Dedicated to rightsizing the senior housing market.
Some small homes are known as accessory dwelling units, or ADUs. Others include apartment structures housing microapartments, 300 to 400 square feet, with ingeniously designed furniture to maximize living space. Another possibility is a tiny house, 300-800 square feet, freestanding or on wheels, and sometimes grouped with others in small pocket neighborhoods. Learn more
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A cheery spaceA cheery space I’ve heard it said that housing a senior in an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) is like sticking granny in a shed in the back yard. What a grim prospect for a senior, to be crammed in a claustrophobic space with a only a bed, a tiny bathroom, a TV and a couple of appliances. But, of course, that is not at all what is on offer. Small spaces can be designed to be homey, welcoming and safe for the elderly. A case in point is the tiny house on wheels explored by the Tiny House website and shown here https://tinyhousetalk.com/aging-in-place-22-ft-verve-by-tru-form-tiny-in-a-tiny-house-village/. Though wheels aren’t necessary for the small home, the décor and appliances shown here are replicable and relevant to the ADU as well. First and foremost to notice is the bedroom located on the first (and only) floor, typically unusual for ADUs tending to favor second-story lofts with access by ladder. The first-floor bedroom is clearly a must for a gait-challenged senior. Placed at the end of the space, it is readily visible and accessible from the kitchen and living areas. Notice too the small but practical furniture, the generous windows and the cheery shelf space taking advantage of them. The cooking, refrigerator and laundry facilities are complete and size-appropriate. Given careful forethought and a sense of attractive interior design, that “granny pod” can be made as livable as anyone would expect it to be.
I’ve heard it said that housing a senior in an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) is like sticking granny in a shed in the back yard. What a grim prospect for a senior, to be crammed in a claustrophobic space with a only a bed, a tiny bathroom, a TV and a couple of appliances.
But, of course, that is not at all what is on offer. Small spaces can be designed to be homey, welcoming and safe for the elderly. A case in point is the tiny house on wheels explored by the Tiny House website and shown here https://tinyhousetalk.com/aging-in-place-22-ft-verve-by-tru-form-tiny-in-a-tiny-house-village/. Though wheels aren’t necessary for the small home, the décor and appliances shown here are replicable and relevant to the ADU as well.
First and foremost to notice is the bedroom located on the first (and only) floor, typically unusual for ADUs tending to favor second-story lofts with access by ladder. The first-floor bedroom is clearly a must for a gait-challenged senior. Placed at the end of the space, it is readily visible and accessible from the kitchen and living areas.
Notice too the small but practical furniture, the generous windows and the cheery shelf space taking advantage of them. The cooking, refrigerator and laundry facilities are complete and size-appropriate.
Given careful forethought and a sense of attractive interior design, that “granny pod” can be made as livable as anyone would expect it to be.
A City Starting to Like ADUs
Problem number one in building an ADU is getting the community to let you do it. Community building codes are still typically ignorant of or unfriendly to the idea. “Not in My Back Yard” for these little structures can be a common response, as people can find the idea of ADUs off-putting, possibly neighborhood-changing, too rental-friendly (Heaven forbid!), etc.
But that’s slowly changing, as communities throughout the United States are revising or developing their codes to allow construction of ADUs in some way, shape or form for particular reasons. As noted elsewhere in this blog, Portland, Oregon has been a bellwether city in this development, but recently one of the country’s three major cities weighed in four-square with one of the most creative and encouraging new codes out there.
Early this year Los Angeles introduced its Accessory Dwelling Unit Standard Plan Program, opening up creation of these new units to multiple designers and developers working in multiple neighborhoods. Under the auspices of the city’s Chief Design Director (a landmark new title in itself and occupied by former architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne), the city offers more than a dozen pre-approved designs to choose from.
Pre-approval of the designs not only offers people considerable choice, but saves the builder time and money from the often slow-moving code clearance process. In California, the program is an outgrowth of the state’s liberalizing state-wide codes that have been more ADU-friendly over the past few years.
The resulting spurt of ADU development has expanded the rental market in several communities. Most ADUs have gone this way, providing ongoing rental income for their developers. Use by family members, including the elderly, is still relatively unusual.
