Permanently Affordable
Housing Co-ops
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SquareOne develops permanently affordable housing co-ops that are designed to create a middle path between renting and traditional homeownership. Residents gain greater control and stability over their housing compared to rental, while being far more accessible and less risky than single-family homeownership.​
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​Here's a summary of how this shared ownership model works:
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Members own the co-op together.
Each household becomes a member by purchasing a membership share in the cooperative corporation. Members do not buy an individual unit. Instead, they share ownership of the whole co-op community.
In a permanently affordable housing co-op, the value that you can resell your membership share for is limited in order to preserve affordability for future members.
Membership comes with both housing rights and voting rights.
Through a proprietary lease, each member receives the right to live in a specific home. As members of the co-op, households also have a voice and vote in major decisions that affect the community.
Members pay a monthly carrying charge.
The monthly carrying charge helps cover the co-op’s shared costs, including mortgage payments, insurance, taxes, maintenance, utilities, reserves, and day-to-day operations. Members set the monthly carrying charge when they vote to adopt an annual budget.
Members elect a Board of Directors.
The board is made up of co-op members elected by the membership. The board is responsible for governing the co-op on behalf of the whole membership. This includes adopting policies, overseeing the budget, making decisions in the best interest of the co-op, and working with service providers.
The property manager handles day-to-day operations.
In larger housing co-ops, the board typically contracts with a property manager to handle day-to-day operations. The property manager may coordinate maintenance, collect carrying charges, send notices, maintain records, work with vendors, and help carry out the co-op’s policies and procedures. The property manager reports to the board.
A Community Land Trust protects permanent affordability.
The co-op holds a 99-year ground lease with the SquareOne Community Land Trust, which helps protect permanent affordability and long-term sustainability. SquareOne also provides ongoing technical assistance to support good governance, financial responsibility and maintenance planning. It does not make decisions for the co-op.
The goal is a healthy, resident-led community.
A strong co-op depends on both structure and culture: clear documents, good governance, respectful communication, shared responsibility, and a commitment to stable, permanently affordable, community-controlled housing.
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Oregon Cooperative Housing Network
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Cooperative ownership offers a powerful tool for keeping homes affordable, resident-led, and rooted in community for the long term. But housing co-ops are still a relatively unfamiliar concept in Oregon.​​
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That’s why SquareOne helped launch the Oregon Cooperative Housing Network: to advance cooperative housing as a practical and desirable form of homeownership, connect people working on co-op housing across the state, and help build the ecosystem needed for more permanently affordable co-ops to take root