That’s the idea behind a new co-housing scheme set to open in London next month – the first in the UK specifically designed for – and by – older people.
The purpose-built block of flats in High Barnet is the brainchild of Shirley Meredeen, who co-founded the Growing Old Disgracefully network with Madeleine Levius.
In 1998, aged in her late 60’s and just retired, Shirley went along to a co-housing workshop organised by academic Maria Brenton. She had been researching options for women ‘helping each other out’ in older age and came across the co-housing model, based on people living close to, but not with each other, in Holland.
Inspired by what they heard, Shirley and Madeleine formed Older Women’s Co-Housing (OWCH).
18 years later, the project is now a reality, with 26 women aged 50 to 86 moving into the community in November.
Not an ‘old people’s home’
The block has 17 flats for sale on 250-year leases and eight for social rent to OWCH members with the largest three-bedroom flats costing about £400,000.
Members also share a common room, guest accommodation, garden and laundry.
“It’s not an old people’s home,” site manager Denis O’Donovan told the UK Telegraph. “It’s independent living for elderly people.”
It’s also designed to reduce the social isolation and loneliness some people can feel living on their own.
More than half of people aged over 75 in the UK live alone with 40 per cent saying the television is their main company.
Some of the OWCH women are widowed or divorced while others are single.
“It’s a way of retaining your independence and your dignity and being among people who can be supportive of you at the same time,” Ms Meredeen, now 86, says.
A different way of living
Originally from Denmark, co-housing is not a new concept – in the Netherlands, there are now around 230 senior co-housing communities according to the UK Cohousing Network.
The £7 million High Barnet scheme is unique though in that it’s strictly women-only.
While men can stay over, they can only be guests for six weeks before they have to pack their bags.
Why? Because the founders say women are often the ones ‘left behind’. “Women live longer than men, and many have fewer resources because they’ve been cut out of the workforce bringing up children,” Ms Brenton, now aged 70 and the group’s adviser, says.
It hasn’t been an easy road though. The original plan was to have the project up and running in five years. Instead trouble with funding and getting approval from housing associations and councils led to years of delays.
But with recent research showing more and more single women can’t afford to live alone[1], it’s an idea that may just find more fans.
To find out more about the community, head to their website here.
[1] Media release: ‘Single working women being locked out of renting in Melbourne’ – Council to Homeless Persons, October 2 1016