But the potential for that use is there, and readily so, for families starting to see the need for an in-law suite, but not necessarily an in-house one. As caregiving technology and interior design ingenuity become more accommodating for aging seniors, this ADU senior housing alternative will grow, all the more rapidly in areas like Los Angeles.
One Builder’s Basic Common Sense Approach to ADUs
ADUs for senior living can seem such a novel approach, with so much new think about in design, livability and code compliance. Builder Derek Huegel, though, thinks it’s not such big challenge and successful ADUs can be implemented with some basic common sense.
Huegel is owner of Wolf Industries, a Vancouver, Washington-based construction firm now offering detached ADUs (called, in some quarters, granny pods) for homeowners wishing to accommodate senior family members in a home-based supportive environment. Huegel says it isn’t necessary to reinvent the living “box” because the same design features that make life easier for anyone apply here.
For example, the loft bedroom which has become a signature ADU feature isn’t recommended and main-floor bedrooms are preferred. “It’s a matter of being practical. You don’t want to have to be climbing up and down stairs simply because you forgot to bring up something or turn off a light.”
Similarly, appliances, such as washing machines, dryers and refrigerators should be normal-sized and can be if the space is designed to accommodate them. This is better functionally and also avoids not being able to find exotic maintenance or replacement parts for those small-sized machines.
Design space should be provided for full-size showers as well, Huegel says—“they’re just so much easier to use.”
Interestingly, the ADU storage conundrum discussed elsewhere in this blog doesn’t have to be overwhelming, says Huegel, given the ingenious solutions being marketed by IKEA and others. Introducing these custom-designed items into the space provides a whole new “scope of work” for ADU builders (in their lingo).
Huegel also takes in stride incorporating of some of the latest smart home technology emerging on the market, including lights-control and voice-activated Alexa—he’s installing these microchips routinely, he says. He still doesn’t include the personal activity-monitoring, anti-fall devices becoming available in the senior housing realm, only because Huegel hasn’t found much demand for them yet.
Finally, the “elephant in the room”—the code compliance challenge posed by many communities resisting the ADU approach—requires simply, in Huegel’s view, studying each municipality’s code thoroughly and coming up with positive ways to address it. Huegel attacked this head-on in his early engagement with ADUs: “I’ve always been focused not on changing the code but on what might be allowed by that code. Maybe use different language—if an ADU isn’t permitted, what about a guest house? I started by taking a crash course in all the municipal codes we would be encountering in this work, and I’ve tried to extrapolate the problem-solving to the given jurisdiction. Rather than pressure them to change I ask, ‘What will work for you.’”
He focuses on detached ADUs (those granny pods) simply because the attached version costs too much. “There is a great deal more labor involved, and labor is your big-ticket item with this.” His structures run from $85,000 to $130,000, including permitting, construction, set-up and delivery.
As a final matter-of-fact step toward the future, Huegel’s structures are manufactured in their entirety in a factory and trucked to their eventual sites. In short, modular construction—still controversial and experimental in some quarters—makes complete business sense to Huegel and, just as importantly, his banks. He finds that building construction quality and structural design control is much more precise in a factory setting than on a usually unpredictable construction site.
To me, as proprietor of smallhomesforaging.com, Huegel’s common sense take is refreshing, given that this senior housing model still causes so much wonder and worry for many.
An absolute must in contemplating any move to a small space is deciding which stuff to get rid of.
That’s a ridiculously simple statement but, trust me, this is one of the most emotionally and physically exhausting challenges you will ever undertake. It is the dark secret of senior moves, seldom talked about until the time comes—and the time will come.
When I moved my Mom from her home of 50 years into a one-bedroom apartment in a senior living community, my wife and I faced a house full of stuff: boxes, stacks of old bills and receipts, ancient toys and gimcracks that hadn’t been touched in decades, letters, photographs, clothing of every description—a half-century’s accumulation of things treasured, not so treasured, kept just in case, forgotten, dated, ruined by time.
We had to figure out what was important, why, what might be missed in a month or so, what might be of value to others. We got through the move, culminating with us and a faithful friend standing hip-deep in packing boxes of all sizes in my mom’s new apartment, ultimately and miraculously finding a storage space (or family attic or cellar) for all of it.
