Housing, Theory and Society

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Motivational Barriers to Shared Housing: The

Importance of Meanings of “Home” in the
Diffusion of Housing Innovations

Bart Put & Inge Pasteels

To cite this article: Bart Put & Inge Pasteels (2022) Motivational Barriers to Shared Housing:
The Importance of Meanings of “Home” in the Diffusion of Housing Innovations, Housing,
Theory and Society, 39:3, 257-274, DOI: 10.1080/14036096.2021.1932580

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HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY
2022, VOL. 39, NO. 3, 257–274
https://doi.org/10.1080/14036096.2021.1932580

Motivational Barriers to Shared Housing: The Importance of

Meanings of “Home” in the Diffusion of Housing Innovations
Bart Put and Inge Pasteels
Social Work Research, PXL University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Hasselt, Belgium
ARTICLE HISTORY Received 7 January 2020; Accepted 12 May 2021
KEYWORDS Shared housing; cohousing; meaning of home; motivational barriers; privacy; conflict

Introduction
In recent years, Flanders has witnessed a notable upsurge in the public attention for
cohousing and other types of shared living arrangements (e.g. Jonckheere et al. 2010; Van
den Houte et al. 2015; Verstraete and De Decker 2017; Brusselmans et al. 2019). The
attention is sparked by discussions on substantial challenges currently faced by the
Flemish housing market. First, there is a growing concern about the long term environ­
mental and societal costs of urban sprawl in Flanders (Vermeiren et al. 2019). A long
history of path dependent policy decisions has resulted in a landscape characterized by
the dispersal of large single family houses in low density areas and ribbon development,
putting an increasing amount of pressure on nature and mobility (De Decker 2011;
Bervoets and Heynen 2013). Second, like in many countries in the Western world, the
demographic set-up of Flanders is undergoing important changes. The ageing of society
and the shrinking size of households exacerbate the problem of an undercrowded
housing stock on the one hand, that of a growing need for mutual support and easy
access to care on the other hand (Bervoets and Heynen 2013; Bervoets, Vanneste, and
Ryckewaert 2014). Furthermore, the Flemish housing model seems ill-suited to accom­
modate the increasing de-standardization of family life (Luyten et al. 2015). Third,
researchers have pointed to persistent problems pertaining to the quality and the
affordability of housing, especially on the lower end of the private rental market
(Depraetere et al. 2015; Heylen 2015; Verstraete and De Decker 2017). In all three respects,
shared housing or shared living arrangements have been thematized by researchers and
policy makers as one of the avenues for confronting such challenges. Flemish law has
been considered too inflexible to be able to support a more important role for collective
housing, however. This was one of the reasons why a decree was issued by the Flemish
Government in 2017, installing a test environment for experimental housing forms, the
results of which will be evaluated in 2023 (Vermeire 2017). As part of its “Vision 2050” the
Flemish Government also committed to stimulating a gradual shift towards “smart hous­
ing and living” and strengthening public support for alternative, including collective, ways
of living (Wonen Vlaanderen 2017).

CONTACT Bart Put [email protected] PXL Social Work Research, Vildersstraat 5, B-3500 Hasselt, Belgium
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any med­
ium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
258 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

More or less simultaneously, scholars have begun to probe people’s readiness to share
(part of) their living space (Bervoets, Vanneste, and Ryckewaert 2014; Gerards, Nuyts, and
Vanrie 2016; GfK Belgium 2017; Heylen and Vanderstraeten 2019). It is worthwhile to focus
a bit more in detail on the two most recent studies, given their nation-wide scale. Both are
large-scale surveys, generating results weighed to a representative sample of the Flemish
population. The first study finds that 55% of Flemish citizens are not prepared to share any
of their living spaces, whether interior or exterior (GfK Belgium 2017). Those who are
prepared to do so, would be more keen on sharing a functional space (work place, office
space, laundry area) than on sharing a more personal space, such as a kitchen or a living
room. Family privacy is reported to be the most important obstacle. Results from the most
recent survey (Heylen and Vanderstraeten 2019) are strongly in line with the earlier study.
Here, the willingness to share ranges from 2.7% for a living room or kitchen (when no
extra private living room or kitchen is available), over 27.5% for garden space, to 52.6% for
parking space and bicycle storage, leading the authors to conclude that the mindset of
Flemings is generally not collective in nature (Heylen and Vanderstraeten 2019).
Such statistics are very valuable for gaining a general overview, but still leave much to
the interpretation when it comes to the deeper meanings of these obstacles to the people
involved. Even a brief look at the notion of privacy (e.g. Margulis 2003), for example,
reveals a quite complex plurality of possible meanings. Therefore, qualitative inquiry can
provide more in-depth insights into the matter, complementing the findings from quan­
titative research, and handing more concrete tools for policy makers to build upon in their
efforts to generate support for collective ways of living. The main focus of this study is to
explore the various factors that impede people from considering shared housing arrange­
ments in the Flemish context. By doing so, we also aim to contribute to a fuller under­
standing of obstacles from the point of view of “non-adopters” (Rogers 1983) more in
general, which proves to be a somewhat neglected perspective in existing research on
shared housing, as we will argue.

