About Us

KSCO is a tight-knit, 7-room house in the heart of the Mission. We value the joy and love that comes from sharing our home with friends and community members. We love to host a variety of events ranging from intimate chats to 100-person dance parties, with a special place in our hearts for art and music events. 

Within the house, we nurture a culture of community care, vulnerability, and emotional connection by sharing our day-to-day lives through twice-weekly dinners, collective grocery shopping, and spontaneous housemate-only events. We prioritize finding housemates that are diverse across gender, race, class, profession, sexuality, and other core lived experiences.

We're looking to fill a room starting October 1st with a long-term resident or subletter. Scroll down to learn more and contact us!

 The community and culture

Kaleidoscope has been around for over 6 years in various incarnations. Many of us bring previous co-op experience, and all of us love the co-op lifestyle!

We recently did an exercise in which we each independently described the community, and here's what some of us wrote:

• We are an intentional community house with a goal of creating and curating a space for housemate and community activities. We like to host a variety of events, big and small, with a special place in our hearts for music, art, and dance events, as well as any events with community building. Within the house, we hope to form close friendships and a support structure for our residents, celebrating individuals and sharing our day to day lives (cooking, chores, movies, birthdays). 

• Nourishing coziness, love, giggles, and smiles. A space to lay your head, heart, and love for one another.

• We value the serendipitous joy and silliness that comes from inviting our friends into our space, ranging from intimate chats over dinner to 100-person dance parties. And we quite like to dance. We enjoy fostering a community that is diverse in race, gender, sexuality, age, and profession. We are vegetarianish.

• KSCO's common space is filled with couches, blankets, and food, but also with friends, laughter, and discussion (silly and serious). Through dinners, events, house meetings, and frequent spontaneous fun, we bond with each other and the broader community in a multitude of meaningful ways. We seek to be welcoming to people of all backgrounds and experiences who resonate with our values and our community.

• KSCO is a tight-knit coop in the heart of the Mission. We don’t all agree about everything, and we think that’s fine, but we generally want the house to be friendly, cozy, progressive, cross-class, integrated into the Mission community, moderately sex-positive, and less substance-centric.

Structure and systems

We have biweekly house meetings to discuss any policies, ideas, or problems, and we cook house dinners twice a week. We buy most basic groceries collectively (veggies, eggs, flour, salt, oils, rice, milk, ice cream, etc.), but residents are on their own for more processed food and meat. We have a chore chart with weekly and biweekly chores (kitchen clean, bathroom clean, etc.), and we have a group clean party every month for bigger chores and projects.

We love improving the space! We've made murals, organized our spices (that's riiiight), created a musical instrument corner, and built a cozy bench.

We love sharing our space with our friends! We host art nights, seasonal clothing swaps, untz-untz dance parties, and partner dance events. 

The people

The house is currently comprised of:

• A: 30, psychologist. Lover of spontaneity, silliness, disco balls, connecting with others, and talking about feelings :) Typically on a long walk or listening to the same three songs that she’s currently obsessed with.

• Kora, 9: Newfie mix with a big heart and low energy. Lover of very short walks and lots of pets. Baby to A. New to the Bay Area and excited to smell all things. *I am very fluffy so I may flare up allergies so please come meet me!*

• C, 34: Studied human movement in grad school, now a mechical-flavored software engineer. Enjoys dabbling in hobbies: social dance, guitar, violin, photography, biking, roller skating! Loves hosting events and going to community events around the city. Hoping to live communally forever :)

• D, 24: Enjoys domestic activities such as drinking herbal tea, curling up with a book, and cooking with her housemates. Once an opponent of house music jams, now enjoys jamming along with the 4 chords she knows on ukulele. Works on a political campaign, applying to civic tech jobs in the hopes of being employed post November 5.

• H, 27: Trying to learn many things, and looking for the time to do so. She may not seem like the most social butterfly at first, but is very interested in one-on-one, or group, talks about housemates' personal lives and tea-time.

• J, 30: A fun fact machine and Stanford grad currently working with AI at Google. He's been loving quizbowl, insightful convos and late night ice cream runs during quarantine. Twitter-famous.

• R, 24: Enjoys the closeness, support, and occasional chaos of communal living. She works as a researcher and loves that her "job is just... speech." She spends significant time in rowboats, dancing in her room, sleeping, and sweeping. A believer in doing it all, she is catching feelings _and_ flights. She would love for you to join her for walks, tea time, writing letters and postcards, or cooking for the house.

• S, 33, is a tea swilling, fountain pen wielding, nap taking house gremlin. You will likely find them fondling comic books at the indie publisher where they work, or cleaning/reorganizing something in the house. In their downtime they read, craft, write, and spend many hours spoiling B.

• B, 8, is a senior rabbit who lives under S’s bed. He likes treats, pets, and gentle play time. He’s very sensitive but extremely sweet and personable. He also takes hella naps. Very likely the softest ball of fluff you’ll ever meet.

The space

You can find a 3D model of the house here (my.matterport.com/models/fU7BjCUf7YU?section=media). See below for photos of the space which show that things have changed a lot since the 3D model was created (new floors, totally painted, a full room added).

The apartment is the entire second floor above a market, and contains a huge common area with a kitchen, dining, office, and living spaces. There's also a cute reading nook. There are two full bathrooms that are shared among all residents, with a third shower.

Unfortunately, the space is not wheelchair accessible. We have one dog, which spends some time in the common area, and one bunny, which stays in a bedroom.

Living With Us

Our opening

We have one room open!

Available: Starting October 1, 2024; flexible

Rent: $1454/mo for two occupants, $1200 for a single, though we typically reevaluate rents when we get a new housemate.

Room size: 10 ft x 14 ft, with a lofted bed (fun!!)

Furnishings: desk and mattress

Deposit: The deposit for each room is $850.

Fees: Residents pay ~$250/mo for utilities, communal food, and our home repair fund.

Duration:  We're looking for either a long-term housemate or subletter (1–2 months). Long-term housemates simply give 2-months notice before leaving.

Who we're excited for

• Someone excited about cooperative living: who will intentionally and proactively cultivate a space that is inviting and fulfilling for all residents.

• Someone who introspects when conflict arises, want to engage with our Mission neighborhood, and bring a queer- and trans-positive attitude.

• We're particularly excited about filling our vacant room with more than one person (a couple, or otherwise; we want more people around!) and people with previous cooperative living experience (but still apply if these don't describe you!).

• Must be vaccinated against COVID-19.

• We're open to discussing pets, especially if they'd stay in your room. Pets that would need to roam around the common space are less likely to work out.

• All ages welcome!

Some of our concrete expectations of housemates are:

• attend house dinners when available

• cook house dinner once every two weeks

• check the house Discord discussions daily

• attend and contribute at biweekly (2x/month) house meetings (subletters attend only the first few minutes of house meetings)

• attend and contribute to monthly house cleans

• complete weekly and biweekly chores (~2 hours/week)

Website updated August, 2024