In considering a move to a small space, an ADU or a granny pod, you will preserve sanity by developing a systematic approach to sorting and getting rid of clutter. Perhaps not surprisingly, a small army exists out there of people with plans, concepts and commercial services to help you get the job done. A brief sampling:
The KonMari method, which essentially involves emptying all closets, drawers and bookshelves, one category after another, and evaluating the resulting stacks in terms of what can be discarded vs. what “inspires joy.”
The 365 Less Things method focuses on giving away, selling or throwing away one item from storage every day for an entire year. It helps, of course, to have that much time available and, of course, patience.
For a packing party, pretend you’re moving now and pack up everything from closets, drawers and shelves, then extract what you need day-by-day to live or enjoy yourself. After a reasonable amount of time (weeks, months), there will be a residual of stuff that was never touched. Those are the candidates for removal from your house and life, whether giving or throwing away, resulting in a move that just might be manageable.
Check out all of these resources online, as well as the concept of minimalism itself (you’ll find a treasure trove on all this), in preparing for your move. You won’t be guaranteed, maybe even allowed to hope, that all will go smoothly and efficiently. But you just might reduce the unavoidable pain and sweat involved in moving to that small home.
Small homes are an attractive senior housing option in many ways, but there is always the big question: Will seniors want to move in?
As anyone with any experience with this (including yours truly) will tell you, simply getting a senior loved one to even consider leaving the family home to move anyplace, no matter how impractical or unsafe the home may be, is difficult. Their resistance is understandable, even though looming staircases get ever higher, rooms get tougher to clean and isolation from friends and neighbors continues to grow.
But then, once a move is settled upon, the small home presents the next challenge: adapting to living in a space of, say, 500 to 800 square feet without feeling stifled or cramped, even if the unit is attached to the family home.
Maine builder Christopher Lee has confronted this challenge several times over during the past couple of years. His company Backyard ADUs
www.backyardadus.com based in Portland, Maine, deals with people, usually in their 60s, who are leaving the larger home to family members, but then take one look at the proposed attached ADU and say they’re feeling cramped. They still want to have a sense of comfortable space and enough room for favored pieces of furniture such as large couches and tables. Even though the adult children take it upon themselves to help these seniors adapt to their new environments, Lee has found that much of the onus for their ultimate acceptance is on the designs he provides.
Lee tries to adjust the planned spaces to accommodate the senior dweller’s priorities, be it a larger kitchen, spacious recreational area or well-equipped bathroom. Lee has come up with a variety of floor plans to accommodate individual preferences.
Spaces can be sized, for example, to accommodate those familiar but large pieces of furniture.
Another key issue accompanying any senior downsizing move is availability of storage. Lee (and others) have found that simply getting rid of “stuff” is unavoidable in a senior downsize, and the choices can be painful. For what is remaining, though, the storage must be sufficient and easy to use. One rule of thumb Lee applies is to make storage or retrieval a one-step procedure, avoiding the need to stack or sort things beforehand. The location and sizing of drawers and closets makes this possible.
Two potential small home design features that Lee has yet to see develop yet are use of innovative flexible furniture and movable walls, as seen in today’s groundbreaking microapartment design (click on the category “microapartments” above), as well as supportive sensor technology enabling seniors to be safely monitored from remote sites (click on the category “technology” above). “Most of my customers so far have been people in their sixties who don’t quite yet see the need for any of this or who may not even want it because of privacy concerns.”
He does see change coming, though, witness the experience of his own grandmother who survived a multi-fracture fall and bleeding episode thanks to monitoring technology and Alexa communications devices in her unit alerting emergency medical technicians. “For people moving into their 90s this could be a real possibility.”
Lee’s customers are finding that the cost of an ADU is far more sustainable than other senior living options, with a price of $130,000-140,000, financed at about $600 a month, compared to the thousands a month of the other options. Financing for this has become increasingly available, he notes, especially in relatively high-priced neighborhoods.