Overview of the Literature

Some Conceptual Clarifications
Before proceeding to a more detailed overview of the literature, some conceptual
clarifications are needed with regard to the use of the notions of “shared housing”,
“shared living (arrangements)” and “cohousing” in this article. To keep in line with recent
Flemish research (see above), we will use the notion of “shared housing” or “shared living
(arrangements)” to refer to any type of housing situation in which (part of) one’s dwelling
is shared with co-residents who are not direct family members. This working definition is
somewhat broader than its use in e.g. Clark et al. (2018) or Woo, Cho, and Kim (2019),
where it mainly targets house sharing or flat sharing among young adults in the context of
the private rental sector (PRS). An important goal of our research, however, is to map
motivations or rationalizations behind (not) sharing various kinds of home spaces in
various possible contexts, not only with reference to the PRS. As we will see, however,
scholarly contributions from that field in particular are among the few that extensively
deal with problems in relationships between co-residents. For that reason, literature on
“shared housing” in the narrower sense has been integrated in our study as well.
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 259

The working definition of “cohousing” used in our interviews, on the other hand, was
also broader than the classic definition by McCamant and Durrett (e.g. quoted in Williams
2008), and consequently, broader than most of the definitions or descriptions used in the
academic work on cohousing (e.g. Boyer and Leland 2018; Sanguinetti and Hibbert 2018;
Jakobsen and Larsen 2019). The focus of our working definition during the interviews was
mainly on the spatial outlay of such projects, and much less on the aspect of collaboration
and communal activities: “Cohousing is a housing form in which several households each
have their own housing units, but can make use of communal living areas as well.” This
description broadly follows the categorization of different types of communal living
elaborated by Samenhuizen vzw, an organization that actively supports communal
housing culture in Flanders, e.g. through the dissemination of knowledge about various
forms of communal housing and specific projects (Jonckheere et al. 2010).

In Search of Obstacles to Shared Housing

In a recent literature review on shared housing among young adults, Clark et al. (2018)
give an account of what they interpret to be the paucity of research on the matter. One of
the main reasons found in the literature, they argue, is the hegemony of a housing culture
structured around the dominance of single family households. This is not only manifested
in the marginalization of shared living in research as such, but also by the fact that
traditional households are seldom analysed in terms of sharing space. In the midst of
a society where private homeownership is still the norm, sharing is at best considered as
a necessary but temporary step (Green and McCarthy 2015), or something you get over
once you get older (Bervoets and Heynen 2013; Clark et al. 2018).
Nonetheless, as Lang, Carriou, and Czischke (2018) have demonstrated in their exten­
sive review on collaborative housing, we already know a great deal about who lives in
shared housing arrangements, who would potentially benefit from it, and the various
motivations behind projects or the people engaging in them. Studies about young adults,
for instance, often highlight the financial and social advantages of sharing a flat (see also
Verhetsel et al. 2017; Clark et al. 2018; Woo, Cho, and Kim 2019). For seniors as well,
sharing could be beneficial both in financial and social respect, preventing loneliness and
isolation, and providing opportunities for the distribution of care tasks and daily chores
among residents (see also Bervoets, Vanneste, and Ryckewaert 2014). Other studies focus
on motivations that are somewhat less pragmatic in nature, and represent more ideolo­
gically or politically informed considerations, such as ecological awareness, the struggle
for gender equality or the post-capitalist transformation of urban space (e.g. Marckmann,
Gram-Hanssen, and Christensen 2012; Vestbro and Horelli 2012; Chatterton 2016).
However, not all studies exclusively highlight the attractive features of shared housing.
With respect to cohousing projects in particular, several recent quantitative studies have
for instance emphasized their limited scope and diffusion. Compared to the socio-
demographic profile of their respective countries in general, participants in cohousing
projects in the USA and Denmark tend to be more affluent, more highly educated, and
more often white (Williams 2008; Boyer and Leland 2018; Sanguinetti and Hibbert 2018;
Jakobsen and Larsen 2019). This has led to the question whether “cohousing [will] be
adopted by the mainstream or will [. . .] continue to be a niche market” (Williams
2008, 275).
260 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

Obstacles to the Diffusion of (Housing) Innovations

Williams' (2008) study signalled the start of the application of a particular conceptual
framework to analyse adoption processes in the field of cohousing research (in the narrow
sense), namely Rogers' (1983) diffusion of innovations theory. Rogers developed the
theory as an analytical framework for mapping the plurality of factors that have an
influence on the diffusion of innovations throughout society. Williams (2008) himself
mainly analysed the role of the characteristics of the innovation itself. Chances of innova­
tions getting diffused are higher, for instance, when the relative advantage is higher
compared to more familiar tools or technologies, when there is a higher degree of
compatibility with existing cultural values, experiences and needs, when innovations
are not too complex in their application, when there is a possibility to try them out, and
when they are visibly present in society. Although emphasizing the opportunities of
cohousing in each of these dimensions, Williams also problematizes disbenefits and
inconsistencies in the context of a strong culture of privacy and individual autonomy.
Other scholars within this research tradition have focused more on what Rogers (1983)
calls the “innovation-decisions process”, analysing the role of knowledge about and
interest in cohousing as important preconditions for its eventual uptake. Not only is
knowledge quite low in general (Sanguinetti and Hibbert 2018), those who know about
it are not entirely the same as those who are interested, and those who are interested are
not entirely the same as those who do it (Boyer and Leland 2018; Sanguinetti and Hibbert
2018). In these studies, demographics are the main focus, although Sanguinetti and
Hibbert (2018, 153) point to the need to include the “influence of cultural norms regarding
privacy” in such models. Other research on attitudinal determinants of interest in shared
housing shows that the importance accorded to privacy, perhaps unsurprisingly, is indeed
often negatively related to the willingness to share, whether in the context of flatting
among young adults (Verhetsel et al. 2017; Woo, Cho, and Kim 2019) or sharing spaces in
multigenerational households (Bervoets and Heynen 2013; Gerards, Nuyts, and Vanrie
2016).

