San Jose has approved the plans for co-housing startup Starcity to build an 803-unit co-living building targeting young tech employees, Curbed reports.
Starcity’s co-housing developments offer a 130- to 220-square-foot bedroom, as well as access to communal kitchens, bathrooms, and living spaces. Rent for the San Jose rooms will start in the low $2,000s, and will also include furnishings, utilities, WiFi, and building-wide events. To become reality, the development required the creation of an entirely new zoning category.
After approval of the rezoning by the city council in February, “co-living” became its own distinct land-use classification in April. “To our knowledge, this is the first dedicated ‘co-living’ zoning code to be established in the U.S.,” says Eli Sokol, Starcity’s development manager.
“We struggle so greatly just to get a shovel in the ground to get housing in the city, because construction costs are so high right now,” says San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo. “The fact that the developer had found an approach that could get housing built was a good enough signal to me that we should get any obstacles out of the way.”
