Posts Tagged “Retirement Homes Communities in Halifax”
If you are a senior homeowner living in property that is too big for you and that no longer meets your needs, you may be reluctant to sell your home because the alternatives for senior housing do not appeal to you. Leaving your home means abandoning what is familiar to you, drastically reducing your living space, and giving up your independence. Fortunately, new trends in senior living promise appealing alternatives that make selling your residence more appealing.
Currently, the senior population of Canadians over 55 is growing so rapidly that this demographic is an important segment of the current and upcoming housing market. Developers, organizations, and property managers are taking heed of the trends, finding ways to develop solutions, and marketing them to older consumers who are ready to make a housing change but want a place that requires minimum compromise.
The Future Of Senior Housing In Canada
What marks likely housing choices of the future that make them more palatable to seniors? For starters, they will have less of an institutional feel. The needs of seniors vary, depending on whether they are able-bodied and alert or have limited mobility and memory loss, but regardless of their state of being, most seniors want surroundings with a more homelike atmosphere that have amenities more like hotels than institutions. Some amenities might include:
– Larger rooms that offer more living space, along with more room for wheelchairs and scooters that you may need in the future
– Appealing common space that expands the living space of individuals
– More activities that appeal to men and women
– More sophisticated fire and safety systems that may incorporate the resident tracking
– Advanced communications and emergency response systems
– Better heating and cooling options
– Flexible design that allows future reconfiguration to allow for mobility devices, automatic door openers, elevators, and other features that residents may come to need
Newly built senior housing will be attractive while incorporating universal design principles that eliminate barriers to make them usable to the vast majority of users. This means that the property might incorporate small changes such as lowering light switches, using door handles rather than knobs, raising electrical outlets, providing adjustable counters, and installing grab bars throughout or convenient.
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Other Alternatives Create A Homelike Setting
As designers and builders step up to meet the challenges with multi family alternatives many less traditional approaches are taking hold. For example, the “Babayaga” concept offers living accommodation to seniors based on the community pitching in to help other members. Typically located near transit and other needed facilities in the midst of a broader urban setting, homes offer comradery and support as a group of older residents of varying ages create a home together. Developed in France, the concept is taking hold in Canada as well: Babayaga Place in Toronto is one example.
Sell Your Home To Pursue These New Opportunities
While housing options that incorporate these desirable features will increase over the next few years, seniors who are considering making a change have options now to relocate to a homey, convenient setting. To take advantage of what the area has to offer requires selling your current home.
If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Funding retirement housing can be challenging, but since 2009, when Tax Free Savings Accounts (TFSA) were created by Canadian Minister of Finance Jim Flaherty, seniors can have one more resource to tap when it comes time to access assisted-living.
What Is A TFSA And How Does It Work
With a TSFA, individuals over 18 can contribute to the fund up to the current limit of $5,500 per year, an amount indexed to the Consumer Price index to allow for inflation. (For 2015, only, the limit was $10,000 with no account for inflation; previous limits were restored when the government was elected.)
The savings account can include cash, stocks, bonds, GICs, and mutual funds; your financial advisor can give you details about diversifying your account. The account does not replace the RRSP, the Registered Retirement Savings Plan that many Canadians have. Within RRSP, you have to pay taxes on money you withdraw and must convert the plan to an annuity known as an RRIF by age 71.
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There are no age restrictions on holding a TSFA. The program is often used in estate planning as it amounts to a tax-sheltered inheritance for beneficiaries. Having a TSFA does not impact any federal benefits or credits you might be entitled to, such as Old Age Security benefits, the Age Credit, or Guaranteed Income Supplement.
Benefits Of A TFSA
The beauty of the TSFA is that contributors can withdraw money at any time without having to pay taxes on the withdrawal. A Canadian who started contributing to the program at its inception, would’ve had $46,500 as of January 1, 2016. Spouses must have their own accounts and even contribute to a TSFA owned by their mate, which can double the amount of money available in a household. Baby Boomers in their fifties can accumulate cash reserves through this program which will offer them cash to use when they return
All this is good news for seniors who find themselves in need of going to assisted living or a nursing home, where monthly costs are high. Elderly homeowners often sell their homes to pay for their care, but having a TFSA in place ensures that when the funds from the sale of the house run out, there will still be money on hand. Funds for the Tax Free Savings Account can keep earning interest until they are needed.