Privacy and the Meaning of Home

This links up with a long-standing theme in the literature on the “meaning of home” (e.g.
Mallett 2004; Claessens, Vlerick, and De Decker 2009; Nasreen and Ruming 2020). A home
is more than the material construction constituting a house or a dwelling. It denotes
a complex set of social and personal meanings interwoven with these material structures.
It is associated with the place one can always return to, that offers protection from a more
dangerous and complex outside, where one can find rest, be free, be oneself, and have
a reassuring degree of control over one’s social and material surroundings. “Home”,
therefore, is an indispensable concept to gain a deeper understanding of potential
obstacles to shared living, since it brings to the fore questions of privacy, personal
boundaries and control. From a different perspective, a similar case was recently made
by Nasreen and Ruming (2020), who emphasized the importance of examining practices
of “home making” and “home unmaking” in shared room housing. They find that feelings
of home strongly hinge on the extent to which one is capable of manipulating one’s own
material environment, to use it in boundary making, and having personal boundaries
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 261

secured vis-à-vis unwanted intrusion by noise, people, etc. In other words, the conceptual
merits of this approach lie in its capacity to link the diffusion of housing innovations
processes to the lived experience of dwellers on a societal micro-level. In the remainder of
this literature overview, we will outline two ways in which privacy and personal bound­
aries have been conceptualized with regard to home and home making.
Firstly, the home can be observed in terms of Goffman’s (1990) distinction between
frontstage and backstage (see also Schwartz 1968; Rechavi 2009). Not only does the home
as such constitute an important instance of the societal “backstage”, allowing people to
relax from efforts of self-presentation in other domains of social life. Also, it is generally
accepted that some spaces within the home may (temporarily) have a more public
character (e.g. the living room, the garden, the kitchen), whereas other rooms are
considered to be private almost by default (e.g. bathrooms and bedrooms). The presence
of others may be experienced as being too intrusive when one is not granted control over
one’s self-presentation (e.g. when sleeping). In the vocabulary of Belk (1988, 2010), the
home can be seen as part of the “extended self”, in the sense that it helps to define the
boundary between self and others. Family relations, however, constitute an important
prototype of sharing according to Belk (1988, 2010), which also explains why they are
hardly ever explicitly discussed in the context of shared living (Clark et al. 2018). The
house, therefore, not only provides a backstage for individuals, but also for the family, in
that it often constitutes a “symbolic body for the family” (Belk 1988, 152).
Secondly, some scholars relate the concept of privacy to Giddens’ notion of ontological
security (Saunders 1989; Dupuis and Thorns 1998; Easthope et al. 2015; Nasreen and
Ruming 2020). Ontological security denotes “the confidence that most human beings
have in the continuity of their self-identity and the constancy of their social and material
environments. Basic to a feeling of ontological security is a sense of the reliability of
persons and things.” (Giddens, as quoted in Easthope et al. 2015, 153) Two aspects are
particularly noteworthy about this concept: the importance of routine activities, and the
importance of control. Through routines, a stable relationship with the world is built, the
experience of which in turn induces the expectation that people and things will be
familiar, allowing one to “go on” with one’s daily life. Control, on the other hand, refers
to the conditions of access to this state. Famously, Saunders (1989) has pointed to
homeownership as an important condition of ontological security, firmly tying feelings
of subjective wellbeing to the laws of individual property. To Easthope et al. (2015),
however, tenure is but one of the possible means of control over the dwelling, next to
control over the use of spaces and the power to make decisions regarding the dwelling
(see also Nasreen and Ruming 2020).
The broader issue of control over space, routines and decisions is a recurring theme in
empirical studies that have focused on the experiences of (ex-)residents of shared living
arrangements or cohousing projects (e.g. Kenyon and Heath 2001; Williams 2008;
Easthope et al. 2015; Clark et al. 2018; Nasreen and Ruming 2020). Respondents in such
studies openly speak about the difficulties in the process of finding the right balance
between privacy and communal living, between autonomy and dependency, and of the
conflicts ensuing from it. Common types of conflict reported in shared living among
young adults, for example, revolve around cleanliness, chores and the problem of free­
loading (Clark et al. 2018). Similar obstacles, however, emerge in studies that focus on
people who neither necessarily have any experience with shared living nor have the
262 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

immediate intention to make that choice (Bervoets and Heynen 2013; Bervoets, Vanneste,
and Ryckewaert 2014; Green and McCarthy 2015; GfK Belgium 2017). The wish to remain
independent, to be able to continue one’s own rhythm of life, and fear of conflict are all
reasons mentioned for not seriously considering sharing (part of) one’s house. Vulnerable
groups in housing need still have additional reasons to be wary of other people’s habits
and decisions; for them, the reluctance to share might also be out of self-protection and
safety reasons (Green and McCarthy 2015; Wilkinson and Ortega-Alcázar 2019; Nasreen
and Ruming 2020).

