Community Investment Cooperatives shaping area

The South Como Community Investment Cooperative welcomed WaldHaven Mental Health as a commercial tenant for its property at 978 Front Avenue in April, according to the co-op’s president, Jessica Willman.

The South Como Community Investment Cooperative (SCC) is a for-profit real estate investment co-op that allows members to pool resources via grants and membership shares in order to purchase properties in the neighborhood. SCC hopes its investment at 978 Front Avenue is the first of many, according to Willman.

Willman is looking forward to working with a Como-based business that is invested in engaging with the community, she said.

“That’s something that really makes me excited about them, is being able to see they’re, you know, biking into the office, and they’re able to really understand what our community needs and is going through,” Willman said.

Although the co-op model is a fairly new one for the industry, real estate investment cooperatives like SCC have been popping up all over the Twin Cities.

Willman said that SCC had benefited from access to the network of real estate investment co-ops that had sprung up in the cities. Organizations like the Northeast Investment Cooperative, Taproot Investment Cooperative and the Midway Investment Cooperative (MIC) helped them find lawyers and real estate agents who suited the co-op’s needs.

MIDWAY INVESTMENT COOP: ‘BIG SYSTEMS FEEL DIFFICULT TO HAVE MUCH SWAY WITH’
MIC board member Mike Reynolds said he was excited about the co-op model because he was interested in how community members can control their own destiny.

“I think, a lot of times, big systems feel really difficult to have much sway with,” Reynolds said. “And casting a vote is important, but you don’t necessarily feel some kind of direct outcome.”
Reynolds and Willman describe their respective organizations’ missions similarly. Both intend to reduce the number of properties owned by large, sometimes out-of-state, real estate investment companies and give members a say in what businesses are in their own neighborhoods.

“We have too many underdeveloped properties in the neighborhood, and that’s true lots of places in the Cities, but it’s particularly true in the Midway,” Reynolds said, pointing out a recently demolished former CVS location that had been vacant since 2022 as an example.

Although MIC hasn’t purchased any properties of their own yet, Reynolds said they’re interested primarily in commercial and mixed use properties, and are hoping to provide affordable spaces to businesses that are struggling with rising rent prices. SCC also plans to invest in more commercial properties going forward, Willman said.

“Kind of starting in the next few months, we’re gonna start looking for our next investment,” Willman said. “I think our ultimate goal is, we would love to see a grocery store. Somewhere you can get a gallon of milk, eggs, fresh fruits, vegetables. That’s what I would love to see.”

SOUTH COMO COMMUNITY INVESTMENT CO-OP: ‘I GET TO DETERMINE WHAT’S IN MY COMMUNITY’
Max Sanders, one of SCC’s board members, said members should expect a monetary return on investment in about five to seven years. But dividends and share values are not the only way members benefit from investing, he said

“What’s interesting is that the ROI of our co-op is not purely money,” Sanders said. “When you think about, ‘How do I see an ROI from being a member?’ it’s not purely, ‘How much money am I getting back in dividends?’ And I would personally argue that’s the less important part. The more important part in ROI is, ‘I get to determine what’s in my community.’”

For SCC, the ultimate goal is to stabilize and build wealth in the community, according to Willman. In the long term, she hopes SCC could sell the buildings it acquires to the business owners who rent them.

“That’s the super long-term goal, we’re talking like 10 years down the road,” Willman said.

“Our goal isn’t to just be property managers forever. The goal is to be stabilizing the buildings and the community to build that wealth within the community, rather than constantly having landlords come in that are sketchy and gross.”

SCC purchased the property with the help of a grant from the Shared Ownership Center at Nexus’ LOCAL Fund, a grant program established in partnership with the City of Saint Paul’s Office of Financial Empowerment. Nexus, a non-profit that focuses on uplifting communities of color, has worked with several real estate co-ops in the area through its Shared Ownership Center.

Willman said the grant allowed the co-op to avoid raising the rents of the property’s two residential tenants and keep the rent for the commercial space affordable.

“Then we get to have these great businesses that couldn’t otherwise afford their own spaces, or a space close to their home,” Willman said.

CJ Julstrom is a University of Minnesota student majoring in journalism.