Further savings have come from his company’s use of prefabrication, with the offsite manufacturer working from those flexible floor plans and adjusting their materials and manufacturing methods accordingly. These structures can be assembled in a matter of days.
The most challenging aspect from the builders’ perspective is dealing with the multifarious codes and requirements of jurisdictions scattered hither and yon, says Lee. “Every town and county has its own approval process and as a result we have ended up eating a lot of the cost of this so far.”
Hence, one more reminder that even the most enlightened builders and developers must still pay a price for leading the way toward the senior small home option.
Planning, developing and building an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) on one’s own property can be difficult—especially in these early days of creating small homes for aging.
But what if one’s hometown had one’s back every step of the way—providing information, planning help and financing options, all at the click of a website?
That is very nearly reality in Seattle, Washington, a town that has recently opened the doors to ADU development of all kinds. “We have the most progressive ADU legislation in the country” says Rick Mohler, an associate professor at the University of Washington and a member of the Seattle Planning Commission assigned to explore and encourage ADU development.
One result has been creation of a website called ADUniverse, which is designed to provide all the localized information a homeowner needs to determine the practicality and affordability of building an ADU, whether in the home or detached in the back yard. A visit to the website will enable the homeowner to select a design for the structure, explore local code requirements, review financing options and initiate construction.
Seattle’s approach to ADUs is also unusually flexible, not even requiring the ADU developer to live in the home or provide additional parking, as most such ordinances do.
Not surprisingly, none of this came about painlessly. “It was fought by various neighborhood groups of private homeowners,” says Mohler, “particularly on grounds of environmental and community quality of life. But other groups in the community strongly favored this. It was quite contentious for a year or so.”
What it seemed to come down to, Mohler says, is that “those who have the ready financing don’t favor it, and those who don’t have easy access to capital do.”
So far the “pro” forces have prevailed in Seattle, aided and abetted by strong mayoral support, while efforts to encourage ADUs statewide have persisted since 1993 but are advancing slowly. Seattle families who have pursued ADU development to date have seen the advantages of flexible occupancy—in some cases the homeowners live in the ADU and adult children and their families affordably occupy the family homes, Mohler notes.
Like so much of American society interrupted by Covid-19, the Seattle ADU movement has ground to a temporary halt and the ADUniverse website remains pending, although this could change soon.
For communities contemplating similar initiatives Mohler recommends connecting with the powerfully supportive activities of the AARP, particularly its Livable Communities program (see “AARP Pushes the ADU Solution” and “The ABCs of ADUs,” under this site’s ADU category), and educating and involving the local real estate community. An active real estate sector is, for example, a key ingredient in the ADU pioneering of Portland, Oregon (see “The View from the ADU Point Person” under the Kol Peterson category).
All in all, broadening community support will make exercising the small homes option for senior housing all the easier.
New visitors to smallhomesforaging.com will find a welcome redesign of this site. Now the content covering all aspects of this subject has been reorganized for improved search, retrieval and reading. Just click on the topic(s) of interest in the header and you will find all the titles published thus far on each one. Click on the title and you’re there.
As always, the newest story will be found at the very top, and other recent titles will be listed thereafter as the Latest. Other topic headers include articles going back months but convey insights and information still fresh and useful.
Be sure to check out the newly organized Resources section, which includes easy access to the relevant newsletters and, as the lead Resource, a thorough exploration of aging in place.
I hope you will find the new site to be a rewarding and stimulating experience.
The reasonably equipped ADU has several things going for it in pandemics: it’s small, it’s safe, it guarantees social distancing by definition, it’s highly suitable for current high-tech communications trends and it’s relatively affordable. But a slam-dunk it isn’t.
Read MoreAmazing technological progress, coupled with equally amazing easy access to this through a single retail outlet, are opening up small homes as safe, affordable alternatives for senior housing.
Integrating circuits embedded on silicon chips have evolved in a remarkable way—becoming ever more powerful as they get smaller. The result has been that “smart” functions of all kinds can be performed by small devices that are easily accommodated within limited living spaces or even by one’s own pocket or wrist.
This very recent trend has been dubbed the Internet of Things (IOT).
The “things” include voice-activated speakers, medication management devices, sensors that monitor physical activity and function and even perform medical examinations.
