Co-Ops Could Help Solve San Francisco’s Affordable Housing Crisis

November 5, 2021

Co-op housing, having fallen largely to the wayside for decades, is getting a second look in San Francisco as the stubbornly high cost of real estate has displaced working class families, entire communities of color and generations of locals.

Cooperative housing — which can offer a less expensive avenue to home ownership — has been a model used to help combat displacement and gentrification in other cities nationwide.

“As an ecosystem and as a way of thinking about housing, both (co-op models) are really important,” said Fernando Marti from Council of Community Housing, a local housing nonprofit.