“The box is generally a two or three story single family home and that’s about it. I think knowing that we need to get a lot more creative about how we’re living means that we need to raise that bar and enable more of that creativity. Because cities should be a little messy. ” — Craig Ruttan

Episode available at lifewithoutuspod.com

Craig Ruttan bought his first home this year giving him a front row seat to the urban housing issues he was already familiar with as a public policy leader and community enthusiast.

At the outset of their search, he, his fiancé Alex, two other couples, and an individual set out to buy a four-unit home in downtown Toronto for their new cohousing community. At the end of it, Craig, Alex, and their friends, Mike and Heather, moved into a two-unit home with ambitions to expand through laneway house construction in the future.

Host Valery connected with Craig three weeks post move-in to talk about the joy of starting to realize his and his co-owners’ vision for living in community and the choices that need to be made to replace profit with people as the focus of Toronto’s housing policy.

In this episode:

• House hunting as a group

• Evolving private rituals and traditions into shared community experiences

• Queer concepts of community

• Intergenerational wealth, white privilege, and Toronto’s homogenization by housing policy problem

• Housing access through “densification” “as-of-right zoning bylaws,” “strata ownership,” “shared equity models” and other creative policy solutions

• Future hopes for a community and a city

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Find Craig: Twitter

Find Other Episode References:

Black North Initiative and Habitat for Humanity GTA Toronto Star editorial on Anti-Black Racism and Housing

Toronto’s Laneway Suites Program

Toronto’s As-of-right Garden Suites Proposal

Types of Strata Ownership

Options for Homes