Aging Baby Boomers Becoming the Roommate Generation

[mia]

...Rachel Caraviello, vice president of Affordable Living for the Aging (ALA), says that nationally there are about 130,000 households where the cohabiters are aged 50 or older, and where they have no familial relationship or romantic connection.

Caraviello views these arrangements as one more manifestation of the “sharing economy”: Here, one party typically is house-rich but cash-poor; and the other has money or services to contribute.

Rodney Harrell, PhD, a specialist on housing with the AARP’s Public Policy Institute, tells ABC News the range of agreements struck can include one party’s helping the other with shopping, transportation, cooking or informal care-giving. He believes there will be more demand for roommate and other sharing programs as the Baby Boom ages.

Baby Boomers living longer, not healthier

By 2030, according to the Federal Administration on Aging, one out of every five Americans will be 65 or older. The sheer size of the Boomer cohort, says Harrell, plus its declared desire to age “in place,” rather than in a nursing home, means having a roommate will be what he calls a growing niche option. “Few do it now,” he tells ABC, “but more could, or would, if that option were made more easily available.”

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/aging-baby-boomers-roommates/story?id=23570035&singlePage=true

[Grey]

1. Can you say "Golden Girls"?

Only makes sense to me.

[yeoman6987]

5. I can be lucrative

A neighbor of our has five roommates. She owns the home and charges 700 each. That is 3500 (she has her own room) so she rents to five people (5 separate bedrooms). It is a great way for a 75 year old woman to make ends meet. I think she is brilliant quite frankly.

[Victor_c3]

7. ... and they have the security, comfort, and piece of mind of not being alone

If they fall or need help, someone is always there. That has to be good for their families too.

[yeoman6987]

11. That is so true

She says that she never slept better. When she was in the home alone years ago before the roomies, she could not sleep well.

[whistler162]

14. In the old days that was called a rooming house.

[WinkyDink]

2. "By 2030" = TWO older generations, for the BBs will be in their 80's, many of us.

[pipoman]

3. I view this very much like climate change. ..

People pretend this baby boomer thing isn't going to have any affect on their lives....

[jtuck004]

4. "plus its declared desire to age “in place," Harrell's mis-informed. Because for as long

as we have been selling homes, and it's recorded and easily verifiable, a huge percentage of people either sold at 65 and retired, or, today, had planned to, but are afraid to try for a variety of reasons, or cannot sell their home for the paper they owe, and have no real alternatives. The vast majority of Americans have never, ever stayed in one place their whole lives unless they were sentenced there with no possibility of parole.

Interesting. What happens to a nation who suddenly finds itself living like trustees at a low-security jail? They could get beyond the fence, but they can't afford the gas. A hundred million frustrated people. (Or they dampen their ambition with cable and other drugs).

Some aren't moving because there is no one to sell them to, here, and they have roommates because we have an economy that continues to circle the drain for millions of people (after the 7 million families were kicked out in foreclosure - wonder how they will vote? - and there are 9 million homes that are worth less than the paper they are mortgaged for - ie, underwater), and because we have quit investing in ourselves, and used the money to "finance" a more opulent style of living. Which we have gotten, for the banksters it was financed with.

For the rest of us...less:

"High-wage jobs accounted for 41% of job losses but have only grown 30% since the recession, and mid-wage jobs made up 37% of job losses but only 26% of recent employment growth. That means there are almost two million fewer high- and mid-wage jobs than there were before the 2008 collapse, according to the report."

here.

Oh, btw, about 12 million or so more people have joined our happy little party since 2008, which has had the effect of making the fight for the scraps of jobs that are left interesting, and the wages lower.

There is no choice on the horizon that is going to change this, except to make the pressures greater for at least the next 20 years, and that will be in the face of mounting challenges over energy, food, and water, some of that driven by climate change. It will be interesting to see what's on the other side, but it doesn't look good on the present path for most people.

It will be interesting to see what happens to a nation of frustrated baby boomers who could change it if they wanted to, but so far have shown little inclination, so we shall see. Without some real change, however, we may just get the equivalent of little islands of rich people surrounded by tar-paper shacks again.

[Le Taz Hot]

6. WTF?

"It will be interesting to see what happens to a nation of frustrated baby boomers who could change it if they wanted to, but so far have shown little inclination,"

"Change" what? We were every bit the victim of the recession as everyone else. Wow! The right wingers came out and blamed the middle class and poor for foreclosures on their homes and loss of jobs. You're blaming the boomers for exactly, what?

In fact, your entire screed didn't make a whole lot of sense.

But divide and conquer, it's what the 1% wants -- it keeps people from blaming the REAL perps -- the 1%.

Just Wow!

I'll never understand some people's hatred for older people. I just don't understand it.

[jtuck004]

8. Since you think have it all figured out, what with your special antenna and all, there's not

much point in discussing it. It didn't make sense to you because you didn't read it for understanding, you simply quoted a line and then made up what you wanted to see to satisfy yourself.

We don't need to talk any longer. At least I don't.

