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Coworking from Home

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48 pointsubac22 comments

If you get enough friends to come over, eventually you can all pitch in and rent a small property that is centrally located between all of you. You could stock the kitchen with coffee and healthy snacks. Maybe you could even get a whiteboard and a ping pong table!

Wait a minute...

I see what you did there!

You joke, but this would be a good idea (I think: I could never get anyone to do it with me). The difference between this and an office would be that you'd only have to go in when you wanted, and it would be located in a place convenient to the people involved, rather than just downtown, or in an office park. You'd also have more control over how it was arranged. Plenty of downsides too of course.

> Plenty of downsides too of course.

Managing the rental (or ownership) comes to mind first. The rest of the logistics surrounding "stock the kitchen with coffee and healthy snacks" comes next. The "have more control over how it was arranged" part also comes with "need to make a bunch of decisions you didn't have to before".

(Essentially just playing devil's advocate; not trying to argue for or against the idea. I'm sure many people would prefer such a set up and many others would not.)

You'd just start a partnership or corporation, assign shares, receive stakes from people, and go in using that entity on an office space.

It's a joke but a huge difference between this and an office is you only have to be around the coworkers you like

And you don't have to work for the same company, which means if you change jobs you don't suddenly lose your social network.

And the friends you work with can refer you to another job while you all still cowork.

Oh man that would actually be pretty great! Except for the hassle of having to organize everything, and the financial risk of taking on a big lease, but maybe with the right friend group you'd have people with strengths in those areas. In theory a coworking space with camaraderie like that would be the best of both worlds - you get to have a place that you can work that's not your home, where there's actual people you can interact with that you get along with, but if you switch jobs you don't have to suddenly give that up. Also potentially you could end up recruiting each other, or referring each other for consulting gigs, or working on joint business ventures together.

I had some coworkers that did this. They (husband and wife) lived on a farm with iffy power and internet so they eventually bought a house in some nearby suburbs mostly to work from.

I feel this article 100%.

Too many people think that remote work means "working from home" or that co-working means "working from WeWork". There are tons of different variations that let you get out and be around other people while working remote. I have long wanted to start a small fun workspace with space for 5 or so people that's really just a place for us all to do work together without being in a traditional office or our houses. A space we can define ourselves (or I define and invite others) that is not my house and also not a stuffy office.

IMHO - This is the future of work.

My partner and I regularly work physically next to each-other, even though we both have separate office spaces. It does help stay focused and it's a great change of pace.

It is an interesting idea to invite friends over to work with! I will have to try it.

It's a jelly! Casual/adhoc coworking at someone home... http://workatjelly.com/

This looks cool! But also doesn't seem to be up to date anymore (at least for SF)

Quite hard with the meetings and all.

But managed to have close friends come over to stay for a week at our place and we plan do go visit them for a week.

Great benefit of remote work. I don’t have to take time off to visit long distance friends or align vacation time with them which seemed earlier impossible because everyone has different commitments and well we would have to align a lot of people to agree on single destination…

Airbnb meets WeWork: The next YCombinator unicorn? :-)

In France a small startup named Cohome has tested the concept several years ago. It unfortunately didn't last long but the idea is great. I've had the chance to use it and it was very nice. The issue is that freelancers can't pay much on these kind of services as they often have limited means. The other issue I believe is that there are more people willing to go to someone's place than people willing to share their place.

I've set up a spare PC at my mother's place so I can help her out when she needs it (I'm in my late 40s) and still do my work remotely. Her house is half way to my office, so it doesn't cost much time. Unfortunately all my friends are too far away to make working at their places less time consuming than going to the office.

Why can't they use the library? Ours are very nice.

Libraries are very nice for focused solo work, but all the ones I have been to are supposed to be quiet places. If you need to join meetings and talk they don't work very well.

my local libaries (king county, WA) have dedicated meeting rooms you can book online ahead of time!

Tried that in the past but the wifi speed was too awful for even voice only zooming

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