A variety of IOT devices have been pulled together and marketed by a nationwide, ubiquitous chain store called Best Buy. Over the past three years the store has made a point of acquiring, manufacturing and integrating the IOT as it applies to senior care.
First, in 2017, it launched a product line called Assured Living, sensor technology that monitors seniors’ activity levels at home and offers reassuring feedback and dysfunction alerts to family caregivers nearby. The next year saw the company’s acquisition of Great Call, a developer of smart phones, smart watches, medical alert devices and the like, a subsidiary that gone on to play a lead role in testing and expanding the marketplace.
More recently Best Buy has partnered with TyTo Care, which manufactures medical examination devices that are key to the development of increasingly popular telehealth programs, which enable physicians to examine, diagnose and treat patients remotely from healthcare locations far away. More recently Best Buy acquired Critical Signals Technologies serving the same market.
Finally, the store has moved into marketing wearable sensors with the acquisition of BioSensics.
A key to the growth and outreach of this market will be Best Buy’s famous Geek Squad, known to one and all home computer users for their at-home technical support for the technologically frustrated. Geek Squad is now charged with helping homeowners install, coordinate and successfully implement IOT devices in their own homes.
Probably sooner than later those homes will include ADUs, granny pods and microapartments designed to accommodate aging seniors safely and comfortably.
Of course, Best Buy isn’t alone in serving this marketplace. Sensor developers of various stripes are out there pioneering in senior housing as well. Information is available from the newsletter Aging and Health Technology Watch.
As always with computer technology, it always pays to investigate before committing—to look before leaping. Questions must be asked, for example: is the IOT something that can be integrated easily and relatively simply into a daily lifestyle? Will access to the information it provides be practically useful to recipients? More globally, and troublingly, will these devices be designed to resist hacking, with dangerous invasions of privacy and malfunction as a result?
Pay attention to the answers. If satisfied, you’re ready to move on to the next significant step toward trying the small home alternative.
As the austere, isolating environment of the coronavirus closes down all around us, it occurred to me that the ADUs and granny pods we’ve been discussing all this time just might be a workable senior housing solution for this most vulnerable population. I just recently had my speculation confirmed by a story in the most recent edition of the newsletter Accessory Dwellings (see Resources), in which author Martin John Brown describes his own 400 square foot ADU.
It was originally intended, he says, as a place to stay for a visiting mother-in-law. But as the coronavirus scare mounted she cancelled her trip, only to have Brown himself move into to isolate from his family as he developed his own symptoms. “I’m very fortunate to have this place to retreat,” he writes. “It’s nicely done. I can see the leaves emerging and the flowers blooming at nearby houses and the park. I get occasional deliveries of food and supplies on an outside table.”
This would seem to be viable alternative for an isolating senior family member, whether symptomatic or not. It can be safe, comfortable and reasonably close to family without having to close off part of the main house itself.
If properly done.
As we’ve gone on about at some length in this blog, an appropriate small house alternative for seniors requires considerable design and technological adaptation. It should be universally designed, with appliances and appurtenances adjustable to maintain senior independence as disability advances—moveable counters, grippable door handles, barrier-free bathing and the like. And ideally it should be equipped with sensor technology allowing close monitoring and transmitting alerts regarding physical safety, as well as interactive devices providing medication management and voice-activated assistance.
Supportive technology in particular has been showing remarkable development in recent months, as will be detailed in a forthcoming entry. And one aspect of this, telehealth—remote medical visits and examinations via the Internet—has been burgeoning with the enforced isolation imposed by Covid-19.
In short, this disruptive episode in all our lives has at least one bright spot: demonstrating the reality and potential of small houses as a practical alternative.
When I attended the recent National Investment Center for Seniors Housing and Care conference in Chicago, I was fascinated to see these experienced seniors housing investors and developers showing an intense interest in a new market for them: the so-called “middle market.” They’re used to developing housing projects serving seniors who are relatively wealthy (often from home sales) or who are low-income enough to qualify for Medicaid-financed long-term care. Now, spearheaded by NIC’s founder and long-time leader Robert G. Kramer, they’re recognizing that most seniors fall in the middle but need senior housing options too.
