Housing Options for "Healthy, Wealthy & Wise" Boomers
Fact: 75% of Australia's Baby Boomers see themselves in full or part time paid employment beyond age 65.
In the article "The Reality of Encore Careers - Why the word "Retired" should be retired", the changes emanating from this fact were addressed from the perspective of marketing, and the impact on our looming labour shortage.
Of all the Industries affected by the huge swing away from the decades long trend to early retirement, Housing finds itself under the most intense spotlight. And the developers of cookie cutter, age-restricted retirement communities will be the first, and most expensive casualties.
The solution to the Boomers' rejection of the various guises of the retirement village concept isn't as simple as a change to one of the many new names for the same housing option, seemingly coined to confuse - active adult, lifestyle village etc.
The Boomer age cohort spans approximately 20 years, but in most other characteristics they are even more diverse - particularly in the areas of family types and responsibilities, and aspects of their life-stage that dictate their choice of housing options.
Boomers in their fifties could be empty nester grandparents, parents with children finishing university, or just starting primary school, step parents within a blended family, or parents to a young second family. They could also agree to house returning adult children, an elderly parent, or both. Think TV's "Packed to the Rafters".
Numerically, everything from a single person household up to multi generational double digits.
In round numbers, Australian Boomers represent 25% of our population, yet have 50% of the nation's buying power and 75% of financial assets, largely caused by an extended period of rising house prices and unprecedented levels of potential and actual inheritance.
Boomers are an heterogeneous group, but if any generalisation is true, they are high earning, big spending, and love to own property - their principal residence, holiday homes and rental investments.
The term often used to describe the new reality is "working retirement", which appears to be an oxymoron, but applies to the 75% of Boomers intending to remain in paid employment, or a form of self employment, beyond the age of 65. This period of working retirement will often include cycles of working, mixed with breaks for recreation. Both impact on housing requirements - everything from high speed internet connection to home offices and a sewing room/study/library that converts to a guest room.
The Downsizing Conundrum
Boomers see themselves as the financial, social and emotional epicentre of their extended families, and therefore demand housing which provides the space requirements of that role. That includes the number of bedrooms and ensuite bathrooms to accommodate adult children and/or elderly parents for extended periods, and grandchildren's sleep-overs.
Family gatherings for special occasions, or regular Sunday lunches, dictate spacious and flexible dining areas; and with one eye on future physical abilities, wide wheelchair friendly doorways and hallways, and reinforced bathroom walls if grab rails become necessary.
That adds up to a demanding shopping list - but that's Boomers for you!
- Location needs to be close to other family households, within walkable communities
- Very definitely single level with easy access
- Space for two cars and the equipment needed for sport and hobbies.
And in a downsized floor plan, with smaller, low maintenance garden and outdoor entertaining areas.
Plus many of the luxuries the Boomers couldn't afford in the previous family home - granite benchtops, top grade appliances, separate showers and vanities, built in vacuum systems, and a priority on security.
And finally, if built in clusters, not too many, and with an opportunity to express the Boomer's individuality.
Market to Boomers' affinities.
The most obvious examples to date of housing that is marketed to Boomers' affinities, are golf communities created within substantial land developments.
However other possibilities will be explored by creative housing developers:
- Within or close to universities to satisfy the many Boomers who now have time to attain a degree, and are attracted to that environment's intellectual stimulation, and the multi generational community
- Replicating the golf community development with other sports, hobbies or interests - tennis, sailing, lawn bowls, horses, dogs - perhaps on a smaller scale and in combination.
In the US, we have already seen Affinity Housing for seniors who live like modern cowboys in ranch developments, and numerous communities developed for gay and lesbian seniors.
Shared Living Arrangements
In excess of 20% of Boomer households comprise a single person. Some suburbs in our capital cities seem to comprise almost entirely of large houses occupied by single older residents, predominately female.
At a time of deteriorating Housing Affordability statistics for all age groups, almost one third of Australia's Seniors are "over housed" - that occurs when the bedrooms in a home outnumber the occupants by more than one.
The most attractive response to these statistics, from the Seniors' economic and standard of living viewpoints, and housing developers' profit potential, is the concept of Shared Living Arrangements.
To clarify our definition, this is not urban consolidation, the other necessary alternative of slicing off under-used parts of large allotments to construct downsized residences (but, please no "granny flats"). Nor is it about elderly parents moving in with their adult children, or vice versa.
Shared Living Arrangements involve the proposition of Seniors, couples and singles, sharing the space and costs in modified conventional homes.
For the practically minded, this achieves better utilisation of housing resources, and brings together compatible physical capabilities and life experiences, while providing company for the otherwise lonely.
The more adventurous will form their own mini-community of socially compatible "family" members of both genders, pooling financial resources to purchase, modify, or build a home comprising luxurious private suites, with dining and recreation amenities in common areas. Perhaps the arrangement will stretch to sharing cleaning and maintenance services, a personal chef or personal trainer, even a mobile masseuse or hairdresser.
This concept is not without its legal challenges to document the many "what if" and title scenarios, but the property developer who is first to market with a financially and socially acceptable formula, will create a highly profitable housing niche.