Methods
The data for this study were collected in the context of a broader interdisciplinary research
project on housing, the increasingly dynamic nature of contemporary family life, and
alternative housing solutions. A qualitative research design was used. In order to gain
a detailed understanding of people’s individual experiences and opinions about home
and housing, we decided to gather data through face-to-face in-depth interviews. Since
gender (male/female), age differences (20–35yo/36-55yo/56-80yo), family type (families
with children, couples and singles without children, single parent families, reconstituted
families) and socio-economic background (financially vulnerable/not financially vulner­
able) were believed to potentially impact individual experiences and opinions on the
matter, a quota sample was designed, so as to make sure that various subgroups along
these axes were incorporated in the sample for analysis.
Respondents were recruited through personal networks of students, a process which
was simultaneously directed and monitored by the imperatives of the quota sample, so
that the various strata would be present in the sample (see below for information on the
final respondent group). After a primary reading, the data for this sample of 70 respon­
dents were considered saturated with regard to the obstacles to shared housing; basic
arguments about obstacles were rehearsed multiple times, by respondents with various
profiles.
Data collection mainly focused on the province of Limburg, situated in the Eastern part
of Flanders. Some specific characteristics of the spatial outlay of the province have
informed our focus on this area for sampling purposes. When aiming to have an in-
depth insight into the obstacles to shared housing more in particular, these characteristics
are expected to be of added value. Limburg has a population of 872.9231 inhabitants,
representing 13.3% of the Flemish population. With 360 inhabitants per square kilometre,
population density is substantially below the Flemish average of 485 inhabitants per
square kilometre. The two largest urban centres in Limburg, Hasselt and Genk, have
a population of 77.709 and 66.159 inhabitants respectively. In terms of the current
housing stock, the share of single family houses is higher in Limburg (74.1%) than in
Flanders as a whole (68.7%). In the stock of single family houses, detached housing is
significantly more present in Limburg (57.3%) than in the whole of Flanders (41.3%).
A total of 70 persons were eventually interviewed in October and November 2018,
dispersed throughout the province. A detailed description of the realized sample in terms
of its socio-demographic composition is provided in Table 1.
The interviews were held using a semi-structured questionnaire, including topics such
as past and current housing situation, future housing plans, attitudes towards specific
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 263

Table 1. Respondent characteristics.

Variable Category Number Percentage
Gender Male 21 30.0%
Female 49 70.0%
Age 18–34yo 37 52.9%
35–54yo 25 35.7%
55–80yo 8 11.4%
Education No higher education 33 52.9%
Higher education 37 47.1%
Household type Single person household 7 10.0%
Single parent household 13 18.6%
Couple without children 13 18.6%
Couple with children (not including reconstituted families) 24 34.3%
Reconstituted family 10 14.3%
Other 3 4.3%
Tenure type Owner 43 61.4%
Private renter 12 17.1%
Social renter 7 10.0%
Free of charge 8 11.4%

types of alternative housing forms (including cohousing), and willingness to share specific
areas of the house with people other than direct family members. All interviews were
transcribed and subsequently submitted to a thematic coding analysis.

Findings
Relevance
Out of the 70 participants in our study, only a minority showed actual interest in some
form of shared living. With regard to cohousing in particular, for instance, 10 respondents
reported they would consider it, albeit very conditionally in most cases. It is not so much
that respondents did not see the benefits, but there were obstacles that put more weight
into the balance. Quite often, respondents referred to some objective aspect of their life
circumstances to explain why it would not apply to them. The following quote contains
a combination of elements, each brought up separately by other respondents as well:
Probably it will never happen, but I think it’s an interesting form. I think if I were any younger,
I would have been more interested [. . .]. I think that if you are together with several young
families, than financially, ecologically . . . You have much more possibilities than when you
start to build a house by yourself, and when you’re younger it’s more difficult financially than
when you’re older, and maybe you see things differently. (R17, man, 45yo)

Although sympathetic to the idea of cohousing, this respondent shows reluctancy because
he links it with a younger age group, a group which can also benefit from creative housing
solutions given their limited financial resources. This can be taken to mean two different
things, both of which are confirmed by statements in other interviews. First, it may mean
that age, or one’s current life phase more in general, constitutes legitimate ground for not
having to seriously consider housing alternatives for oneself (e.g. R8, woman, 47yo; R33,
woman, 47yo). Homeownership plays a role for some: one already has a house one is
satisfied with (R4, woman, 74yo) or one would dread the prospect of having to go through
cumbersome administrative processes again (R17, man, 45yo). Secondly, and relatedly, it
264 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

alludes to the existence of a normative housing career embedded in age categories or life
cycle stages. What constitutes an appropriate home is viewed as age-specific (see also
Meeus and De Decker 2015), and this in turn impacts to what extent shared spaces can
justifiably be part of one’s own “home”.
This rationalization in terms of “normal” age boundaries for shared housing solutions
surfaces in a number of other ways as well. Apart from clear benefits for a younger
generation, it is also hailed as a potentially valuable means to tackle loneliness in old
age (R17, man, 45yo), or to provide practical support in the face of decreasing physical
self-reliance. Like in the case of limited financial resourcefulness, however, sharing
appears as a choice on a “needs must” basis, as something you would resort to when
life does not leave you much other options (yet):

Well, if I wouldn’t be sufficiently self-reliant anymore, or if I wouldn’t be sufficiently financially

resourceful anymore, then it could be a solution, and the two groups can actually help each
other. Because if you’re not financially resourceful and you get involved in such a project with
a good mix of people, being a young person wanting to save some money, you can help
people that are not sufficiently self-reliant anymore. And if costs are divided well, then you
can get into such a project later on in life when you become less self-reliant, and give
a chance to people who are less financially resourceful. (R24, man, 50yo)

