Oakcreek Community co-housing project near Stillwater reaches halfway point for build

Find out more about the Stillwater co-housing project.

A year ago, the drawing hung on a wall in a mid-century, ranch-style house - all that the Oakcreek Community had to show for itself.

Now you can look out the window and see that same row of cottages, albeit with unfinished roofs and unpainted walls.

As construction approaches the halfway mark, Stillwater's experiment with "co-housing" has become more than theoretical.

"In a side-by-side comparison," says Oakcreek homeowner Nadine Olson, "you can see it coming into being exactly as we imagined it."

In a co-housing neighborhood, the residents own the entire development and run the project themselves, controlling every detail, from arranging finances to hiring an architect.

When home buyers begin moving into Oakcreek this fall, they will own their individual houses but also share ownership in the wider property.

A lot of day-to-day life - including some, if not most, of their meals - will happen in the "common house" near the center of the compound.

"It's more than a place to live," says Olson, who recently retired from teaching Spanish at Oklahoma State University. "It's going to be a community - a real community."

The first of its kind in Oklahoma, Oakcreek follows the example of similar projects in Colorado, Virginia and a handful of other states.

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Oakcreek Community co-housing project near Stillwater reaches halfway point for build