A study from AARP found that 90 percent of people ages 65 and over would rather stay in their homes as they age, instead of going to a nursing home or care facility.
Understanding the increased interest in American seniors wishing to age in place can be hard to analyze because of the variables and influence of peoples’ demographics, socioeconomic status, and cultural background.
What is Multigenerational Living?
The U.S. Census Bureau defines a multigenerational household to be family households comprising three or more generations living under one roof. A multigenerational housing structure can come in all shapes and sizes and is very common in minority and immigrant families across the U.S.
For many aging seniors, living a multigenerational lifestyle is deeply rooted within their culture and entwined with their beliefs, attitudes, and customs, which are then passed down from one generation to the next. It allows families to come together to create a supportive community among its generations to face life’s struggles and celebrations together.
There are also many benefits of multigenerational living, along with key disadvantages.
Being aware of these benefits and potential problems can help you to choose wisely – and to make sure that your home environment is always a good one.
Reasons People Choose To Live In A Multigenerational Household
Finances
There are many reasons a family might choose to start living in a multigenerational home and one of those reasons always concerns money.
Multigenerational living allows the family structure to pool their expenses and allocate resources to meet the family’s needs. The family’s combined income makes it easier to afford things like elder care, childcare, and to meet high costs of living, just to name a few.
The Benefits of Elders Aging In Place
The CDC defines aging in place as “the ability to live in one’s own home and community safely, independently, and comfortably, regardless of age, income, or ability level”.
Multigeneration family structures can help in this area, as they provide all the support elders need to age in place. Across many subcultures, it has shown this unique combination promotes a sense of familial wellbeing and improved quality of life.
Aging in place within a multigenerational lifestyle allows seniors to have the choice of where and when they want to engage with their family. Multigenerational living arrangements are designed to provide both communal public spaces and private spaces. Doing this allows family members to keep their independence and autonomy, while also coming together to reconnect between their generations.
If a senior needs care that you cannot provide yourself, calling a licensed healthcare professional who specializes in home health care can be a peaceful transition. It also provides a favorable balance of care, convenience, and comfort that the entire family can benefit from.
Pros of Multigenerational Living
Family Relationships
There are many advantages of living in a multigenerational household. Many studies have shown that multigenerational living promotes elder longevity and a better quality of life.
This is in part because the seniors serve as role models for younger adults in the family. Grandchildren living a multigenerational lifestyle learn, grow, and connect with their elder generations—who in turn can pass down family traditions and beliefs.
In these ways, multigenerational living offers stability, strengthens family values, and preserves cultural traditions.
Positive Impacts On Health
Studies conducted on the benefits of multicultural living have shown to improve seniors’ mental health by decreasing loneliness throughout the day. Aging seniors sharing a home with their family feel a sense of connection through daily familial activities.
A sense of connectedness can reinforce a senior’s self-esteem and can help to maintain connections throughout the community.
However, it’s important to remember that just living with family isn’t enough to prevent loneliness entirely. Some seniors still end up feeling lonely because they are at home on their own for most of the day, while other family members have activities, including work, school, and social engagements.
Living a multigenerational lifestyle also has physical benefits to a senior’s health. It’s not uncommon for seniors aging alone at home to experience a fall accident.
Aging seniors benefit from the visibility a large family size brings. This allows them to be more independent and safer because they’re never alone for extended periods of time.
Cons of Multigenerational Living
Despite the many positive benefits of multigenerational households, it’s important to remember that this lifestyle may not work for every family.
It’s not uncommon for adult children and their aging parents to experience familial friction in their relationships. Before moving ahead with any plans, be sure to balance the pros and cons of moving a family member in with you.
Added Responsibility
Another thing to consider before living a multigenerational lifestyle is to consider the responsibilities and needs of everyone living together.
Decisions and plans need to be made for who provides for an elder’s care. Considerations also need to include parent caregivers raising younger children in the home.
It’s important that everyone’s individual role and responsibility in the family is balanced to prevent overwhelm.