Furthermore, age-related family situations are mentioned. Having a partner or, even more
so, having children is sometimes seen as incompatible with shared housing. This is not
only because there is a fear of losing part of the intimate family experience (see below),
but also because there is a feeling that life will become too complicated once there are
family obligations. “I think it’s all OK when you’re single and you don’t have any obliga­
tions, but from the moment you have a partner . . . maybe that would still be OK, but when
you have children, it’s not an option anymore.” (R6, woman, 35yo) The complexity of the
household required her to do things whenever she was able to, without having to take
into account schedules or rules about using the laundry room. “I wouldn’t want it for
myself, as a student maybe, but now with my family . . . I don’t live according to a fixed
schedule.” The persistent association with single status or (post-)student life, a life without
pressing responsibilities, reinforces the idea that shared housing is normally or preferably
a temporary thing (e.g. Bervoets, Vanneste, and Ryckewaert 2014; Green and McCarthy
2015). This may be due, at least in part, to the specific cultural cues one actually uses to
give meaning to shared housing. When asked about their familiarity with the idea of
cohousing, for example, some respondents took their own definitions automatically in the
direction of student life: “Is it like living together with someone else? And share every­
thing? A bit like a student home?” (R46, woman, 22yo) “Yes, when friends all buy a house
together, but it more often occurs in Leuven [a university town near Brussels] I think, no?”
(R6, woman, 35yo) In other words, the strong cultural embeddedness of very specific
types of shared housing, such as student homes in the Belgian context, combined with
a relative lack of knowledge about (or relative lack of visibility of) other types of shared
housing, colours perceptions about “ideal” target audiences for shared housing more in
general.
Not all relevance issues were explicitly linked to age or life cycle stages, however. For
instance, a young man (R26, man, 24yo) pointed to the lack of financial problems as
a reason in and of itself for not having to be interested in shared housing at the moment.
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 265

The perception of one’s place of residence can play a role as well. More in particular,
cohousing carries associations with an urban context. “I would never do it, I would not like
it at all. But I think in cities, where building plots are scarce, you can really cut costs by
doing it.” (R2, woman, 44yo) Lack of space was repeatedly mentioned as an urban
problem, implying that policy measures or development should focus on urban areas
and not on rural communities: “It’s more something for cities, but not for . . . I believe
everyone needs his own space and his own things.” (R20, woman, 39yo)
In what follows, we will discuss in more detail what it is exactly about the idea of
sharing space that people find problematic. There are three factors in particular which for
many respondents tilt the balance unequivocally towards the disadvantages of shared
living: privacy issues, routine activities and fear of conflict.

Privacy
By far the most frequently mentioned obstacle to sharing living space is the prospect of
having to give up “privacy”. Although the privacy argument might seem self-explanatory,
it came up in quite different meaning contexts. In all of the meanings, however, the
immediate presence of other people was described as potentially disturbing in some
respect.
One obvious consequence of the presence of other people is that it becomes busier
around the house, noisier, potentially threatening the feeling of quietness and peace of
mind that is often associated with home. “I like to be alone. You know, just by myself. Not
too many people around me. Just enjoy, you know.” (R7, woman, 51yo) This enjoyment is
often contrasted with the world of work, and its intensity of social contacts and
interactions:
I think when you’re at home, you like to have some peace. When I return home from
work, I very much like to be at ease. I think that’s possible when you’re by yourself, when
your children are present as well, family also, but with strange people . . . (R2, woman,
44yo)

Here and in similar comments (e.g. R12, man, 26yo; R15, man, 52yo), returning home
means entering a space where one can be at ease and be oneself, where no “strangers”
are present. Shared housing forms, for many interviewees, entail the risk of losing (part of)
the Goffmanian backstage, and, thereby, crucial opportunities to relax from social con­
tacts and obligations. The presence of strangers brings extra work with regard to self-
presentation; the “peace of mind” associated with home depends on opportunities to
relax from such efforts.
In line with Goffman’s (1990) observations (see also Rechavi 2009), various types of
rooms or home spaces are also differentially positioned with regard to this frontstage/
backstage logic. Especially when aspects of bodily care are concerned, there is a great deal
of reluctancy, not only in view of keeping preparations for public performance backstage,
but also to protect oneself (or one’s family members) from the potentially indiscrete looks
of strangers. In that respect, most respondents declared bedrooms and bathrooms off
limits. Laundry rooms as well can be too intimate to share: “[. . .] it’s a piece of your private
life you put on display for other people to see, and I don’t like that.” (R40, woman, 42yo)
Being able to relax from self-presentation, of course, is also important in rooms or spaces
266 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

that are specifically used for leisure and relaxation purposes, such as gardens (e.g. R17,
man, 45yo) and living rooms. Being able to let one’s guard down is a crucial reason for
some respondents to strictly limit access to such spaces:
For me, the living room is the moment [sic] when I can sink into the couch in my pyjamas
without having to worry about how I look like. Watching television under a blanket . . . this is
one of the rooms where I really need my privacy. (R6, woman, 35yo; see also R22, woman,
48yo)

The degree of “strangeness” of others depends on whether or not frontstage behaviour is

warranted. It is clear from earlier comments (R2), for example, that this state of privacy can
also be attained in the presence of very specific others, mostly family members. This
echoes Belk’s (1988) idea that family can be seen as part of an extended self, and that
home, in turn, can constitute a symbolic body for the family. Throughout the interviews,
this was illustrated in a number of other ways as well. Firstly, some fear it would become
more difficult to reserve spaces and occasions exclusively for family quality time. “There
are moments you want to be alone with your family, and then you can’t just say the
garden is ours, we are all alone here, that would be inappropriate.” (R22, woman, 48yo)
Similar comments were made about living rooms and kitchens (e.g. R28, woman, 22yo;
R31, man, 53yo). Secondly, family privacy is reported to be needed in case of discussions
on family matters or arguments between family members (R19, woman, 34yo; R55,
woman, 23yo). One fears not being able to “be oneself” (R55) when having to put too
much effort into controlling the image that “strangers” may have of internal family affairs.
Viewed from this perspective, a home should provide ample space where such family
interaction can take place freely, and where a sufficient degree of discretion can be
guaranteed. This means retaining exclusive access to a proper family living room,
a private garden and/or a family kitchen, depending on the customs of the family in
question.

