The problem of demographic decline

When you look at the "ethos" and business model of the current providers such as UKO, then it becomes clear that affordability is not exactly the goal, but rather convenience and the 'vibe' of the thing. All the co-living houses have full time "community managers" that organise the social life of the inhabitants. The concept being that the people attracted to co-living are lonely young professionals that are choosing to live with others for the company not for economic reasons. The other part of the business model that the likes of UKO and the future gen-x retirees share is an assumption that the inhabitants want services like cleaning, laundry, and personal training provided onsite for them rather than sharing these tasks or doing their own "adulting".

To be fair it is the provision of all these services that allow the companies that own these residences to turn a profit in addition to merely collecting rent. Co-living after all has become a business model.

But is possible (if not more apt) to run these as a co-ops with cleaning rosters and people volunteering their time to organise the living arrangements.

This is also why inter-generational living – or more aptly having different residents at different stages of life – is crucial as each phase of life comes with a different kind of surplus, retirees have time, young professionals have money, families have mothers that can take on a caring role (usually). The household can be arranged in such a way that people contribute what they are "rich in" (or have more of).

This kind of arrangement way very typical through most of human history.

To misquote Mary Harrington, the problem with conservatives is that they are not conservative enough, they are pining for the time when nuclear families was a thing but that was a very small blip in history, for most of the time we have been living in extended and multi-generational dwellings.

Co-living is just a modern term for the most traditional form of living. The problem with its current iteration is that it is forgetting that the value is not by socialising people that are in the same time of life (young professionals or retirees) but by bringing people together that are in very different stages of life because they can each provide something of value to the other.

Re-creating this style of living could do a lot for the material problems that demographic decline both creates and is caused by. It can (if managed correctly) make the cost of living and housing cheaper for the young people that are wanting to start families, it also will provide social support for the aging that can no longer rely on the government to take care of their needs as they age.

But for such an enterprise to be truly successful, in that it wouldn't just solve the material problems but also the non-material problems, there would have to be an overarching mission and vision. Co-living arrangements would not just need to be a marriage of convenience between people that want their material conditions ameliorated, but of people that want to create a community based on shared values.

You say cult, I say community

This is where people start to get worried. If you form a household or worse a whole community based on proscribed values that one has to hold to be a part of it then it opens the door to accusations of discrimination if not being a "cult". And, yes, if you want to form such a community then discrimination is required. There is a need to select for people that share the values of the community and also boot people out if they no longer share them.

But this is a much better starting point than the current co-living situation where the values are implicit – but not express – by the fact that companies like UKO post incessant social justice content on their socials, which makes me feel like I wouldn't be welcome in a co-living house managed by them. It would be much better if they made their offer expressly one of young professionals that shared the standard social justice views and values.