We are founding a small community on 7.25 acres of wooded, hilly land in Hamden, Connecticut, USA, with a ranch house, a stream, a streamside meadow, and soaring poplars and maples. Although the land is heavily populated with invasive species, we also noticed bloodroot, white wood asters, snakeroot, and several types of goldenrod; we’re excited to see what’s visible there in the spring. Day to day, we will be spending a lot of time together as a community: cooking and eating together; sharing chores; working together on home and land improvement projects; and hanging out. We want to host occasional events like workshops, cookouts, and backyard shows.
We want to manage the forest as a forest-understory farm that provides food for humans, especially mushrooms, shade-tolerant native edible plants like mayapple, honewort, ramps and fiddleheads, and water plants like wapato and cattail. We want the land to provide way more ecosystem services than it does now and support all kinds of wildlife, from turkeys to caterpillars. There is also mown yard near the house that can be converted over time into small garden and orchard areas. We’ll also have small livestock -- definitely chickens, possibly geese and goats, depending on the interests of the community.
We haven’t closed on the land yet, but we’re under contract and hoping to find people to move in with us starting as soon as November 18th (the current planned close date) or on December 1st. It’s at 585 Main St in Hamden, CT, about 15 car-minutes or 30 bike-minutes from central New Haven. The house was expensive, and we’ll likely be looking at a monthly cost of between $700-950 per person, per month (including utilities). You can see pictures of the house on Redfin or your preferred listing service. The listing doesn’t have a lot of pictures of the land, unfortunately, so I’ve made a public album to give a better sense of what it looks like. We want to protect the land so that it can never be sold, but instead is owned in trust by the community, providing everyone who lives there with land security.
If this sounds like your dream living situation, please message us! We’ll be happy to answer any questions and send an application your way. If the house falls through, we'll still be looking for land and would love to have your contact info. Properties like this seem to come up 1-2 times a year in Hamden.
Link to album:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/kuYSJNkQkBfFCEbZ6
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We have a hugely overwhelming amount of planning to do -- it will absolutely take the prescribed year -- so if you want to come brainstorm with us you'd be welcome, and I'd also love to come to a meetup wherever it is, although I always seem to be double-scheduled for the coolest things. Where are you at in CT?
