Seniors Housing & Healthcare Trends

LOS ANGELES: Home sharing is a growing trend for retirees intent on reducing both cost and loneliness.

Brenda Atchison retired prematurely and then found herself struggling to afford rent in Boston’s ultra-pricey housing market. Not ready to downsize her apartment, 72-year-old Atchison knew she needed a different solution. That’s when she heard, through a friend, about home sharing.

What is Home Sharing?

Home sharing is an alternative housing option for people of any age, akin to roommates, where two or more people occupy the same living space and cohabitate in a mutually beneficial agreement. The concept of roommates is not new, but due to increasingly expensive housing costs and limited budgets for older adults, more retirees like Atchison are sharing their homes, allowing them to age in place at home while reducing housing costs and mitigating social isolation.

Finding and affording housing is a common struggle for the older population – a third of those aged 50 and older pay more than 30% of their income on housing. This percentage is substantial considering that 40% of individuals 65 and older rely solely on Social Security for income, as documented by the National Institute on Retirement Security.

The “Golden Girls” TV show popularized the idea of unrelated, older roommates living together at the show’s start date in 1985. Fast forward to today, and home sharing is no longer confined to the fiction of a quirky television sitcom and has been integrated into the lives of 879,000 Americans aged 65 and older, according to 2016 data from the American Community Survey.

While this number only accounts for 1.8% of all older adults, the same survey revealed a dramatic spike in seniors living with non-familial roommates from 2006 to 2016. As the 65 and over population increased, so did the number of home-sharers by 88%. This uptick is influenced by the influx of private businesses like Silvernest and Nesterly — online services that connect individuals looking to start a home-sharing agreement — but local governments have also created programs to usher seniors into similar arrangements as a means to alleviate pressure on the city’s housing market.

How Home Sharing Works

The City of Boston partnered with Nesterly in 2017 to launch a municipality-endorsed pilot program for intergenerational home-sharing. According to the City of Boston, the pilot’s mission to “match households with a spare bedroom to students who are seeking an affordable place to stay during their studies, as well as an opportunity to engage with the local community,” exceeded expectations with 80 Nesterly applications in only three weeks.

Atchison lives in a city where housing is scarce, and older adults and young people alike must grapple with the fact that demand far outweighs supply. According to The Boston Foundation’s annual accounting, apartment vacancy rates float around 4% and homeowner vacancies at about 0.9% in Boston, compared to 6% and 1.5% respectively in a healthy housing market.

Given her situation, Atchison embarked on an intergenerational home-sharing agreement where she welcomes graduate students from Boston-based colleges and universities into her apartment to split the rent – helping not only herself but others. The average monthly rent in Boston is $3,300, which when cut in half becomes radically more affordable when considering that, according to 2014 data from the City of Boston, the median personal income for individuals aged 60 to 79 is just $18,000 per year.

“Housing is so very important not only to the younger generation but to us as we grow older as well,” Atchison said. “For me, it’s an opportunity to experience a new aspect of life I wasn’t expecting.”

Home Sharing Reduces Isolation

Housing advocate Ryan Frederick, author of “Right Place, Right Time,” said home sharing provides not just a new stream of income, but also a solution to the critical problem of elder isolation. Frederick identified the key difference between home sharing and roommates: connection.

“There’s value on both sides, both, I’d say, the owner and then the renter in the sense that for the owner, they get the benefit of cash flow. They get the benefit of greater social connection in an era that’s harder and harder these days,” Frederick said.

Though Atchison lives with young people in an intergenerational agreement, home sharing often extends to two older adults living together. While more affordable rent drove her to open her apartment to another person, many older people are considering this housing alternative for companionship. The struggle for housing is a well-known obstacle for the older population; however, the damaging effects of loneliness are often under-discussed.

According to the 2021 Profile of Older Americans, 27% – 15.2 million – of Americans aged 65 and older lived alone in 2021. This percentage increases with age and predominantly affects women, 43% of whom live alone past age 75. The consequence of social isolation on older Americans extends beyond emotional dissatisfaction, however. Research suggests significant time spent alone increases the risk for physical and mental ailments like high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity, a weakened immune system, depression, cognitive decline, Alzheimer’s disease and even death.

