Customer Reviews

Sharing Solution, The: How to Save Money, Simplify Your Life & Build Community (Sharing Solution: How to Save Money, Simplify Your Life &)

5 star:		(13)
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3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
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i bought this because my girlfriend and i are thinking of purchasing some land together with friends. not only did it answer my questions, but it really got me thinking about how to share even more stuff. the authors seem to be incredibly knowledgeable about this subject, and i appreciate that there are some lawyers out there who care about the world. like they said, it's not just a financial benefit, but it also creates community.

I have always been interested in learning more about Cohousing. It's a growing movement that started in Europe. I have a few friends who have been discussing this as a possibility in our older years and I have never really understood the legalities. The sharing solution made it all clear.

The Sharing solution is a new book by Nolo Press that about....yes, Sharing. It's not just about Cohousing, it goes over many different ways you can share including household goods, sharing food, sharing child/pet care, sharing transportation & sharing at work. It gives detailed information about how to find sharing partners and what questions to ask and because of course it's a Nolo book, gives forms you can use in your sharing adventures.

This is such a timely book, and gives so many ideas on ways to share and save money. Another great Nolo book.

I don't expect to embrace sharing as an entirely new way of life, but this book helped me see many new ways I can share more than I do now. It's causing me to think and consider how I can help myself, help others, and help the planet. The book gives me the tools I will need to forge new relationships that will endure and surmount the inevitable messiness of human interactions. Well researched and very readable. All in all, I think this book is a fresh breeze!

I've had this book for a couple months now and I've been thinking about it off and on and I've picked it up dozens of times. Oh if it could only work, I keep thinking, this sharing business. If people could only do it, you know, car pool, co-op, share their stuff, but sadly for the most part, I don't think they can. If the world was perfect, but it's not.

Still, there is tons of valuable advice in this book, even if in my opinion the general premise is unworkable and the book is well written and easy to understand (no legalese in this Nolo Press book). If you have a lot of friends and if you have no trouble making new ones, this could be a good book for you.

I would bet that a book like this probably existed thirty or forty years ago at the height of the 60s/70s counterculture alongside things like the Whole Earth Catalog. But a lot has changed since then -- the science of environmentalism has advanced, as has the culture of mindless greed that caused the 2008 economic train wreck, and communal living of all sorts has receded from the mainstream. In fact, it's only in the last ten years or so as Peak Oil has come to be a possibility, housing prices have gone through the roof, and victories in the battle over same-sex marriage have shown how far this country has to go that the legal issues of cooperation have come back to the fore.

So Nolo Press brings us this. From ridesharing all the way up to communal housing developments, the authors Orsi and Doskow lay out the many and varied issues involved in sharing -- ownership shares, niceties of communication, business partnership issues -- and provide a simple, easy-to-follow approach to dealing with them. Tables and worksheets lay out the variables in a simple-to-follow fashion, and case studies show the principles the authors lay out in action.

The social isolation that once allowed people to start and operate a collaboration on a handshake no longer exists in the United States or most of the Westernized world, if it ever really did to begin with. Nolo Press has always sought to be a substitute for that, making many legal procedures accessible to nonspecialists. This book continues that long tradition, bringing the reader as close to handshake-contract territory as is reasonably possible.

If you are looking for a way to share almost anything and do it in a manner that is legal, ethical and as free from trouble as possible, this is an excellent resource to have at your disposal. It contains tons of checklists to use which help you think of all of the issues that need to be addressed with different types of sharing arrangements.

Sharing builds wealth. We all have things that we don't fully utilize and our culture wants us to buy more things so they can sit in our home and draw dust and/or end up in a landfill. This book provides a blueprint for putting that stuff to use as well as being able to use things that belong to others. In this time of economic turmoil, this book could not have come at a better time.

Side benefit: If you ever have any interest in forming a business partnership, many of the concepts contained in the book are applicable in a business context as well.

I live in a situation that requires the sharing of many resources, from space to items. I wanted to learn more about how to efficiently do this, and I happened on this treasure of a book. Nothing can cause resentment or irritation faster than mishandling someone else's items, no matter how close you are, and this book lays out the guidelines from small issues/things to huge and vast ones.

You might think a lot of this is common sense. I mean, things like siting down and coming up with a contract or personal rule list for communal property seems obvious. Yet, how many of us have done things like this? This book basically takes the experience of the authors and writes it out for the rest of us to apply in a practical and easy manner. I can't tell you how many times I remember friends saying, "It won't be an issue! My neighbor/spouse/SO/friend/mother-in-law will understand!" This will hopefully avoid a few of those problems we all encounter, which can potentially ruin relationships.

The book is quite thorough, and covers everything from items, land, large group purchases (tools) to services like sharing childcare/carpooling. It is also pointed out that not only does successful sharing save money, but it's environmentally good in some cases, and most of all, good sharing can save a relationship from getting ruined. I actually am tempted to recommence this book to friends getting married and moving in together, too. I think it's a great asset to anyone who will find themselves in such a situation, or for those who want to start sharing.

Sustainability is something we should all strive for. This is an excellent place to start.

On as micro and macro level, this book offers ideas on solutions regarding how to contribute through maximizing shared everyday tasks in a changing and perhaps shrinking world. Car- pooling is a good start, though this is just one of many. The premise of this book is in building a community spirit, and reading it , and acting on some of these ideas is a great start!

Picked up the Sharing Solution and now understand all those "situations" with friends where things just didn't work out right.

This book is more than just a feel good self help book - the legal background of author combined with professional experience make this this book a practical handbook with guidelines that can help in any situation that involves shared assumptions.

Have given this book as a gift to friends looking at sharing childcare, to friends trying to share a season of a ski cabin.

This is a very interesting book that gets you thinking a little more formally and expansively about ways to share stuff, work, and responsibilities. Some is barter, some cooperative working and living, some sharing with the greater community. The bottom line goals of the book are to help you gain more time, share resources (reduce consumption, increase affordability of greener options), and build community.

While some of the topics covered (co-living, for instance) are a little too hippy-dippy for me at this stage in my life, but a great deal of it is excellent stuff, including a lot of activities & resources I wouldn't have thought of sharing, or at least not in a formalized way. The formal rules are a great idea because they make the sharing equitable, fair, and prevent hurt feelings or misunderstandings.

While they're less practical to me now that I live in the country (population's not dense enough to make many of the ideas worthwhile), I particularly liked the examples of programs in various cities (Austin's yellow bike program, fruit harvesting clubs, registered hitchhiking programs, etc.). They would be an excellent resource for people in small to medium cities for organizing sharing programs.

Now that I live in a less familiar setting, I do feel a little shy about organizing a sharing club (somehow strangers are easier to approach in a city...), but I think this book is a great resource that will help me get going.

This would be particularly useful for families and people living in single-family neighborhoods in mid-sized cities. I wish I'd read it when I still lived in Austin!