Investing in Stonehill Cohousing
In order to purchase Stonehill, we have partnered with Catalyst Collective to build a financial model that takes as a starting point the savings of our current member households. Our journey towards purchasing the site involved conversations with a number of ethical lenders who specialise in offering commercial mortgages for community housing projects. This led to us building a finance forecast in which we have modelled and stress-tested our monthly cash flow for the next 40 years, with the assistance of a specialist co-housing finance expert.
Due to our commitment to ensure that Stonehill provides affordable and inclusive accommodation, we rely on investments in addition to the savings put in by our member households. We were able to purchase the site due to the amazing support of our initial investors – but as we continue on the journey of opening up the site and expanding our capacity to house more members more investment will be needed.
Why invest?
The type of investment we are seeking is called ‘loan stock’. It offers significant benefits to us as a group compared with seeking traditional loans from a bank.
With these kinds of loans from individuals we are able to agree on bespoke amounts, payback periods, and rates of interest per investor. For example, if we agreed an interest rate of 3%, (we offer 0-4% interest) this would be significantly lower than a mortgage for us, but higher than your average savings account for the investor.
Some investors may choose to help us further by accepting an interest rate of 0%. Please note that loan stock is unsecured and as such not backed by the value of property. However, as a cooperative society we are required to file annual reports with the Financial Conduct Authority.
Invest today
If you would like a copy of our investor pack or are interested in investing please get in touch with us at info@stonehillcohousing.org and we’ll be able to discuss further details with you.