[Le Taz Hot]

10. . . .

LTH<------ backing out, smiling and nodding.

I hope you find the help you need, sir/madam.

[jtuck004]

12. "I hope you find the help you need, sir/madam."

LTH<------ backing out, smiling and nodding. <-------- Just got it.

And it's gonna be a much nicer day now. Hope you get the reading lessons you need...I'm gonna go press a button to make sure it stays that way.

[marions ghost]

15. Could you blame Republicans and oligarchs please?

Thanks.

[jtuck004]

16. Oh, sorry. Bad Enemy!! Bad, Bad Enemy! Evil, Republican Oligarch POS!

It has to be you, there is no other alternative that makes sense to those who know better. Go to your crate Republican!

There. All better.

(I may spend too much time with my dogs).

[marions ghost]

17. It makes more sense than

Bad evil baby boomers....

Know the enemy is a saying that has some truth to it.

[jtuck004]

18. I didn't write bad baby boomers. Just said they haven't gotten up off their cable-

watching asses to fix things, instead preferring to live in the Master's house at the cost of those who are in the fields, a behavior learned from leaders they have selected since Carter told us we needed to go a different direction and they tossed him./

Too many of those, and that's a fact. Whether one likes it or not is irrelevant, especially to me.

Anyway, I'm not big on whiners that want to point fingers when they haven't done what they could, who take advantage of their comfort while other people are being hurt by their actions.

Sorry about your reading comprehension issue. But you will have to fix it on your own, and I won't be able to read what you reply.

[marions ghost]

19. "Whiners"

and you would be not whining? And you are fixing things? That's so heroic of you.

It doesn't fix things to alienate people based on ffed up theories of generational division.

You can't blame Reagan and the Bushes on all the baby boomers. Many other factors there.

So put me on ignore because I'm saying what you've closed your mind to. The problem isn't baby boomers, it's RethugliCons.

But you seem to need that right wing "bad baby boomers" crutch for some reason.

[LiberalElite]

20. Hold On -

Baby boomers cable watching asses??? We have to fix it all now? There's millions of adults under 50. They just get to watch us allegedly do nothing? How old are YOU anyway?

[jtuck004]

21. Sigh. There are 316 million people in the country. The 99% would

be about 312 million, the 1% about 4. Instead of whining about everyone taking all the profit and putting it in their pocket those 316 million could change that, but at nearly every opportunity, they, massively and in a herd, don't.

On the other hand, a cable tv show with singers whose only claim to fame is that the screeching coming from their vocal cords would probably drive evil spirits away from your village can pull in tens of millions of people.

Harriet Tubman said "I saved a thousand slaves. I could have saved a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves". I don't think that problem has ever left us. I do think it applies to a lot more people than we think.

I'm 60. I lived through times when most of the knucklehead baby boomers around me saw how much better life could be. Taxpayers heavily subsidized their college educations, they worked together to fight against a war. They didn't sit around and whine that things weren't good, they started soup kitchens and places to live and organized and tried to understand their world.

Then a few of them, and many of their children, became bankers and stockbrokers and everyone forgot that real wealth comes from making things, from creation. Instead they found that they didn't have to work, they could suck all the profit off of some poor schmucks labor, and in the process found that they could suck the value out of everything around them. So we aren't building, we just live to make the rentiers lives better while 9 million homes are underwater, 7 million families have been foreclosed on and thrown in the streets, good-paying jobs replaced by pieces of shit jobs (if anything) by the millions, and we are getting poorer as a country.

Simple fact is that there are a couple hundred million people moping around about their condition, and they have the power to make it exactly how they want it in their hands. But each day finds many people with less, bankers with more, and families still running out of food at the end of the month.

We are the only ones who could ever fix it, because the Master likes it this way.

[magical thyme]

22. your entire screed made sense to me until the last paragraph...

"It will be interesting to see what happens to a nation of frustrated baby boomers who could change it if they wanted to, but so far have shown little inclination, so we shall see...."

Who could change *what* if we wanted to? Most boomers are not rich. Do not forget that we paid double into social security, to fund both our parents and ourselves.

I would love to sell my house and downsize my location and house, which I own outright due to frugal living. If could sell, I could downsize my location, further shrink my carbon footprint, and live relatively comfortably on social security, growing much of my own food and bartering. But there is no housing market here.

I'm 18 months from being eligible for social security.

Don't fall for the intergenerational warfare. This is a class war, through and through. There are billionaire 20 year olds and billionaire 80 year olds.

[TheManInTheMac]

9. 130,000/300,000,000 = 0.00043 or 0.043%. You cannot predict a trend with such an infinitesimal

quantity.

[magical thyme]

23. 300,000,000 in the US are age 50 or older?

I agree it's a small percentage, but likely a bit bigger than you've stated.

And trends are something that occur over time, not in a single snapshot. It would require comparisons of data from prior years.

[TheManInTheMac]

24. Good point.

[Coventina]

13. Man, the comments on that story are scary and depressing!

So much insanity and hatred!