A housing micro-cooperative in Gdynia Orłowo as a model of action for a grassroots building initiative
During my studies in Poznan fifteen years ago, I was exploring the city extensively and happened to come across the oldest squat still operating in Poland: Rozbrat. The slogan painted on the entrance gate - "Get organized!" - gave me food for thought and at the time seemed counterintuitive. After all, it was called for by anarchists. The organization was supposed to be grassroots and in the spirit of DIY. Perhaps something remained in me from that impression.
Grzegorz TĘGOWSKI - graduate of philosophy at the Faculty of Social Sciences at UAM and architecture at Gdansk University of Technology. Since 2019 he has been running a studio ZZAA in Gdynia, where he seeks sustainable architectural solutions. He is a member of the Pomeranian Regional Chamber of Architects. He gained professional experience by developing hotels, resorts and residential projects in Poland, Tanzania and Cambodia.
need
After graduation, I returned to my hometown and settled in Gdynia. Ten years and two children later, in 2025, my family and I are facing the mundane of life in the context of the housing affordability crisis affecting the Tri-City metropolitan area. The average offer price for apartments on the primary market in Gdynia from December 2019 to December 2024 increased by 54 percent: from PLN 8,748 per square meter to PLN 13,488 per square meter. The price increases are linked to both the general economic situation and the specifics of the region. In the Tri-City, the availability of construction land is limited. The natural expansion of the metropolitan core is limited from the west and north by the moraine hills covered by the protected Oliwski Forest and the Darżlub Forest. From the east and north, the barrier is formed by the waters of the Gulf of Gdansk. The entire region is an attractive place to live, and real estate on the Coast is a good capital investment for domestic and foreign investors. In 2022, the National Bank of Poland conducted a nationwide survey of real estate developers, which showed that about 70 percent of new apartments were purchased by individuals for investment purposes, and 30 percent for personal use. With capital rushing in, residents of Gdansk, Sopot and Gdynia must compete for limited housing stock. One consequence is dynamic suburbanization. The rate of the average annual number of housing units completed in new residential buildings between 2013 and 2020 per 10,000 people nationwide was 44.2. The suburban zones of the Tri-City saw a level of construction activity of 106.3 housing units completed per 10,000 residents, indicating the exceptional intensity of the region's suburbanization process compared to the rest of the country.
My wife, Kasia, and I were looking for a way to improve our family housing situation. At the same time, we wanted to live in a well-connected part of the city, close to the city center and the sea, and we also wanted to avoid huge debt for years. The optimal solution seemed to us to form a housing cooperative. In December 2024, together with two friendly couples, we bought a small plot of land located in Gdynia Orlowo and intend to jointly build a multi-family residential building on it.
idea
Several years ago, I co-founded the now-defunct TEKA collective with other Tricity architects. During meetings and cooperation on projects, we exchanged ideas and inspired each other. Tomasz Bogusz from the HAG studio instilled in me an enthusiasm for the idea of cooperatives. A housing co-op is a group of people joining together with the common goal of building a house designed most often to meet their own housing needs. It is also a process of joint action. It happened to us that distant acquaintances, who were very vaguely familiar with our situation, asked ironically about the development of our "commune." The planned development is partly cohousing, and in addition to private apartments, we plan to share a garden, a bicycle room and a rooftop observation deck. The ultimate nature of the operation of the planned building and community will not differ significantly from the standard situation in other multifamily houses. In accordance with the provisions of the contract binding all members of the cooperative, upon completion of the construction process we will relinquish the commonality of property and record the apartments in separate land registers.
entry threshold
In the Polish legal order, cooperatives appeared with the Law of November 4, 2022 on housing cooperatives. It did not give cooperatives an independent legal personality. After signing the agreement , our group members will co-found a civil partnership, which also formally does not constitute an independent legal entity. We considered various options for formally framing our cooperation. In the context of the relatively small scale of our investment, the establishment of a limited liability company or an association seemed inadequate. A good solution would be to establish a cooperative, which could potentially fit into the nature of our cooperation. Housing cooperatives are well-established legally and fiscally in Poland due to their long history of operation, dating back to the 1920s (WSM). However, we did not organize in this form for formal reasons. Our six-member group does not meet the requirement of a minimum of ten founding members.
