{"id":217019,"date":"2026-05-01T20:03:31","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T20:03:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/217019\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T20:03:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T20:03:31","slug":"why-this-viral-nyc-mommune-is-hitting-home-with-other-single-moms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/217019\/","title":{"rendered":"Why This Viral NYC ‘Mommune’ Is Hitting Home With Other Single Moms"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of New York City mom friends have gone viral for a simple, inspiring reason: shacking up together, not as lovers, but best friends, along with their three kids<\/a>. Because real estate is pricey and parenting is hard \u2014 and what better way to both ease the cost and ensure built-in emotional support?<\/p>\n

\u201cOur #mommune is not temporary,\u201d the friends captioned an Instagram video<\/a>, posted at the end of March, that shows mom-of-two Bernie Sinclaire putting up a curiously patterned orange-and-pink wallpaper. It\u2019s since been viewed by more than 169,000.<\/p>\n

More from SheKnows<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that we\u2019re waiting for a boyfriend or a man or a traditional family,\u201d she says in a voiceover as she smooths and trims the wallpaper. \u201cThis is the kind of lifestyle that works for us: a women-centered lifestyle in a home full of yoni symbols.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since then, Sinclaire and Annabelle Gonzalez, both teachers, have been sharing glimpses into their life and prompting curiosity, support, and envy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis seems like the natural way things should be \u2014 a matriarchy,\u201d said a commenter on the viral post.<\/p>\n

Another noted, \u201cI think that we\u2019re gonna start to see a lot more of this, and I am so here for it. I love the idea of women coming together and supporting each other,\u201d while yet another offered, \u201cThis is amazing! Thank you for being such an awesome example of the different ways a family and raising kids can look!\u201d<\/p>\n

Other wrote: \u201cPerfection,\u201d \u201cThis is a dream,\u201d \u201cI wish I had been raised like this,\u201d \u201cThis is honestly why I desperately wish I was lesbian sometimes,\u201d and \u201cI would love to find me a partner just like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though Sinclaire and Gonzalez are currently at the center of the discussion, they\u2019re far from the first to try out such an arrangement and certainly won\u2019t be the last.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t invent the term \u2018mommune,\u2019\u201d Sinclaire tells SheKnows. \u201cI\u2019m approaching it from a financial perspective and an affordability perspective, living in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other stories looking at the mommune phenomenon \u2014 single moms coming together to share household tasks and expenses and create the community they desire in which to raise their kids \u2014 pop up from time to time. In March, the Independent profiled<\/a> several such living arrangements, including of two friends in Florida, and several years ago, the New York Times <\/a>looked at mommunes<\/a> in Maryland, Florida, and Abu Dhabi. Both stories gave a nod to CoAbode<\/a>, a service that helps moms match, connect, and combine households.<\/p>\n

\u201cSingle moms stagger under the burden of providing for young children without proper financial support from family or social services,\u201d said CoAbode founder Carmel Boss in a 2024 press release<\/a> about the service. \u201cThe very people who could most benefit from a stable emotional support system often go home with their children to an empty house or apartment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such thoughts are also in the artistic ether, according to a recent Atlantic article titled \u201cIs Cohabitation the Feminist Future?\u201d<\/a> It looks at the wave of literature tackling the topic \u2014 the Japanese novel Sisters in Yellow and the memoirs Two Women Living Together and My Seven Mothers, among others, and notes, \u201cEach of them invites readers to think more fully about how women might assert their independence in societies still designed in many ways for men \u2014 and to imagine what might get upended in turn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Making Mommunes Happen \u2014 and What They\u2019re Like<\/p>\n

While CoAbode appears to be the main, if not sole, app connecting moms who want to cohabitate (another, Mommymune<\/a>, appears to be not functioning), but other women are getting ideas. On the West Coast, Marissa Merrill, a Los Angeles\u2013based actor\/director and mom of a 9-year-old, has purchased an eight-bedroom house in Oregon that she hopes to eventually turn into a co-living space for moms; she\u2019s locked down the Mommune name for her website<\/a> in the meantime.<\/p>\n

Sinclaire says that she is developing her own mom-matching app \u2014 and has been entertaining fantasies about expanding<\/a> into an entire city building (or at least having meetups about it). That\u2019s because the amount of feedback she\u2019s gotten from moms, not to mention the flurry of press prompted by the viral video, has been staggering.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that it offers a real solution to women that find themselves stuck for various reasons \u2014 either financially stuck because they\u2019re single moms on a one-income household, or it offers women this idea of the different family structure that maybe they hadn\u2019t considered before,\u201d says Sinclaire, who now splits the $4,350 rent of a three-bedroom, two-bath apartment in upper Manhattan with Gonzalez.<\/p>\n

In addition to the financial support, she says, they trade school drop-off and kid-watching duties. \u201cBut the main thing we noticed immediately was the relief from the amount of domestic labor<\/a>,\u201d she adds, \u201cand how quickly we could accomplish tasks that were originally just us doing them independently.\u201d Sinclair explains they are like \u201ca power couple\u201d with their combined efficiency, and that the relief has allowed them more free time to rediscover their \u201chobbies and passions.\u201d One of which, Sinclaire says, is the Mommune itself, which prompted them to start posting on Instagram.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had no intention of becoming content creators,\u201d she says. \u201cWe were just playing around.\u201d Their posts range from thoughtful to silly and celebrate different aspects of the mommune, as well as how they make sure to spend time apart to bond with their kids.<\/p>\n

While Sinclaire\u2019s son, 4, gets on so well with Gonzalez\u2019s 7-year-old daughter that they refer to each other as brother and sister, Sinclair\u2019s older son, 9, had a bit more trouble warming to the idea. \u201cBecause he, developmentally, was able to understand, like, okay, so you don\u2019t want to live by yourself. But why not choose Dad? Because I do have a positive and healthy co-parenting relationship with his father,\u201d she says. \u201cHe\u2019s had more questions about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Living together doesn\u2019t quite feel like having a roommate, says Sinclaire. \u201cWe have sit-down dinners together, go food shopping together, vacation together,\u201d she explains. \u201cI think of a roommate as someone who lives in a random room and steals your food \u2026 We function as a family.\u201d<\/p>\n

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