A cooperative model of homes for students, collectively managed and at affordable rents. SEASALT in Brighton shows the way

Small, concrete achievements in community power should be celebrated. We picked up this success this week, in Brighton.

An organisation rather beautifully titled SEASALT - standing for “South-East Students Autonomously Living Together” - in conjunction with Brighton & Hove Community Land Trust, “has just purchased its first property, making it the fifth project in the UK, and the first in the South-East to establish a co-operative model of homes for students, collectively managed and at affordable rents” (according to their press release).

SEASALT give their rationale below:

As young people, we have grown up in a country where the impacts of the financial crash, resulting austerity and a profit driven neoliberal system have disproportionately impacted disadvantaged communities, including us.

The mass sell-off of public land and unequal land ownership have given rise to a financialised housing market with accommodation and rent prices spiralling faster than inflation.

For students, these issues are only enhanced as landlords and letting agents look to exploit our inexperience and precarious, insecure situations, frequently to make maximum profit for minimum effort. This means that student accommodation often exemplifies the worst aspects of housing in this country.

Thus, it is very difficult to break the yearly cycle of renting with private landlords who usually have no incentive to improve student living conditions or tackle big issues such as the carbon emissions and accessibility of their housing stock.

By empowering our students to take control of their accommodation, we have taken the first steps towards building a fairer and more equal future across Brighton and Hove, putting the needs of our local community first.

So, not only do we want to provide affordable, sustainable and democratic solutions to housing, we also want to demonstrate how co-ops and the co-operative economy can help solve the big issues of our time. This could include climate change and sustainability, wealth and land inequality, democratising our economy or, of course, our housing crisis.

That’s how we fit into the bigger picture, because after all, if we a small group of students can make big change in our community, why can’t you?

There seems to be a growing movement for student housing cooperatives (see the Student Homes federation.) The Brighton achievement seems to be rooted in the diversity of ethical investment they have secured - a community land trust, a community share offer (raising £336,200 from over 140 investors), and a mortgage from the Ecology Building Society. As Coop News reports:

The student housing co-op movement is aimed at offering an alternative to the private rental market, offering lower rents and better-quality accommodation. They are designed to allow tenants to pool their resources to create community-style homes where everyone collaborates for mutual benefit. The rent paid is only used to cover the upkeep of the house (lease, bills, repairs, etc.) and not to enrich landlords. 

The project comes against a backdrop of increasing difficulty in the student housing market. Brighton University lecturer Rebecca Searle has warned: “High rents are causing significant inequalities in education. Those students whose families are able to support them are able to devote considerably more time to their studies then those who are having to work long hours to cover their rents.”

More here. And for their full range of activities, visit the SEASALT Linktree.