Loneliness, however, is not an issue for Atchison who has cycled through several co-habitations with graduate students. “I have met people from all over the world. I only get to know them for a few months but it’s a life-long memory that gets created,” she said.

Ideal Candidates for Home Sharing

Silvernest president Riley Gibson said that while the service doesn’t only serve elders, this demographic is the most interested.

He noted that it’s crucial that prospective hosts assess their health needs before considering home sharing as a housing option because it works best for people without serious medical conditions.

“Home sharing is not a great solution for someone that’s looking for a roommate that can offer care,” Gibson said, describing the ideal home-sharing host as someone with “limited mobility but not major health issues.”

Home sharing cannot offer the same level of caregiving as assisted living and skilled nursing facilities can for those with age-related disabilities. Atchison, for example, enlists her co-occupants for help with taking out the trash but is still able to perform activities of daily living (ADLs) without depending on the individuals who share her home

Safety and Compatibility Concerns

Safety is always a concern when inviting unknown people to live in a home, so Silvernest allows users – both hosts and potential candidates – to opt for a background check that will display on their profile.

Users also answer compatibility questions about their living styles, preferences for shared spaces and expectations for topics such as tidiness. Gibson explained that these agreements do not always work out because, in many cases, retirees are “totally re-learning how to share a space.” Because of this, Silvernest recommends a 30-day opt-out for either party.

While Atchison said she has never had a negative experience with her occupants, one of Sue Larsen’s living agreements ended earlier than expected.

Larsen, 72, lives in a home with a second-bedroom suite that was “too beautiful to leave empty most of the time,” she said. Nearly five years ago, she welcomed a renter through Silvernest into her home in Longmont, Colorado. This renter, however, had living objectives that didn’t align with her own and was seeking an arrangement closer to roommates, which Larsen describes as more casual and lacking commitment to the house or an effort toward building a positive relationship.

This was her first home-sharing agreement. It ended amicably but encouraged Larsen to seek someone with a more compatible mindset. She’s since happily lived with the same woman for three years thanks to their in-depth, initial conversation where both discussed everything from political beliefs to pet peeves before agreeing to share a space.

“Oftentimes we have these spaces, our homes with wonderful spaces, and we don’t know what to do with them, but we don’t want to move,” Larsen said. “Home sharing is a perfect solution, but you have to be careful about who you get.”

Home-Sharing Dos and Don’ts

Do:

– Use reputable sources to find pairings. Choosing to live with someone unknown to you can be risky, but some routes of getting in contact with potential roommates are safer than others. Resources like Silvernest, Nesterly or even government-led programs have the highest likelihood of safety for both hosts and renters. One piece of advice that both formerly mentioned testimonials shared: Do not use Craigslist.
– Be transparent about your living habits and preferences. Some degree of compatibility or at least being able to functionally co-exist is necessary for home-sharing arrangements to work. That being said, be honest about how you live! It may be tempting to front as the ideal roommate, but that is not sustainable in the long term.
– Meet in person. Sharing a home is no small endeavor and even if everything looks perfect on paper, it’s important to get a sense of compatibility in person. Current home-sharer testimonials highly encourage preparing a list of in-depth questions for the first meeting. This will illuminate any potential for conflict or even spark a new friendship.

Don’t:

– Rush into a home-sharing arrangement. The longevity of these agreements depends on living compatibility, so when you’re looking for a roommate, be picky! The more you understand the situation and who you’ll be living with, the more successful it will be.
– Assume home sharing is assisted living. Home sharing is best for individuals without serious health conditions and should not be viewed as a stand-in for assisted living or at-home care. Unless explicitly agreed upon, do not expect a roommate to offer any form of health care.
– Breach your home-sharing agreement. Although this model may look different from typical roommate agreements, given the age of cohabitants, the same rules still apply. It is important to be respectful to the person you’re sharing a space with. This means abiding by their boundaries and clearly setting your own.