TFSA offers seniors flexibility to meet whatever life circumstances occur. If, for example, one person in a marriage requires nursing home care, the other spouse can rely on what is in both accounts to pay for care, rather than immediately having to sell the family home to pay for the care.
Using TFSA As Part Of A Financial Strategy For Seniors
Even able-bodied seniors may want to sell their homes to alleviate the costs of maintenance and upkeep. You can put some of the proceeds in a TFSA and have it on hand when you need it. But financial advisors often suggest putting any money from the sale of your home that you don’t immediately need into a nonregistered account and then transferring $5,500 per person each year into a TFSA for future needs.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
The average Canadian love owning their home. If you happen to be hooked on shows such as Property, Brothers, Love It Or List. It, or Holmes On Holmes, you know, quality renovations can pay off big when you sell, so updating your kitchen to gourmet status, opening up the floor plan, and investing in costly remodels seems like the thing to do. But, is it?
In Canada, money is cheap, and banks are willing to lend money to homeowners. If you are a baby boomer or senior citizen, there are several things you should think of before you go running to the bank to upgrade your home to make it livable for years to come. Not all renovations give you a great return on your investments.
Renovation Spending At An All-time High In Canada
When you look ahead to see where you want to live in a few years, borrowing to make the house suitable for aging in place seems like a great idea when the banks are making it easy. Recent statistics show that Canadians spend about $64 billion last year on a renovation, a figure that is double yearly expenditures in the late nineties and equal to about 4% of Canada’s GDP.
This spending reflects an extremely vibrant housing market, full of buyers who are willing to pay more to get a house in a desirable area that has popular upgrades. Some economists fear that either an increase in interest rates or a decline in housing prices will leave would-be sellers left with houses that are overpriced for the market. No one wants to owe more than the value of their home.
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Will Your Renovations Increase The Value Of Your Home?
While it is generally true for any home that has been renovated, the chance that you as the seller might not get a good return on your investment increases along with the amount you spent. If you added improvements that cost $80,000 in hopes of adding another $100-120,000 to the selling price, you might not get back any of your investment should the market tank.
Some renovations that homeowners add to their age in place property like ramps and walk-in baths pose additional problems for home sellers. While home buyers might be enthusiastic about buying a home with a first-floor master or new granite counter-tops, custom, dark wood cabinets, and stainless appliances, they may not want a ramp or elevator, lower counters, a walk-in bath, or other adaptations specifically made to accommodate disabilities or mobility issues. Upgrades like this can actually lower the value of the house. Transforming a property and removing these modifications can be costly to the seller or buyer. Who will pay for it? A huge unsightly ramp could detract from your home curb appeal and repel buyers.
Does Renovation Make Sense versus Selling Your Home?
When you are at a crossroads of deciding whether to sell your home or invest in renovations, these concerns can be boiled down to three questions that you need to ask yourself:
Are your desired renovations in line with what others in the neighborhood have done? Will they keep your home competitive without overpricing your home?
Are the renovations you want and need to make ones that would help or hurt your chances of selling a home, regardless of the market?
Homeowners need to ask themselves these questions, getting the answer right is especially important for seniors. For help in evaluating your housing choices, contact Roy Thomas, who can give you the facts and help you sell your home. If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
An often cited perk of home ownership is that you have a source of cash when you need to sell it. As you age, you may realize that your home no longer provides a convenient, affordable place to live. When you own a home, you have options that you can rely on to obtain the housing you need.
Senior Living Can Be Costly
For some seniors, modifying their home to make it safe and accessible is an option, made possible by taking out a loan from the equity in the hands. In many cases, however, renovations are not feasible or not cost-effective. In that case, your best option is moving and having a house to sell can provide you with the funds you need for your new housing. According to the senior living specialists A Place For Mom, housing options can be costly, especially if you need care in addition to living space.
In Canada, the national average for renting a one-bedroom apartment or studio in a facility that includes one meal per day is $1,995, in a price range of $1,400-$3,500 per month. For supportive living, retirement homes and senior lodges, the costs paid in $1,500- $5,000 per month, while residing in a center that provides care for dementia or Alzheimer’s averages $3,477, with the range of $3,000-$7,000.
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Paying For Senior Living
All of these options are private pay, which means that even after Old Age Pension, Canada Pension, other pension income, and savings, you may be in need of a source of funds to meet your housing needs.