Routines
Another category of reasons why people don’t consider shared living to be a feasible
option has to do with routines. It is not only about the sheer presence of strangers, but
also about how they do things, and how this impacts the way I (or we) do things. All types
of rooms are to some extent affected by and constitute an inherent part of day-to-day
routines. Whereas the preferred exclusivity of bedrooms, bathrooms, living rooms and
gardens to a great extent derives from concerns with securing a “backstage” space,
concerns with routines easily translate into a reluctancy to share more functional spaces
as well. There are two types of concerns with routines we would like to consider here:
what we would term “first order concerns” (1), or concerns about the intersection of
routines in terms of time and space, and “second order concerns” (2), concerns about the
organization of such routines.
1) First order concerns with regard to routines revolve around the more or less direct
incompatibility of routines of different people. Some respondents, for example, expressed
the concern that they would not be able to watch their preferred television programmes
when having to share a living room, or that they would feel bad forcing their own
preferences on someone else (e.g. R11, man, 68yo). Intersecting routines are also
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 267

expected to be particularly annoying with regard to kitchen and bathroom use, causing
fears of bathrooms being overburdened (R9, man, 22yo) and kitchens with chaotic
circulation of residents (R16, man, 49yo). This impacts routines in a spatial sense as well,
leading to worries about orderliness and cleanliness standards, particularly in bathroom
and kitchen areas. For some, this type of concern is strong enough to prefer a shared
living room over a shared kitchen (e.g. R27, man, 34yo). The worry to be confronted with
other people’s spatial habits could go in two directions: either orderliness standards could
be too low (as is the case for R27), or they could be too high in the sense that co-residents
expect you to clean up right away (R7, woman, 51yo). By being used, spaces are left with
imprints of the presence of others, affecting one’s own feeling of orientation. Apart from
“less space for my own stuff” (R35, woman, 52yo), this might entail the risk of things being
misplaced, things getting lost (R16, man, 49yo) or things getting damaged. For that
reason, some would not be happy to share even a garage, storage space, or laundry
room, despite the fact that they are mostly meant for putting stuff.
2) Second order concerns, rather than flowing from direct disturbances caused by the
routines of others, have to do with a loss of autonomy in the organization of one’s own
routines. Above, we already quoted the woman (R6) who would not be prepared to
compromise on her laundry habits. Schedules would be an effective way to organize
routines of different people or households, but would, in her eyes, also hamper the
flexibility needed to meet the pressing demands of a busy household. Organizational
autonomy is valued because it is a guarantee for controlling the efficacy of one’s own
routines: “I don’t like others to move my stuff around. I kind of have my own . . . I am not
the kind of person that would easily adapt to someone else.” (R20, woman, 39yo) “The
laundry room is my area, because I’m using it practically every day. It would be chaos
when someone else would use it.” (R37, woman, 39yo) Such comments strongly attest to
the idea that being able to control one’s routines is considered to be an important
precondition of feeling at home somewhere and gaining a sense of ontological security
(Easthope et al. 2015; Nasreen and Ruming 2020).

Fear of Conflict
Given some of the above comments, it is not surprising that many respondents are wary
of sharing living space mainly because they fear conflicts with co-residents. The language
used sometimes refers to a kind of inescapability, of a law-like mechanism automatically
resulting in conflict: “For a short period of time, it will work just fine, but in the long run,
I foresee nothing but problems.” (R25, woman, 36yo) A home, for many interviewees,
should be kept free of problems, arguments, conflicts or tensions as much as possible. Any
factor that would add to such an environment should be avoided, because it would
undermine the feeling of ease and peace of mind that a home symbolizes. There are
several perceived sources of conflict.
The first source of conflict are straightforward differences in opinion. Different people
have different views and preferences, which can make decision processes difficult and
cumbersome. “Take ten residents, you’ll have ten opinions. [. . .] Ten captains on a ship:
that doesn’t work.” (R16, man, 49yo)
A second potential source of conflict has been suggested already in the previous
paragraph: discrepancies in routines can easily result in unsurmountable problems,
268 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

both with regard to temporal intersections and with regard to the use of space and
orderliness standards. As described by this respondent, not only do intersecting habits
potentially lead to personal frustrations, but also to clashes between co-residents:

[E]veryone has a different biorhythm, a different time of arriving and leaving, you name it.
I think it’s a nice story on paper, but if it really was such a success story, we would all be living
together by now, and sharing costs. But because everyone likes to have his own privacy and
has his own way of doing things, it is bound to clash. (R16, man, 49yo)

A third potential source of conflict are discussions about the written or unwritten rules of
cohabitation, especially the rules pertaining to a fair division of tasks and responsibilities.
There’s always a risk of some residents not taking their responsibilities. “A disadvantage
[is] that everyone has to put in an equal amount of time. If not, people will start to accuse
each other of not wanting to cooperate.” (R25, woman, 36yo) For some respondents, this
would also complicate matters when they would have to share housing with people who
are financially less well off; they fear it would increase the likeliness that problems or
difficulties regarding financial contributions arise along the way. Assuming responsibil­
ities is difficult, however, when the rules themselves are not clear:

You can never divide it entirely fairly. Question is: does it have to be? But you have so many
children, six and seven years old, and others have children of 20 years old, and you have to
divide the food, you know those teenagers can eat until you’re poor so to speak. Where do
you draw the line? Very difficult. (R16, man, 49yo)