But these financiers also feel perplexed. They look for returns on their investments and projects, but wonder about these and question how to develop and market this sort of housing. What model will work? How can they inspire community planners’ interest in an approach that sometimes conflicts with existing zoning? And, for that matter, how can they get aging seniors and their families interested? Also, the bottom line: how can they make money on these more modestly priced structures?
As luck would have it, as I was walking along a corridor between sessions, I found myself suddenly buttonholed by a developer who eagerly told me his company is working on the answers to these questions and more. Brian Deamer, along with his partners Peter Beukema and physical therapist George Pasteur, working under the company name Andersen Price Lifestyles, are collaborating closely with planning officials in Fairfax County (Virginia) and Montgomery County (Maryland) to create a middle market solution that works for everyone.
“It’s basically a bed-and-breakfast model,” Deamer explains. “Each building will have six or seven 750 square-foot apartments, each including a living room and a bath-and-a-half, with attractive common areas for socializing, gardens, front porches and guest apartments for relatives’ overnight stays. Services of all kinds will be unbundled, that is, brought in ala carte, provided and paid for as needed. The new structures would be located in or close to seniors’ home neighborhoods and so maintain convenient access to food stores and other shopping.”
A simple-sounding neighborhood-based structure, but one with profound implications on many levels:
1) The structure blends in much more easily with a residential community than the typical senior care and housing facility that often incites “not in my back yard” reactions.
2) It’s a rental model, meaning that, rather than spending small fortunes on entry fees and high-end rentals, seniors are able to keep the proceeds of their home sales and spend, on average, $2,000-3,000 a month for rent (moderate in those two counties), along with additional funds for services delivered only as needed.
3) These structures will allow seniors to stay in or very close to their home communities, preserving contact with relatives, neighbors, friends and stores.
But there are still more potential advantages. Deamer, Beukema and Dr. Pasteur propose to build these projects using many of the latest concepts in home construction:
1) Hidden but readily available “universal design” features that make living spaces readily adaptable to aging in place, including bathroom grab bar anchors and height-adjusted kitchen counters which come into play only when seniors need them.
2) So-called green design elements—including, if possible, environmentally sensitive features such as solar power, efficient HVAC control and water conservation.
3) Supportive technology using electronic sensors for unobtrusive motion surveillance, voice-activation and lighting control.
4) Modular construction, assembling structural parts and utility packages in factories and shipping the finished structures to building sites rather than building them on-site—potentially a huge money-saver that helps preserve capital returns for developers and investors. Peter Beukema notes he has a half-dozen modular designs available that he says will scale up quickly and be readily adaptable.
Putting it all together, it’s an attractive and affordable alternative to upscale senior communities and facilities that cost so much. Ideally, says Deamer, seniors will consider leaving their homes earlier than they anticipated, in the process avoiding the growing isolation that comes with aging in place. “Our partner, Dr. Pasteur, has said that, from his physical therapy practice experience, he knows that isolation is a serious medical problem in itself,” says Deamer. “This model reduces the chances of that happening.”
Andersen Price Lifestyles is still two or three years away from realizing the complete vision. Deamer says the challenge right now is to educate community officials and spread the word to neighboring communities who might support the concept. “After watching my dad’s development work, I know it’s better to work with community planners now rather than asking them to adapt to something we’ve already done. And, as he always said, the more people involved in understanding the situation, the faster things get done.”
For starters, the partners are offering a test concept of mixed use housing, using existing acre and half-acre commercial properties allowing senior apartments to be located above various retail establishments and medical service providers. “Community planners have shown considerable interest in this initial approach, which in many cases won’t require zoning changes,” says Beukema. “This will establish the idea of allowing seniors the dignity of choice while continuing to live in their home communities.”
Small home experimentation like this is in fact happening around the country. For anyone who feels daunted by the questions and obstacles posed by small homes for aging (discussed in What will it take?), it can now be confidently stated that practical and experienced developers like Andersen Price Lifestyles are taking a serious shot at the solutions.
