Darra co-housing gives five older women studios on 50-year leases

Sharing with Friends, the charity behind the project, says residents selected each other through workshops it ran. Its president, Susan Davies, told the ABC the project has had “virtually no help from government”. The article carries no government response.

The numbers

All figures are as reported by the ABC.

• Five self-contained studio units, each with a kitchen and courtyard.
• Shared kitchen, living room and central courtyard.
• $120,000 per woman, based on the average super balance of a woman at retirement age. On our arithmetic, that is $600,000 across the five residents.
• 50-year lease. The charity owns the land, and residents pay their own electricity and rates.
• On leaving, or after death, residents receive their initial investment plus CPI.

The ABC reports architect Eloise Atkinson designed the model pro bono, and that the project was funded through philanthropic donations.

Planning category

The article says the project was approved under the boarding house category, which the architect said is not the right fit. The charity says councils and governments need to cut red tape and write the model into their planning acts so it can be replicated.

What’s next

The charity wants to roll the model out nationally, the ABC reports. Its next project would need a buy-in of about $200,000. The article gives no location or timeline for it.

We have not independently checked the approval record, so the details above are attributed to the ABC. The Australian Developer will update the story if the charity or council publishes further detail.