Everybody is either a cook or a cleaner. If you arrive too late to cook, you're a cleaner. Don't worry if you haven't cooked for a group before, we'll have plenty of experienced hands on hand, and the right tools in the Common House kitchen to make it fun and easy.
We'll take turns, with one group cooking while another socializes, take time to eat together, and then the cooks get to relax while the cleaners cleans up.
Advance registration and payment required, so we can shop and prepare. We always use local organic ingredients to the extent available, and offer alternatives to accommodate a wide variety of dietary needs.
Past events
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