In addition to current income, many people find themselves needing to take other measures such as selling off life insurance policies or relying on support from their families to cover the costs of senior living. Unless you have a long-term care insurance plan in place, selling off real estate may be the best place to start to provide funds for the next stage of life. There are several advantages to taking this approach:
– The expenses of homeownership, such as taxes and home-repair, improvement, and upkeep costs immediately end.
– You do not have to immediately exhaust other resources such as savings accounts or life insurance policies.
– Even if you have a mortgage on your home, you will reduce debt and pull out the cash equity from your home.
– The new home you select can have all the services you need in place, rather than you or your family having to piece together home care, meal delivery, and a visitation schedule to provide for you.
If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Whether you’re a baby boomer approaching retirement or a senior citizen facing health issues, you will eventually question whether your current home will continue to work for you as you age. Are you able to get in and out easily? Can you manage the steps up to the bedroom or down to the laundry easily? If you need to use a wheelchair, can you maneuver into rooms with your mobility device? When the answer to one or more of these questions is “no,” you might consider whether to modify your home to age in place, or whether to move.
The High Cost Of Transforming Your Home
The ideal location for many people who have mobility or other health issues is a home with a first-floor master bedroom, a bathroom, and laundry. If your current home does not have these amenities, you may consider adding them if you love your home and don’t want to move. Unfortunately, adding on what makes a home easy to manage for seniors requires a large outlay of money.
Take, for example, what is required to create a bedroom, bathroom, and laundry facility on the first floor. If you have space on your main floor that you can convert to a bedroom and a bathroom, your cost may be minor, but when you’re talking about adding an addition, your project can cost thousands. You may be talking a minimum of $25,000 for a bedroom addition. Converting existing space to make way for a new bathroom might cost a minimum of $3.000, but if you’re adding an addition to your home which includes a bathroom, the cost is much more.
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Moving the laundry to the first floor can make your life easier, but ensure you have enough floor space for your washer and dryer. The cost to do the plumbing might be a minimum of $2,000, but the figure can rise if you are moving the laundry up to the second floor. If you have room to put laundry appliances on the wall adjacent to a bathroom where there is already plumbing, your costs might be less than if you had to run water lines up a flight or two.
Other Issues To Consider
Remodelling projects are expensive, but the high costs are just one thing that you have to think about. You also need to ask:
– Is there enough room on your lot to expand your structure?
– Will the city approve your plans for expansion?
– Will expanding and renovating make your home too costly for the neighborhood?
When you count these costs, you may realize that looking for another home is a smart idea. Your Realtor® can help you find a place that has the main accessibility features you need already included for the price you can pay, without the hassle of major construction, zoning board hearings, permits, and lots of cash. Before you decide to remodel, carefully count the cost.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
As you get older, you may realize that surrounding yourself with a lifetime of memories has a cost to you. Your home may be so cluttered that downsizing to a smaller house, senior apartment, or assisted living facility is an overwhelming project. Even if you want to stay in your current home, you may need to clear space so you can move through your home in a wheelchair, or you may need to accommodate a live-in caregiver. When your home is overloaded with too much furniture and clothing or too many knickknacks and treasures from the past, you may find yourself feeling stuck.
The Challenges of Decluttering
When you try to approach the clutter yourself, you can find plenty of resources that suggest how to plan a decluttering project. Start with a room at a time, the articles say, or do little work each day until you have a manageable amount of possessions. Call in a relative to help make the job easier. For seniors, these suggestions might not be workable, especially if you are not in good health, if you have no relatives able to help, or if you need to make a quick move.
For most people, one of the hardest things in parting with possessions that DIY approaches do not address is that “things” acquire emotional value beyond their monetary worth. While looking over boxes of old memorabilia that chronicles your life or the early life of your children can bring closure, the decluttering process can be time-consuming and not extensive enough.
Hiring The Pros Can Get the Job Done
One of the most effective ways to whittle your possessions down to size is to obtain help of professionals who specialize in decluttering. As an objective third-party, the professionals do not have the same attachment to your possessions as you do, so they can move through your house quickly and help you decide what to keep, what to throw out, and what to donate. A good decluttering firm is respectful of your memories while getting the job done. Whether you are trying to make more room in your current location or you need to move to a smaller space, the pros have the experience to know exactly what will fit. They can do the job quickly and at a reasonable price.
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Who to Call
While you could run a classified ad in Kijiji one of the safest ways to obtain the help is to hire a professional organizer. There are several local firms that specialize in decluttering in Halifax. When you hire a firm, they will take care of arranging to have your unneeded possessions hauled away.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here