In addition to issues of legal liability, the formal status of the cooperative is important because of investment financing. There are no banking products for housing cooperatives on the Polish market. The idea in our country is still new, and cooperatives have no legal personality, which actually prevents them from taking loans. In addition, access to commonly used financial tools in housing investment, such as an escrow account, is also limited. In this regard, we will rely on a bank account set up for a partnership, in which all members of our group will be partners. At this point, we are basing our investment financing plan on the individual assets of the co-op members and their creditworthiness. Theoretically, it is possible to take out a joint mortgage to cover the costs already incurred for the purchase of the plot of land within a year of the purchase and to credit the activities of the partnership. For the operation of our micro-cooperative, we have adopted the model of individual financing. We are in the process of developing the project and collecting quotes from potential contractors. Our calculations show that we will close the average cost of construction of a square meter of apartment in developer condition, together with the expenses incurred for the purchase of the plot, in 9,000 zlotys. The project is located in a neighborhood where the average bid price for comparable apartments is PLN 23,400 per square meter.
To create an effective group, first of all, you need committed, compact and ready people. The process of building a house within the cooperative is complex because of its deeply participatory nature, in which all members within the framework of established rules must approve solutions to problems that arise. At stake is a house built to a standard influenced by all co-op members at a price significantly lower than the market. Our group includes six adults and three children. There are two architects among us (Diana Pachulska and the author of the text), and Diana's husband Radek is a non-practicing civil engineer. The experience of working in the construction industry of several people in the group helps throughout the process. So far, we are operating essentially without conflict, in organizational matters some difficulty may be the adopted principle of unanimity of the group in decision-making.
Panoramic photo of the plot on which a residential building for three families with additional balconies and a roof garden is to be built
photo: author's archive
architectural assumptions
We are in the process of creating design documentation on the basis of the analysis and consultations carried out. Prior to the actual purchase of the plot, after signing a conditional preliminary agreement, we obtained a legally binding decision on development conditions. One of the key parameters limiting the possibility of development on a small plot of 424 square meters is the requirement for a minimum number of parking spaces. In our case, we managed to get the possibility to park three cars on the site and are not forced to invest in an expensive garage hall. On the plot there are existing buildings of an old garage and an outbuilding, which we intend to reconstruct for separate storage cells and a shared bicycle room with a workshop.
The designed building will have three floors above ground. There will be a common viewing terrace - a "sun garden" - on the roof, and a common "shade garden" on the grounds as well. The floors will be connected by an external, open, prefabricated staircase. In addition to the roof terrace, apartments on the floors will have access to additional balconies. We still have before us a final decision on the choice of construction technology. We are considering the use of the following methods: wood prefabrication or reinforced concrete frame with silicate block walls.
system
The housing micro-cooperative can be one of the model solutions for grassroots construction initiatives activities. This does not mean that it is without flaws, but that it can provide a certain benchmark that can be improved according to one's needs. It is characterized by a small scale of investment. In this model, a cooperative group of three to five families has a chance to compete in the market with private investors for limited land resources in large cities. A small group can afford to buy a plot of land large enough to meet its own needs, but too small for a developer's needs. Alternatively, a cooperative of three families can purchase an existing single-family home, remodel it, change its use and set aside independent units. In a small community made up of people with good relationships, it is easy to rely on mutual trust in some matters.
I agree with Dr. Margaret Mader's opinion expressed in an episode of the Architecture Should podcast devoted to housing cooperatives in the Netherlands. The idea of cooperatives will not solve the housing crisis. In Amsterdam, where there is an active municipal policy toward co-operatives (zelfbouw), these groups build about 2 percent of the housing units per year. Due to the nature of the process, this is not a systemic solution for everyone. The micro-cooperative concept may be a good idea for families and small groups with similar property status and for people with an amicable disposition.
Grzegorz Tęgowski
Read more: A&B 3/2025 - RESIDENCE,
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