Some situations are indeed perceived to be underdefined in terms of what constitutes

a fair contribution, leaving little clues as to how to solve them in a way that is acceptable
for everyone involved. This relates to Rogers' (1983) (and Williams' [2008]) point that
innovations that are complex in their application, will be less likely to diffuse easily. Even
when people showed openness to or very concrete interest in the idea of cohousing,
unclarities about rules and responsibilities would prevent them to pursue their interests.
One woman, for instance, explains how she was left with important questions after
attending a local information meeting on cohousing:

I had the impression that things were presented very beautifully, but some questions were
left unanswered. For instance: what if one of my children would damage common property,
how would it be solved? (R25, woman, 36yo)

A fourth source of conflict, finally, are differences between personalities. Some personal­
ities simply do not match, or are believed to be too difficult to make things work.
Although many respondents believed that clear agreements are able to prevent a good
deal of conflict, there is still the lingering uncertainty about people’s characters. “In every
cohousing project, there will always be a peacock, let’s be honest, someone that thinks he
knows better, which will lead to conflict. Even when you agree upon common rules, then
there will still be conflict.” (R16, man, 49yo) Other respondents equally fear the one anti-
social person that will spoil it (R17, man, 49yo), the people that meddle in someone else’s
business (R20, woman, 39yo) or the one “that always complains about ‘this is not good,
that is not good’” (R23, man, 51yo).
Keeping a safe distance to strangers is seen as a way to avoid serious issues: “You don’t
know what they are like, what their values and norms are. They can be annoying people,
bad people, or they might turn out to be good people.” (R35, woman, 50yo) In a worst case
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 269

scenario, as a young ex-homeless man explains, they will “pull you back” (R47, man, 25yo)
and ruin your life. Therefore, most respondents would also prefer to share living arrange­
ments with people who they already know sufficiently well, like family or friends. However,
some would opt for a different strategy and would avoid sharing with friends or family,
mainly because they fear the detrimental effects of conflicts on close relationships (R10,
man, 80yo; R20, woman, 39yo).
These findings are in line with previous studies that highlight some of the “bad
experiences” of ex-residents in shared housing contexts (e.g. Kenyon and Heath 2001;
Clark et al. 2018; Nasreen and Ruming 2020) as well as the fears voiced by “non-adopters”
when probed about their views on shared housing solutions (Bervoets and Heynen 2013;
Bervoets, Vanneste, and Ryckewaert 2014; Green and McCarthy 2015; GfK Belgium 2017).
From the point of view of the meaning of home, we can add, the prospect of conflict or
power imbalances paints a picture of an environment fraught with social friction and
permanent unease (see also Nasreen and Ruming 2020). It is perceived to cause disrup­
tions in the relationship between self and home, potentially putting strain on personal
wellbeing.

Contrast Foils: Physical Boundaries and Private Property

Throughout the interviews, two main principles emerged that consistently functioned as
a contrast foil against which many of the disadvantages of shared housing were eval­
uated. The first one is the principle of strong physical boundaries. Boundaries prevent
unwanted things from intruding, whether it be noise, weeds, or indiscrete looks. A feeling
of “being at ease” results from having your private space fenced off effectively. “It’s very
quiet here. It’s all very well fenced off. Our neighbours are no nuisance to us. Delightful!”
(R6, woman, 35yo) “Everything is fenced off outside, and the children can do whatever
they want without being watched.” (R20, woman, 39yo) The same function can be fulfilled
by a buffer zone, marking a reasonable distance to property boundaries or next door
neighbours. This is manifested in the discourse surrounding the preference for a spacious
(detached) housing style. “You’ll have more freedom, more privacy [than in a terraced
house]” (R18, woman, 23yo).
Secondly, there is the principle of private property, which is believed to constitute an
effective means for protecting autonomous decision making and for avoiding conflicts
ensuing from problematic decisions and routines of others. “Just leave me by myself, I’ll
invite friends when I want to. I work every day for that, for me to be able to be by myself. [. . .]
I would rather work a week longer and have my own thing.” (R16, man, 49yo) Here, the idea
is hailed that home is something that can be bought, that property allows you to maximize
control of (access to) the home, and, at the same time, to minimize disruption of this sense of
“being by yourself”. A very similar remark was made by a different man. To be able to own
something increases the opportunity to prevent problems, problems that potentially disrupt
the home in terms of the harmonious relationship between self and environment:

I’ve bought a piece [of land] from my neighbours, to be able to rest easy. Because they
weren’t doing anything about it. It was full of poison ivy and thistles, and the seeds always
blew into my garden, and I constantly needed to spray [herbicides]. And because they really
didn’t do anything about it, I just bought it. (R1, man, 63yo)
270 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

This comment makes clear that (home)ownership still provides an important cultural
backdrop against which new and alternative ideas of home are evaluated. Ownership in
terms of tenure may not represent the pinnacle of ontological security in any normative
sense, as argued by Saunders (1989), but it definitely circulates as an important cultural
and political standard (De Decker 2011; Meeus and De Decker 2015).

