I remember some stories about rationalist grouphouses that didn’t end well. This could be a selection bias—if everything works okay, it is kinda boring, no good story to tell. But unless someone makes a proper research, I am going to assume that, let’s say, 50% of rationalist grouphouses fall apart because of some kind of conflict.
This seems to me like a good argument in favor of renting—if the conflict happens and the project falls apart, it is easier for everyone to go their own way. If you bought the house together, now your situation is similar to a divorce, only with more people involved.
I would make an exception if you already live together for one year, and everyone seems to be okay with the situation and wishes to stay for another few years. Even then you should write a contract specifying what happens if two years later someone decides to leave. (Will they keep owning a part of the house they no longer live in? Will the remaining people now pay them rent? Or will the remaining people buy the fraction of the house back? What if the market prices have changed in the meanwhile?)
Alternately, maybe one person owns the house, and everyone else pays rent to them?
This seems much easier. You just need one person sufficiently rich to buy a house where dozen people will want to live.
Strongly disagree that 50% of rationalist group houses fall apart because of some kind of conflict, although I guess I’d probably want to operationalize ‘fall apart’ and ‘conflict’ better.
I can only think of one(?) public story about a group house that didn’t end well (Decision Tree, which was very much not a typical rationalist house)
I think a lot of houses chose to dissolve around the beginning of the pandemic, which was often due to disagreements about how to respond to the pandemic, but I wouldn’t necessarily characterize those disagreements as ‘conflict’
I know group houses where there has been some level of conflict but that often just results in one person moving out, rather than the house disbanding
I know of plenty of group houses that have been disbanded amicably, because young single people in the Bay live ever-changing lives
I don’t disagree that it seems better to rent partly because of the possibility of conflict — lots of group houses have a rotating cast anyway, and that seems like a bitch to manage if everyone somehow went in on the house together. But I disagree with the characterization of rationalist houses as incredibly unstable and conflict-prone.
What were the covid disagreements about? If it was just about differences in personal preferences and risk tolerances, fair enough, situations changed, someone had to move, but if it was about inability to reconcile or reach a satisfying compromise on the epistemics… I’d be disappointed.
My limited experience is that most grouphouses, in general, fall apart due to conflict. Despite being pretty thoroughly embedded in the rationalist community, still hear about as many grouphouse stories from outside it.
I’d agree that renting probably makes it easier to dissolve after conflicts, I don’t know how much easier. In a partial ownership scheme, it’s just a matter of finding someone to buy you out, or if only one person is leaving at a time (and this applies to a renting situation as well), maybe there could be a scheme where the others are obligated to buy someone out (they then sell that share to whoever moves in next).
I guess in that case, the house should only be expected to be able to deal with one house-backed buyout at a time.
I can think of a number of ways this could be done:
There’s a minimum fraction of the share that each member must be prepared to buy. (What’s the enforcement mechanism?)
Or maybe we should be nice and exempt members who don’t manage any little liquid wealth from having to contribute.
But it’s permissible to let someone else buy your fraction, if they’re willing.
The house maintains a communal liquid investment to be drawn from when a buyout is necessary.
The house takes on a collective loan to pay for the buyout. Which is then usually paid back when a new member arrives. From what I’ve heard (sorry, can’t remember source) collective loans have extremely high payback rates because a communities are really good for accountability, so the interest rate could be potentially quite low. It might also be feasible to get CEA to facilitate these if finding sufficiently trusting lenders is an issue.
I remember some stories about rationalist grouphouses that didn’t end well. This could be a selection bias—if everything works okay, it is kinda boring, no good story to tell. But unless someone makes a proper research, I am going to assume that, let’s say, 50% of rationalist grouphouses fall apart because of some kind of conflict.
This seems to me like a good argument in favor of renting—if the conflict happens and the project falls apart, it is easier for everyone to go their own way. If you bought the house together, now your situation is similar to a divorce, only with more people involved.
I would make an exception if you already live together for one year, and everyone seems to be okay with the situation and wishes to stay for another few years. Even then you should write a contract specifying what happens if two years later someone decides to leave. (Will they keep owning a part of the house they no longer live in? Will the remaining people now pay them rent? Or will the remaining people buy the fraction of the house back? What if the market prices have changed in the meanwhile?)
This seems much easier. You just need one person sufficiently rich to buy a house where dozen people will want to live.
Strongly disagree that 50% of rationalist group houses fall apart because of some kind of conflict, although I guess I’d probably want to operationalize ‘fall apart’ and ‘conflict’ better.
I can only think of one(?) public story about a group house that didn’t end well (Decision Tree, which was very much not a typical rationalist house)
I think a lot of houses chose to dissolve around the beginning of the pandemic, which was often due to disagreements about how to respond to the pandemic, but I wouldn’t necessarily characterize those disagreements as ‘conflict’
I know group houses where there has been some level of conflict but that often just results in one person moving out, rather than the house disbanding
I know of plenty of group houses that have been disbanded amicably, because young single people in the Bay live ever-changing lives
I don’t disagree that it seems better to rent partly because of the possibility of conflict — lots of group houses have a rotating cast anyway, and that seems like a bitch to manage if everyone somehow went in on the house together. But I disagree with the characterization of rationalist houses as incredibly unstable and conflict-prone.
What were the covid disagreements about? If it was just about differences in personal preferences and risk tolerances, fair enough, situations changed, someone had to move, but if it was about inability to reconcile or reach a satisfying compromise on the epistemics… I’d be disappointed.
I hope you are right.
My limited experience is that most grouphouses, in general, fall apart due to conflict. Despite being pretty thoroughly embedded in the rationalist community, still hear about as many grouphouse stories from outside it.
I’d agree that renting probably makes it easier to dissolve after conflicts, I don’t know how much easier. In a partial ownership scheme, it’s just a matter of finding someone to buy you out, or if only one person is leaving at a time (and this applies to a renting situation as well), maybe there could be a scheme where the others are obligated to buy someone out (they then sell that share to whoever moves in next).
I guess in that case, the house should only be expected to be able to deal with one house-backed buyout at a time.
I can think of a number of ways this could be done:
There’s a minimum fraction of the share that each member must be prepared to buy. (What’s the enforcement mechanism?)
Or maybe we should be nice and exempt members who don’t manage any little liquid wealth from having to contribute.
But it’s permissible to let someone else buy your fraction, if they’re willing.
The house maintains a communal liquid investment to be drawn from when a buyout is necessary.
The house takes on a collective loan to pay for the buyout. Which is then usually paid back when a new member arrives. From what I’ve heard (sorry, can’t remember source) collective loans have extremely high payback rates because a communities are really good for accountability, so the interest rate could be potentially quite low. It might also be feasible to get CEA to facilitate these if finding sufficiently trusting lenders is an issue.