Communal Living

I live in a communal house in the East Bay. Before that I spent several years in a 6-person communal house in Park Slope, Brooklyn — we started with 2 people and grew to 6, and the hope was to get to around 8 and buy a home together. Living communally is one of the best decisions I've ever made, and I've never seriously considered going back.

Why Communal Living

Several reasons In order of importance:

Connection: This is by far the most important. It makes close deep loving relationships easeful. I stumble into quality time accidentally. I am connected and it is wonderful.

Practical: Shared resources make life easier. There are so many economies of scale. Cooking, dealing with utilities, cleaning, receiving packages, planning events, rearing children, etc etc.

Economic: I get a lot more home per dollar. In the Brooklyn house I only paid for one sixth of the kitchen, one sixth of the living room, one sixth of the private backyard, but I got to fully enjoy all of them surrounded by people I love.

What does it actually look like in practice? Here's the Brooklyn house, which is the one I ran for years and can describe precisely. A weekly house meeting that averaged probably 1.5 hours — I actively enjoyed house meeting since it's being present with my friends and solving problems with my friends. 3-4 communal meals cooked each week; I didn't have to show up to all of them but the expectation was that each person tried to show up to at least a majority. I cooked dinner once a week targeting around 16 servings, which was enough for everyone plus another 2 meals or so per person worth of leftovers. I grocery shopped for the house 2-3 times per month with all groceries split evenly. Lots of natural easeful time spent with my homies: Co-working, eating, watching tv, impromptu plans, providing support, planned plans, climbing, physical touch, problem solving, etc etc. Even if the only perks of communal living were logistical and economical it would clearly be worth it, but the ease of deep connection is one of the largest increases to my quality of life. I am of the opinion that approximately all joy in life comes from other humans, whether that be directly or indirectly, and let me just tell you running into my homies every day is joyous!