Become a neighbor
If you are considering living at Katywil, or any cohousing community, the houses are only one consideration. Lifestyle and your thoughts about living in community are equally important. We think community living is the best way to live a quality life, but it’s not for everyone. See Are we a good fit? To ascertain mutual compatability, we have a membership process to help you know what life at Katywil is like, what you are looking for, what responsibilities we have to each other, and if it feels right. We welcome new members who share our vision and want to participate in creating our community.
Diana Leafe Christian wrote a book about forming a community, which has been central to Katywil’s development. She also wrote Finding Community, about joining an intentional community. It covers “how to research, visit, evaluate and join the community of your dreams”. We highly recommend it for your search.
Explore Katywil
Participating in work and social gatherings is the best way for all of us to get to know each other and to ensure that we are a good match. As part of our membership process, we encourage you to find the events that interest you, and attend as many as you can. Our monthly business meetings are especially informative. Please contact Nancy at 413.624.3040 or nancy@katywil.com to attend an event or meeting.
If you sign up for our newsletter, besides Katywil news, we will invite you to upcoming potlucks, meetings, work parties, and other events. You can also like us on Facebook to get little snippets of daily life.
Are we a good fit?
We’ve formulated a list to help you consider whether our community and cohousing would be a good match. It’s meant to be used as a discussion tool with your family and to help formulate questions. If you agree with most of the statements in this list, living at Katywil might be just the place for you!
Roadmap
We are all coming from different places and have different visions for our future. This is a good thing, because a sustainable community needs diversity, however, our visions also need to be compatible. We found that visualizing the future tells us volumes about ourselves, our partners, and each other. We recommend that you and family members create a vision of what it will be like to live at Katywil first.
Vision Exercise:
Write about a day or life in general at Katywil after you’ve lived here for 5 years, each family member do your own. Go for what you really dream about; you don’t have to show the first draft to anybody; go to a place you filed away under “that could never really happen”. Write in the present day: 2017. Do NOT spend more than 15 or 30 minutes on it. Be specific, descriptive, and add details. Remember it’s not HOW you are getting there, only about what your life will be like in 2017.
Picking a lot
Houses at Katywil are clustered, each with its own deeded lot, on approximately 3/4 acres. However, Katywil comprises 112 acres so each lot owner also has a 1/17 share of the remaining acres, including managed forest, open meadows, woodland trails, agricultural land and some planned community structures (barn, greenhouse, other TBD). There are six lots still available in Phase I. When Phase I is completed, Phase II, which will have five lots, will begin. Please contact Nancy at 413.624.3040 or nancy@katywil.com to set up a time to see and discuss.
Building a home and Cost
Buying into Katywil involves first selecting and purchasing a lot. All lots are currently priced at $110,000. This price includes the cost of the land, a share of the cost of roads and other infrastructure, as well as a share of community property such as a tractor, common house and common land.
Once you have purchased a lot there are a couple of options for building your house. You may select or modify one of two existing architectural designs or come up with your own design. Construction costs listed below for the two existing architectural designs are estimates for illustration purposes only. Actual costs may vary due to modifications in the basic architectural design and cost of materials.
1. Katywil designed 2-bedroom, or 3-bedroom house.
The 2-bedroom Katywil Mini House is ~1060 sq. ft. The estimated construction cost of this house is about $175,000. With the lot price (see above), total cost is $285,000.
The 3-bedroom Katywil essential house is ~1350 sq. ft. The estimated construction cost of this house is about $275,000. With the lot price (see above), total cost is $385,000.
Both of the above house designs may be customized for additional cost. We have suggested guidelines and a design review committee that considers proposals that include changes to the exterior.
Designed to be very low maintenance, Katywil houses are clad in HardiPlank, which has a 15-year paint, and 50-year performance warranty, is non-combustible, resists rodents, mold, cracking, and is environmentally friendly.
The walls are a foot thick, filled with dense-pack, blown-in cellulose, and rated R-45. The roof is also cellulose-insulated with an R-value of 65. Windows are low-e, argon-filled, and triple-glazed to provide maximum passive-solar access and cross-ventilation.The large south-facing, passive solar windows look across to Stone Mountain and southeast to Catamount. The roof eaves are designed to be cool in summer and warm in winter.
Each house is caulked during construction to be airtight. Air leakage is tested using a blower-door test after the exterior walls and windows are complete. Any air leaks that appear during this test are sealed.
2. A house that you design and/or build.
Do you have a unique house design in mind? You may also build a house yourself or have it built according to your own design. We have suggested guidelines and a design review committee that considers proposals to ensure that your needs are balanced with the community’s focus on green building techniques and materials, quality, energy and space efficiency, and how the house will fit into the environment and neighborhood. The construction costs associated with a unique design must be determined and can vary widely which is why some people feel there is an advantage to using an existing design.
Katywil Monthly Fees
The monthly membership is $100 per lot. This fee is used to fund operational expenses such as insurance, snowplowing or general maintenance. Part of this fee is also set aside as a reserve for future anticipated repairs or expenses. Once you hold the title to a lot you are responsible for paying monthly dues.
In certain circumstances funds may be needed for an essential new expense that exceeds budget. In this case Katywil members may choose to impose a “special assessment”, typically a one-time fee in addition to monthly dues. This decision is subject to approval by all property owners.
Also during the annual budget process, members may choose to increase the monthly assessment to account for new recurring expenses or simply to make cost of living adjustments. In calculating your on-going expenses at Katywil you should assume that dues will increase at an annual inflation rate of about 5%.
