Opinion: Housing strategy must also focus on "aging in place"

Construction progress on The Aster seniors' housing tower at 349 East 6th Avenue, Vancouver. (Brightside Community Homes Foundation)

Written for Daily Hive Urbanized by Dr. David Brook, who is a Clinical Associate Professor of Community Geriatrics at the University of British Columbia’s Faculty of Medicine.

It’s good to see that the housing crisis — and its impact on families — is top-of-mind in an election year. Along with other reforms aimed at addressing the housing crisis, the provincial government’s new budget also introduced a house-flipping tax to “further crack down on speculators and those driving up the cost of housing.” Designed to ease cost-of-living pressures by limiting price growth and increasing affordability, this tax will no doubt offer some relief to those who need it most.

Taxes alone, however, will not address the deepening shortage in our housing supply or address the changing needs of our city as our demographics rapidly shift.

Seniors are the fastest-growing cohort in our population. According to a 2020 study by the City of Vancouver, the number of seniors aged 75 and over on the Westside alone is expected to double by 2042, increasing by 25% in just the next three years.

We need more continuum-of-care housing to support seniors as they age and become frailer. This is known as “aging in place.”

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With a rapidly aging population, competing demands for housing vulnerable populations like Mental Health and Substance Use clients, and with limited resources, the strain on publicly funded care facilities is severe.

Private-pay retirement homes with licensed care (Skilled Nursing Facilities) alleviate pressure on the public sector. They preserve capacity in the publicly funded healthcare system for those who need it most while enhancing access to essential care services, including community resources, for all seniors in need.

What may not be recognized is that private-pay retirement homes play a key role in returning housing stock to the market, particularly single-family homes. A significant number of seniors live alone at home. In 2016, about 26% of Canadians aged 65 and over, amounting to 1.4 million seniors, lived alone, according to the UK’s Centre for Study of Financial Innovation.

As seniors transition to these highly specialized residences (for reasons of growing burden-of-illness), they happen to free up much-needed housing inventory in our city. Thus, increasing the number of seniors’ residences will, a priori, increase housing supply.

Seniors’ residences serve as vibrant hubs where, through living congregations, seniors can enhance their health through connectedness, social engagement in meaningful activity, and remain in being part of purposeful activities, and, thus, continue to lead fulfilling lives and combat the vicissitudes of late-life, disconnectedness/social isolation amongst them. They provide supportive environments, rich in culture and heritage, that foster a sense of belonging and community, and, in doing so, they enhance the vitality of neighbourhoods.

As referenced in Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s 2018 report, older Canadians have more assets and less debt than the average population and can contribute to their community by spending locally and investing in local businesses.

Speaking plainly, seniors spend where they live. By helping seniors age in place and returning more housing stock to the market for new families, communities can benefit from local economic growth and boost generational connections. The “15-minute” neighbourhood needs seniors, if for no other reason than the demographic realities we see all around us. Older folks are no longer “invisible”!

In my professional experience, I have seen the transformative power of congregate living in the lives of older adults. Social connectedness and meaningful activity are fundamental to well-being at all ages. There is growing evidence that these key ingredients sustain health and reduce frailty and suffering, and they are more easily accessed and facilitated in congregate settings. The phenomenology of “late- life” necessitates it, in my view.

We are seeing the growing effect of “demographic climate change” — the seemingly unstoppable “Silver Tsunami” (appropriately named given the marked demographic changes occurring in Japan) — and we simply do not have the housing supply or the healthcare capacity to support the imminent ripple effects. Increasing the availability of private-pay seniors’ housing will preserve healthcare capacity while contributing to refreshing the availability of desirable housing stock and the vibrancy of our communities for everyone who lives there, seniors included.

People fear change (see their reaction to the government’s recent policies regarding urban density). Beyond tax policies and fears of changes to our neighbourhoods, we must accept that we are all aging, that with aging comes late life and growing frailties, and that we all deserve to age with grace and dignity in the communities we choose to call home. With a housing strategy rooted in compassion, not fear or greed, we can help increase housing and quality of life for everyone.

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