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Comment by blondie9x | Hacker News Reader

The problem is pretty easy to fix. 50-70% of homes (Depends on Area) are owned by people over 58-70 (Baby Boomers). They don't have good senior apartment/living options. Make more senior housing and provide incentives for them to sell their homes. There are so few available affordable senior apartment options. It's really saddening. Most places have 5-10 year waiting lists, if the waiting list is open at all.

Fixing senior living options will create inventory in the market and give seniors better choices with an active community.

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Handouts to the homeowners does not feel like the right call here

Senior living centers are often atrocious and still can set people back over $10,000 a month. I think a program could be designed without being a handout.

One option could be if you’re going into a government run senior living center you need to pass that money down to whoever was going to inherit it/receive it through donation. And that has to be a taxable event to cover the cost of the subsidy on senior living.

People would hate that option because no one likes taxes but the private market is not getting us where we need to be. If people don’t like the option, no subsidy for them and they are free to figure out their own senior care. That money goes surprisingly fast.

And if the old people don’t have enough wealth to cover the subsidy via taxes that they would have paid anyway just later on their inheritances?

> Senior living centers are often atrocious and still can set people back over $10,000 a month.

For "fun", most states publish nursing home reports. In the county I work in EMS, there are probably only two that have only either minor or no infractions. Every single other one has major / patient/resident risk infractions. Often around minimum staffing levels. Perhaps pay your CNAs above minimum wage, your LPNs above $20/hr, and so...

I'm not talking about just senior living or senior care places. I'm talking about total independent just 55+ or 62+ senior apartments that have affordable rents available. There are very few of these and waiting lists are usually completely closed off and take 10+ years if your name is called at all.

Are you sure you a replying to the correct place? No one talked about handouts, just about building more senior style housing.

Seniors can pay for that, especially after selling a house.

No they’re talking about subsidizing senior living facilities

boomers with houses have no incentives to move into them

And paying money to get them to leave their houses is a terrible policy

unfortunately, since they own the homes, unless you want to take them from them by force, you'll have to give them some sort of incentive to give up their homes so no matter how much you structure it, it will amount to the same thing in order to get them to move.

Build more homes

Where? The desirable places to build the homes have homes with said people already in them.

Bullshit.

I bet this isn’t the entire solution but it seems like a really good part of it. I know seniors are snapping up Ranchers in the US, which takes away a starter home option for people just getting into homeownership.

> Make more senior housing and provide incentives for them to sell their homes.

Oftentimes those same Boomers in business own retirement/senior living/nursing homes. And while generalizing, the fuck you, got mine attitude means that nursing staff get paid a pittance, and oftentimes they're abusing the 911 system (multiple homes around here have a "policy" to call 911 for anything worse than requiring a bandaid - they won't let their nursing staff evaluate or treat patients for ... reasons ... - so we (paramedics) get called multiple times a day for little more than first aid, if that. Meanwhile, out front of the nursing home is a big billboard, "Round the clock nursing care!" and they're sending bills to the residents/families that reflect that, while you have CNAs and an LPN or two barely meeting staffing mandates, if they even are, who are unable to do anything).

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