Introductory essay published by the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing and Care
The sheer cost of long-term care! Few shocks in modern life can equal that of the average middle-class family seeking safe accommodations for a loved one in need and discovering the price tag of safe housing. Costs run from the mid-30-thousands a year for assisted living and significant home care to $90,000 a year and above for skilled nursing.
Then comes the shock of learning that virtually none of this is covered by government or, in particular, Medicare. And the government coverage that does apply, Medicaid, only comes in when the family member becomes legally impoverished.
This is the “big surprise” I alluded to in publishing a small book on that theme several years ago (“The Big Surprise,” XLibris Publishing, 2012). Families are experiencing it every day in growing numbers—a growth soon to burgeon, as the oldest Baby Boomers move into their 70s.
It’s questionable how, or whether, society will respond to this challenge, but one thing is becoming increasingly clear: a form of safe and affordable housing is evolving that may meet much of this need.
Small homes are just starting to penetrate the national consciousness. These include, but are not limited to, tiny houses—around 500 square feet, often on wheels—that have gained some trendy attention in news media and entertainment venues (a character in the Netflix series Grace and Frankie lives in one). But small homes are also defined by the term accessory dwelling units (ADUs).
ADUs come in several flavors—additional dwelling space in a family home, small detached homes of varying heights, so-called “granny pods” (small, independent units installed in back yards), and microapartments of 300 square feet or less. They are attached or detached, urban or suburban, freestanding or offered as small communities, such as pocket neighborhoods or tiny villages.
Usually (though not always) these come at relatively affordable prices, a one-time expense of roughly $45-120,000. So their affordability is already a selling point for the senior housing field.
But beyond this are the design advances and new technologies that have evolved only recently to make small home viable for seniors seeking safe, affordable housing.
Some design innovations include adjustable-height counters, beds and tables that fold into walls when not needed, ingenious arrangements of furniture and storage space allowing for maximum mobility and avoidance of claustrophobia, and pleasant finishes worthy of any home.
Technologically there is the microchip, and all the supportive equipment that this enables—motion sensors; personal emergency response; voice-enabled “servants” providing schedule reminders, entertainment and home security; and medication management. Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) point to the imminent arrival of helpful robots performing needed chores and errands.
Coming as well is telemedicine, allowing physician offices to connect directly with patients in their dwellings, providing surveillance and advice, as well as needed examinations.
All of these technologies are working together to create a new alternative for senior housing.
Needless to say, none of this is commonplace as yet—this development can be fairly characterized as “bleeding edge.” Supportive technologies have a way to go to secure seniors’ trust and adoption, not to mention basic understanding (although a surge of voice-enabled devices, such as Alexa and her sisters, seems to be in full swing). Intense focus on the elderly is not quite there yet in Silicon Valley, and AI has a long way to go to become domestically useful.
An even bigger current obstacle is the slow advance of municipal housing codes to make way for the development of small homes of various types. Most codes are very conservatively single family home-oriented. Northwestern cities such as Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, British Columbia are currently leading the way in opening the door to smaller spaces, and recently Minneapolis, Minnesota became the first city in America to end single-family zoning throughout the city. Meanwhile Virginia became a “granny pod” pioneer only a few years ago in allowing development of backyard MedCottages.
Last year long-term care innovator Dr. Bill Thomas laid the groundwork for his so-called Minka small home communities in the state of Indiana and has initiated construction.
In general, though, municipalities and states have been leery of small home developments for fear of uncontrolled spread and severe diminishment of property values, and this appears to be a challenge slow to resolve.
Or maybe not.
In any event, all elements are present for a true revolution in senior housing—an affordability salvation for many families, a step toward safe independent living for elderly no longer able to live in the family home, and a rich opportunity for imaginative real estate developers who see what’s coming in only a few years.
To that end I have established the blog smallhomesforaging.com to track these developments, educate decision-makers, and perhaps even entertain.
Richard L. Peck is former Editor-in-Chief of the magazines Long-Term Living (formerly Nursing Homes Magazine) and Healthcare Design, of which he is founding editor. He also began the DESIGN series of annuals (now known as Environments for Aging) showcasing advanced design for long-term care facilities. Previously he spent nearly 10 years editing Geriatrics, a clinical magazine aimed at primary care physicians.