Discussion and Conclusion

In this paper, we have attempted to give an in-depth account of the various
obstacles people see to share (part of) their living environment. If shared housing
constitutes part of the answer to important current and future challenges with
regard to housing, it is of paramount importance to gain an insight into the
obstacles seen by “non-adopters”. Our main aim has been to fill this gap in the
literature, as most existing studies deal with disadvantages or problems experienced
by (ex-)residents of shared housing itself, as testified by the reviews by Clark et al.
(2018) and Lang, Carriou, and Czischke (2018).
Theoretically, we have made a case for extending the diffusion of innovations
perspective (Rogers 1983; Williams 2008; Boyer and Leland 2018; Sanguinetti and
Hibbert 2018) with a meaning of home perspective (e.g. Mallett 2004; Claessens,
Vlerick, and De Decker 2009). The potential merits of this theoretical perspective for
research on shared housing in general has been highlighted in recent scholarly work on
the matter (Easthope et al. 2015; Nasreen and Ruming 2020). Elaborating on these
contributions, we have emphasized its central role for studying obstacles to the diffu­
sion of shared housing solutions, given its focus on people’s lived experience of home
and cultural ideals about home. The diffusion of innovations perspective identifies
a number of macro-societal factors influencing the take-up and institutionalization of
innovations. With regard to housing innovations, a meaning of home perspective,
however, allows to further flesh out these factors systematically from the point of
view of the “micro-world” of individuals. And if public support for shared or collective
housing forms (in the broad sense of the term) is to be increased, this micro-perspective
of non-adopters needs special attention.
A first important finding pertains to the perceived limited relevance of shared
housing, justified or rationalized in terms of assumptions about “normal” housing
careers. There are strong cultural scripts for shared housing for young adults and
students, but still much less so for families with children, or for rural communities.
This is in line with studies that have emphasized the persistent dominance of
aspirations tied to the classical housing ladder, both in Flanders (Meeus and De
Decker 2015) and elsewhere (e.g. Green and McCarthy 2015; Clark et al. 2018).
Although Flemish policy measures have primarily focused on reducing legal obstacles
(by way of creating a testing environment), these findings suggest it is of paramount
importance to support the development and diffusion of cultural examples for less
obvious target groups as well. These efforts are in fact already part of the planning in
the context of the Vision 2050 of the Flemish government (Wonen Vlaanderen 2017),
but should indeed be sustained, if collective housing solutions are to receive broad
public support as part of this shift towards “a smart way of living”.
 HOUSING, THEORY AND SOCIETY 271

Secondly, and relatedly, an important factor in people’s reservations about shared

housing forms may be the strong norm of homeownership, combined with the domi­
nance of a (semi-)detached housing style. Flanders, like Belgium more in general, is
a homeowner society, with 71.6% homeowners (Heylen and Vanderstraeten 2019), and
past government policies have contributed heavily to this situation (De Decker 2011;
Bervoets and Heynen 2013; Meeus and De Decker 2015). In some interviews, ownership in
terms of individual property is indeed explicitly mentioned as a crucial precondition for
creating an ontologically secure environment (see also Saunders 1989; Easthope et al.
2015). Although further research is needed to substantiate these findings, deviations from
this norm might be perceived as suboptimal in the quest for a “proper” home. Tenure-
neutral housing policies, therefore, could contribute to a broader public support base for
shared housing in the long run, in a more indirect manner.
Thirdly, with regard to privacy, our results seem to confirm the findings of
previous research that there is a difference with regard to the level of privacy needed
for various types of spaces, with bedrooms and bathrooms being off limits, with
living rooms and kitchens (and gardens) being important to safeguard as backstage
spaces (Goffman 1990) for relaxing and intimate conversation, and the more func­
tional rooms constituting much less of an issue (Gerards, Nuyts, and Vanrie 2016; GfK
Belgium 2017; Heylen and Vanderstraeten 2019). However, this hierarchy in the need
for personal space does not apply to everyone invariably. While some would indeed
mainly fear the idea of not being able to regulate when or where to enter into
a backstage mode, others rather dread the idea of losing control of one’s routines in
terms of access to spaces and use of objects or facilities. Further research is certainly
required to analyse these preference patterns more in detail. Our results, however,
urge policy makers, planners, architects and developers to take account of this
ostensible plurality of obstacles and preferences, and to diversify designs, concepts,
project plans or marketing campaigns accordingly.
Fourthly and lastly, rehearsing the idea of home as a friction-free environment (see
also Bervoets, Vanneste, and Ryckewaert 2014; Easthope et al. 2015; Green and
McCarthy 2015; Woo, Cho, and Kim 2019; Nasreen and Ruming 2020), many respon­
dents dread both the conflicts that would ensue from shared housing and the complex­
ity to resolve them. Therefore, it remains crucial for policy makers and advocates of
shared housing to take seriously people’s fear of conflicts, whether they are instigated
by a lack of knowledge about the right rules, or about ways to disentangle the knot
when things go wrong. Reducing legal obstacles may be part of the answer, but it
seems crucial as well to initiate (or stimulate) clear communication about rules and
about ways to prevent or resolve conflicts in various types of shared living arrange­
ments. In any attempt to strengthen public support, consideration should therefore also
be given to models or examples that allow to relieve the group of co-residents in terms
of conflict management.

Note
1. Population statistics are based on National Registry data for 2018, housing stock statistics on
Land Registry data for the same year (Limburg in cijfers 2019).
272 B. PUT AND I. PASTEELS

Acknowledgments
An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2019 Conference of the European Network for
Housing Research in Athens, Greece. We would like to thank the discussants and participants of the
“Collaborative Housing” session for their useful comments. We are also very grateful to all the
students and interviewees who have cooperated in the collection of the data. Finally, this article has
benefited greatly from the insightful feedback of the three anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Funding
This article resulted as part of a multidisciplinary research project entitled “Flexibel wonen voor
iedereen” (project number 1/DWO/2018/BE/P106), funded by PXL-Research.

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