The students living with retirees

What happens when students share homes with the elderly? Frankie Adkins investigates a new experiment in multi-generational living.

When 23-year-old Poppy Jenkinson got home in the evening, she would sit around the dinner table with her two housemates and discuss her day – sharing work news, friendship dramas, and, on occasion, relationship problems.

Often, her housemates would give her a fresh perspective. "They’re both in their 70s and have been married for almost 40 years. They were always sharing nuggets of wisdom," she says. 

After graduating from Falmouth University last year – a small, creative university in Cornwall in the South West of England – Jenkinson struggled to find a house in Falmouth's competitive rental market. She met Pete and Lee King, 70, through the university, and moved into their three-bedroom cottage on the outskirts of town.

While their arrangement was private, it reflects a broader trend in multi-generational housing: students and senior citizens living together.

In recent years, projects that encourage distant generations to share a home have surfaced all over the world, including on university campuses in Canada, California and the Netherlands.

But not all experiments in multi-generational living end as happily as Jenkinson's. The reality can be more complicated, research shows.

Getty Images

In theory, multi-generational living cleverly solves two pressing modern problems: a shortage of affordable housing for young people and a rise in loneliness among older people.

"The loneliness epidemic is a global trend, especially in countries where there's an aging population," says Patricia Collins, an associate professor in the department of geography and planning at Queen's University, Canada.

Studies indicate that severe loneliness can lead to depression and suicidal ideation, poor cardiovascular or heart health, and even increased risk of premature death. "This was exacerbated recently by [the Covid-19 pandemic] and stay-at-home orders," she adds.

Meanwhile, a slew of research from around the world has highlighted young people's growing struggles to find affordable housing. In the US, the average rent has risen 18% over the last five years, outpacing inflation, and the situation is similar in other countries. Since younger adults are more likely to rent rather than own a home, they are especially vulnerable to such rent rises. Research has also shown the wide-ranging impact of scarce and poor-quality housing on young people's lives, including the impact on their health.

Collins wanted to better understand if multi-generational housing was really easing accommodation shortages and social problems.

She mapped the demand for co-living schemes in Kingston, Ontario, by surveying graduate students' interest to "room" with a senior citizen.

In Canada, adults aged 65 years and older are the fastest-growing age group – and are projected to reach 23% of the population by 2030. Added to this, many Canadians seniors are living alone.

With waterfront views and plenty of green space, Kingston is the second most popular city to retire to in Canada, says Collins. But it is also home to a handful of secondary institutions, with students competing for rentals in an overstretched property market.

"Historically [Kingston] has had very substandard housing conditions for students," says Collins. "Now we’re seeing this coupled with rising rental rates."

At first glance, the students she surveyed seemed to like the idea of different generations sharing homes. Out of 3,800 graduate students polled, more than half the students said that the university should support this kind of housing model.

However, when it came to whether they would personally want to live that way, the results were strikingly different. Only 13% of the students polled were "extremely" or "very" interested in living with seniors. Students' reservations included feeling awkward, not being allowed guests over and a general lack of privacy. 

It appeared that many liked the idea in the abstract, but didn't quite see it as a workable option for themselves.

Getty Images

Collins points out that "as a society we're not that accustomed to interacting with people outside of our generation, unless they're within our immediate family".

One exception is young people who volunteer with seniors – and the data suggests these people may also be more open to living with seniors too. Of the students who were attracted to the idea of co-living, 56% had work experience with seniors, and 60% had volunteer experience with seniors.

However, schemes that make volunteering part of the package can also run into difficulties.

Humanitas Deventer, a co-housing project in the Netherlands, is often used as a prime example for multi-generational harmony. It has seen many students integrate into retirement homes. In place of paying rent, the students spend 30 hours a month interacting with elderly residents, and teaching them skills such as using email or social media.

But adding a social contract to a co-living dynamic can trigger certain problems, says Gemma Burgess, director of the Cambridge Centre for Housing and Planning Research at the University of Cambridge, UK.

Burgess carried out an evaluation of a reciprocal co-living programme in Cambridge called LinkAges, which took its first cohort of post-graduate students in 2017. A student or key worker looking for cheaper rent was matched with an older person in supported housing who needed assistance. The expectation of the students was to give "light touch engagement", such as supporting residents with shopping, helping them around the house or simply providing some company.

The project offered important lessons, Burgess says. One was that supporting another person might look simple in theory, but can require more time and effort than students expect. At busy and stressful times, such as exam periods or when writing up a thesis, it can be hard for students to fit another person's needs into their own schedule.

"It took a lot of intervention to support relationships," Burgess says.

Multi-generational households, she says, can be complex. "It's somewhat idealised to say: 'You're going to play the role of a jolly grandparent, and a younger person is going to play the role of a doting grandchild'. People are much more complicated than that."

Getty Images

One way of learning from past mistakes is to incorporate multi-generational living into a university's design, but add a bit more distance. Seniors and students may not be living in the same household, but the principles of skill-sharing and social interaction remain.

In recent years an estimated 100 US colleges have developed retirement communities on or near their campuses, including facilities such as golf courses, clubhouses and assisted living units. Typically, it's retired college alumni who apply to become neighbours with their present-day counterparts.

For example, at Arizona State University (ASU), a retirement home opened its doors in 2020, a stone's throw from student dorms. Residents can access classes, the library and sporting events. Returning to a stimulating learning environment may bring a range of benefits. Research suggests that older adults who take college courses may increase their cognitive capacity and possibly reduce their risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease or other forms of dementia.

Back in Falmouth, the university is collaborating on a £170m ($204m) housing project known as the Pydar Street development that aims to integrate student spaces into the wider community.

Peter Howells, head of estate development at Falmouth University, says the development, which is still in the planning stages, will be a patchwork of 300 homes and 160 student beds and apartments. "The site will incorporate mixed housing, academic learning, innovation spaces, food and drink outlets and open spaces to meet, learn and chat," he says.

British architectural firm PRP, which specialises in multi-generational living, is co-designing the project. Manisha Patel, the lead architect on Pydar Street, says one way of encouraging interaction is simply assigning apartments with age in mind – with elderly residents on the ground floors and students on the upper levels. "Different generations would be in apartments that are connected, but they're not actually living together," she says. 

A communal area at the heart of the development will foster relationship-building. "Multi-generational housing should encourage cross-thinking – generations at each end of the spectrum have so much knowledge to give," says Patel. 

For Pete King, Jenkinson's host, living in a multi-generational house with students has brought "huge rewards." A chaplain at Falmouth University’s multi-faith center, he and his wife Lee have filled the empty space in their cottage with a string of students over the years. Both sides say they have benefited in both practical and emotional ways.

For Jenkinson, the "family atmosphere" was the best part of the experience. The trio would take turns to cook, although she was always nervous when she was on dinner duty: "The Kings are such good cooks, they would make tarts or risottos, whereas I would mostly do student stuff, like pasta or pizza." 

She paid less rent than the market rate, while other students paid for part of the rent in kind, taking on chores like gardening.

The Kings say they have enjoyed learning about new technologies and student life. "There's an indefinable energy you get from being around young people," says Pete.

--

Join one million Future fans by liking us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter or Instagram.

If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called "The Essential List" – a handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Worklife, Traveland Reel delivered to your inbox every Friday.