Proposal
New Hampshire Starter Villages
Small homes. Strong communities. A costed model for attainable ownership.
Key finding
A 20-cottage community on 10 to 15 acres pencils out at $4.675 million, or $233,750 per home, producing an estimated home price of $200,000 to $250,000 with no assumed construction subsidy.
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The concept
Cluster 15 to 30 efficient, well-insulated cottages on a shared piece of land with common amenities and shared infrastructure. The homes are privately owned. The land around them, the water and wastewater systems, and the energy system are shared.
The point of the shared layer is cost. A single well, a single wastewater system and a single microgrid across 20 homes cost less per home than 20 separate ones, and they use less land.
The numbers
The worked example is a 20-cottage community on 10 to 15 acres in Coos County. Land is $125,000. The cottages, at 700 square feet and roughly $175 per square foot, are $2.45 million. Foundations and site pads, wastewater, water, roads and parking, the solar microgrid, site work, engineering and permitting and a contingency bring the total to $4,675,000 — $233,750 per home.
That supports an estimated home price of $200,000 to $250,000 with no assumed construction subsidy, plus a monthly community fee of $175 to $250.
Why this is filed as a proposal
The State Ledger publishes findings about what policy has done. This is a different kind of object: a model of something that has not been built, offered with its cost assumptions exposed so they can be argued with.
It is filed as a proposal, and it is not evidence of anything until somebody builds one.
What the evidence shows
- A worked development cost breakdown for a 20-cottage community on 10 to 15 acres, totalling $4,675,000, or $233,750 per home.
- The model assumes 600 to 900 square foot homes of one to two bedrooms, built at roughly $175 per square foot, on shared water, wastewater and solar-plus-battery infrastructure.
- An estimated monthly community fee of $175 to $250 covering road maintenance, snow removal, water and wastewater, common land care and energy system maintenance.
- Regional applications differ: year-round housing supply in Coos County, workforce housing in the Upper Valley and Seacoast, and a downsizing option in Central New Hampshire.
What it does not show
- These are estimates for an illustrative site, not bids. Land, site work and permitting costs vary widely by town.
- It does not identify a site, a developer or a town that has agreed to any of this.
- It does not address whether current municipal zoning would permit this density, which is the binding constraint in most New Hampshire towns.
- No government construction subsidy is assumed, and none is demonstrated to be unnecessary.
- It does not model absorption — whether buyers at that price exist in a given market.