Many women who are middle-aged adult children tend to take multiple roles within the multigenerational living structure. These women caregivers, often called the sandwich generation, are caring for aging parents as well as their young children and have the additional burden of maintaining the family structure.
Overwhelmed caregivers often brush off their own time for self-care and respite to help other family member’s needs. This well-meaning action can quickly spiral into caregiver burnout and can lead to many negative outcomes.
Safety Concerns
Medication safety and an elder’s overall health can be a concern. Living in a multigenerational lifestyle means that somebody is around day or night.
The drawback is that harmful medications, medical equipment, or adaptive devices are more easily accessible to smaller children, pets, and other family members. Without proper management, the whole family is at risk of physical harm, not to mention the risk of breaking expensive medical equipment.
Bigger Family Size Comes With Risks
When deciding whether to create a multigenerational lifestyle, it’s important to keep in mind that bigger is often better.
However, bigger families come with bigger risks. Being unprepared for a multigenerational lifestyle can cause chaos and quickly ruin the success of intergenerational happiness.
Having a bigger family also means there’s an increased risk of spreading illnesses between one another. With multiple people living under one roof, there is only so much you can do to contain and care for a sick family member.
Using proper handwashing techniques and other guidelines can help everyone in the family minimize the spread of illness to aging family members and others at risk of infection.
Preparing A Multigenerational Lifestyle
Planning a multigenerational lifestyle can be easy if you prepare and think ahead. Some questions to ask are: Who is contributing to the purchase price of where you will live? How do you keep ownership balanced for the whole family? What happens in a family crisis?
Having a plan allows you to ask yourself and your family important questions before anything is set in stone.
Set Clear Expectations, Boundaries, And Create An Organized Family Structure
When planning your multigenerational lifestyle, be sure to set actionable goals and ground rules that your whole family agrees on.
Being consistent and communicating with family members can help everyone set clear expectations and boundaries for their household and promote an overall healthy living arrangement.
To ensure a multigenerational household is emotionally maintained, make time for each individual to pursue their own hobbies and interests outside the home. The social needs of your family are just as important as the needs within the home. Try to keep everybody’s needs and wants in mind, but also, let people live their own lives.
Organize Tangible Resources
Deciding who shares in household costs and financial responsibilities is also an important consideration to make. Without having a plan in place for your family’s tangible resources, you’ll miss out on the benefits that multigenerational living can offer.
Creating a household budget to track payments and expenses gives you the ability to pool your finances together. It’s also beneficial to allocate money in a way that meets the whole family’s needs. Combining your family’s income makes it easier to afford things like elder and child care, and a higher cost of living, just to name a few.
Making a plan for unexpected expenses and emergency situations can be a huge lifesaver for your whole family. Be sure to include your whole family and provide updated information as circumstances change. Any emergency plan should contain important information about medical care, health proxies, guardianship, and caregiving needs.
Housing Options
Very often, families seeking a multigenerational lifestyle have a larger financial advantage since they are using their combined income for the purchase of one property. Typically, you have more buying power and access to less competitive housing markets that might have otherwise been outside your comfort zone.
Many families also agree that having a home that suits their needs is more desirable than paying for a nursing home or senior living facility. In terms of the specific cost, It would be smart for families to weigh the home improvement and renovation costs of a multigenerational lifestyle and consider looking for a house that is a better fit for a larger family.
Transportation is an important factor to keep in mind when evaluating a senior’s affordable housing and location options. Together, seniors and their family caregivers need to decide if it’s best to cut community ties or prepare for the trials and tribulations of re-establishing a new one.
Aging seniors might not acclimate to a new community they’re unfamiliar with, leading to increased feelings of loneliness and isolation. Helping seniors maintain their independence and overall wellbeing is critical to living a multigenerational lifestyle or any other housing option you choose.
Deciding whether multigenerational living is right for you and your family can be a tough choice to make. Bringing the whole family together to talk it over is the best place to start. But, no matter what you decide, it’s clear that multigenerational living is increasing in popularity.
Having all the information available to you helps you weigh the risks and benefits included in this type of family structure so you can decide if multigenerational living is right for you.
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