Why resident ownership?
✔️ Resident ownership means that you and your neighbors have control over the quality of services in your community.
✔️ All decisions are made through democratic participation. You vote on the operating budget, the Board of Directors, and all governing documents, including the community rules.
✔️ You know exactly where your rent goes. Rent is re-invested into your community and infrastructure needs are taken care of.
✔️ A generation of local, mom-and-pop community owner-operators are leaving the sector and are being replaced by private equity/Wall Street companies, who are often out-of-state. These companies may never even visit a community before they purchase, they may not be familiar with local regulations, and they will do whatever they can to keep operating costs down, while increasing their income (your rent). When a private equity/Wall Street company purchases a property, they create a profit. When a resident group purchases, you create a community. You control your destiny, and you never need to worry about the uncertainty of a future sale.
Why work with Cooperative Development Institute (CDI)?
✔️CDI has 15 years of experience converting manufactured housing communities to resident ownership. Our staff is made up of 15 individuals devoted full-time to resident-owned manufactured housing cooperatives. They come from a broad range of professional backgrounds, from social work to community economic development, financial analysis, as well as for-profit and non-profit management. We are well versed in both manufactured housing laws/regulations and in cooperative governance.
✔️ Our goal, pre-purchase, during this phase is to support a resident group through the purchase exploration process. We bring a range of vendors to the table including attorneys, engineers, environmental site assessment companies, and financiers. We will help you hit all milestones and reach a point of making an informed decision about resident ownership. We help you structure your cooperative so if the community decides to purchase, you’re able to successfully operate from day one.
✔️ After supporting the conversion of a community to limited-equity cooperative ownership, CDI provides longterm operations, governance, and finance technical assistance to support residents in sustaining the viability of their communities over the life of the purchase loan. This includes support to boards of directors and committees on democratic governance, conflict resolution, day-to-day operations and management, budgeting, loan compliance, and legal and regulatory compliance. None of the resident-owned communities in CDI’s portfolio have failed; all operate successfully today.
Contact the NEROC Acquisition Team
Pat Schwebler
Co-director of NEROC
Email: pschwebler@cdi.coop
Pat’s background is in real estate, finance, nonprofits, and business management. Working as a realtor in an urban setting, Pat developed an educational first-time homebuyer program and helped over 50 new Americans secure their first home. She served as co-chair of a nonprofit that provided emergency shelter to victims of domestic violence. Before joining CDI she was executive director of a senior center and worked to improve community conditions for the elderly. She helped create a free medical equipment loan closet in Kennebunk, Maine and served on Kennebunk’s Committee on Aging. Pat obtained her B.A. in Communications and graduate certificate in grant writing from the University of Southern Maine.
Nora Gosselin
Market Development Acquisitions Specialist
Email: ngosselin@cdi.coop
Nora Gosselin joined CDI in 2019 as a Cooperative Housing Specialist, and moved into the Market Development and Acquisitions role in 2021. Prior to joining CDI, Nora lived in a co-op for four years. During her time there, she worked as the treasurer, housing coordinator, and as an intern with the North American Students of Cooperation (NASCO). Nora has a BA in Urban Studies, and wrote a thesis focused on the regulatory and cultural barriers that face housing cooperatives in small cities. Nora has also worked as a waitress, barista, bookstore clerk, volunteer radio DJ, and coordinator/counselor for a music education program. She lives in Providence, RI.
