Developer-driven co-housing in Denmark: Experiences from an emerging trend

In recent years an increasing number of commercial housing developers have started to deliver pre-designed cohousing settlements in the Danish market for co-housing. We estimate that around 30% of new-built co-housing units
in Denmark today is established by private developers and might increase further in the coming years. This development has contributed to a strong growth of co-housing in Denmark over the last 2-3 years. Although the
group of developers is quite heterogenous, the top-down approach represents a large change compared to the predominant bottom-up process, for instance a shorter planning process, reduced risks for the residents, but also less
involvement of the residents in the planning and design stages. Several co-housing concepts are designed as turn-key projects, aiming for a broader audience compared to traditional co-housing, with limited involvement in design
decisions, activities based on voluntary participation, and a physical design that supports and promotes spontaneous meetings amongst neighbors. A main question is how the limited involvement will influence the operation stage
where the residents will be developing the community by sharing facilities and meals, making joint decisions etc. Based on interviews with developers, facilitators and residents, our findings suggests that residents generally
welcome the main features of the developer-driven co-housing, but also that some features need further attention and development, including the facilitation of the community, the organizational structure, as well as decision-making on
operational issues between residents and owner. In short, top-down approaches need facilitation of the community. Developer-driven co-housing has a large potential for meeting an apparently huge demand on co-housing, but also
represents a large experiment with the co-housing idea, that needs continued attention.