My Grand Tour to Great Britain: looking for a third way for senior living

As it is known, Italy was the key destination of Grand Tours taken during the 17th and 19th century by nobility and aristocrats from Great Britain to discover its’ culture, art and architecture.

My one was to Sweden, in search of valuable later living and care projects. Back in the 2010’s, I joined an organised business trip for professionals in the later living sector in search of innovations in the provision of older people’s housing and care homes to help inform my understanding and thinking on how these could be applied in Spain, in particular, to translate it into a brand new and unique project in Madrid (Monteparís Mayores (opens new window)).

I was fortunate to take advantage of this incredible immersion. The goal was to broaden my knowledge about the diversity of housing for older people and care homes in Sweden. As a welfare state, a wide variety of scheme were provided and visited: care homes, nursing homes, mental health homes, cohousing and intergenerational houses.

One of the key learning points which was a positive impact on our project, was the implementation of small units (8-12 people) for residents with dementia. This has been proved a successful improvement for the person-centered care approach in an iconic and modern care home I managed. But still a care home.

However, as the number of older people are becoming increasingly higher, particularly in Spain (as well as in the UK where the rise of people aged 75 will be of 38% by 2040 see UK seniors housing report 2024 by JLL), concern is: is there sufficient supply and choice of housing schemes in the, so called, later living market? Is there scope for a wider variety of scheme types?

The second leg of my Grand Tour, started about a year ago when I met Teresa Atkinson (Senior Research Fellow at Association for Dementia Studies University of Worcester and co-lead of the DemECH project hosted by the Housing LIN) in a conference in Madrid. As she spoke about Extra Care Housing schemes in the UK, she kindly invited me to visit ExtraCare Charitable Trust’s Longbridge Retirement Village in Birmingham – a very well designed set of 260 apartments with outstanding facilities and a wide variety of activities (see Housing LIN case study).

This Village provide housing with care across a range of tenures with access to personal care to enable independent living. As good examples of the latter are, among other independent living schemes for older people: the award-winning Almshouse Appleby Blue in London (see Housing LIN Inspirational Achievement), the stunning Riverstone Apartments in London and the cosy Pegasus Homes’ Grange Apartments in Oxford. Within the first group, a special mention for Loveday Care in Kensington where they are committed to give nursing support and unparalleled hospitality. 

Some of the key learning points from these visits include:

• Very well equipped and decorated care homes visited;
• Scarcity of qualified personnel is a common challenge in both countries;
• A much wider offer of Retirement Housing in the UK compared to Spain; 
• In the few cases where it does exist in Spain, rental is preferred to purchase.
• Average cost/fees in the care homes in the UK (60.320 pounds for care 73.320 for a nursing home, see Care Home UK (opens new window) is more than 2 times compared to Spain (24.000€ see Inforesidencias 2023 (opens new window))

Lastly, compared to Spain, where the number of old people living only in care homes is approximately 395.000, in the UK approximately 750.000 people live in a senior housing scheme (Retirement Housing + Integrated Retirement Communities). On my way back to Spain, my Grand Tour continues. I now want to explore how I can put the lessons I learned from my visits to Sweden and England into practice. I believe that there are significant opportunities to develop different types of housing for older people in a Spanish context.

In conclusion, the challenge is how to adapt the offer with the needs of older people. Are we in Spain ten years behind the UK market which is likewise ten years behind the market in Australia/New Zealand? Irrespective of these nations’ respective market positions, in the coming years, we will certainly face new challenges and housing opportunities for our ageing population, mainly as retirement housing, apartments, integrated retirement communities, cohousing and intergenerational homes. Are the companies, funds and Governments ready for these challenges? And more importantly,  are the older people ready to take the step?