Local tenants at North Austin cooperative housing site negotiate for housing affordability

AUSTIN, Texas — A success story in the housing crisis- a group of tenants has cut the average rent of an 800 sq. ft. apartment in half.

Hardy House, a cooperative housing site in North Austin that was originally built as a fourplex, is now expanding. They negotiated an affordable lease agreement in January as rent remains high in Austin.

"For the past two years we've been renting out just half the building and the other half was vacant since last summer. A couple weeks ago we negotiated a contract for the other half, so now we can take over the entire building and expand," said Danial Kaufman, Treasurer of Hardy House Cooperative.

Kaufman took part in negotiating the contract with the landlord and said four new rooms are available for rent beginning this month.

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"When you put a lot of people together and all combined paying rent, it gets cheaper. So, instead of paying individual leases with the landlord, we have a master lease and each person has a sublease with the co-op and that makes it cheaper for us," Kaufman said.

Rooms at the Hardy House are now as low as $750 and go up to $900 per month depending on the size of the bedroom.

Ryan Nill is a Cooperative Consultant who supported Hardy House Cooperative through the lease negotiation.

"They got one of the most affordable places in town I think. If you get something less then $900 it sounds like a steal," Nill said. "Last I heard it's about 1600 to rent about 800 900 sq. ft. so this is about half as much as your Austin rent right now," Nill said.

Kaufman said the only difference between a co-op housing site and having your own apartment is shared spaces and responsibilities, which could be beneficial to tenants.

"Co-ops are for anyone. We have people of all ages here," Kaufman said.

If you wish to apply for their available rooms, click here.

Nill will teach a free, virtual workshop, "Discover the Benefits of Housing Co-ops," on February 16 from 6-8 p.m. The workshop is part of a series sponsored by the City of Austin’s Economic Development Department.