NEW YORK CITY — Solo agers are contributing to the heightened demand for seniors housing, says a new Berkadia white paper composed by Ezekiel Duprey, a lead research analyst at the company.
According to data cited in the report, which is titled “The Proxy Care Economy: Owning the Mandatory Gateway for America’s Solo Agers,” approximately 16.5 percent of Americans age 55 and older had no biological children as of 2018. Furthermore, the marriage rate in the U.S. is at its lowest level since federal records began in 1867.
These dynamics are driving demand for senior living communities, says the white paper. “Historically, informal family labor absorbed an estimated 80 percent of all care provided to older adults,” the report states. “When that labor pool does not exist, the [seniors housing] facility is not a preference, it is the only available infrastructure.”
The reality and needs of solo agers should inform the strategies of senior living owners and operators, the paper argues. For example, San Francisco, Manhattan, Seattle and Washington, D.C. are identified as “epicenters of solo ager density” and therefore ideal targets for investment.
Boston and coastal Florida are also named as ideal markets, due to “peak solo ager wealth concentration, near-zero inventory growth, proven assisted living and memory care pricing power and the highest density of residents who lack any alternative care infrastructure.”