What older people want? A rapid evidence assessment on what older people want, and can afford, when it comes to their housing choices when looking to move

Project Director: Ian Wilson
Project Duration: 2024

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), on behalf of the Older People’s Housing Taskforce (OPHTF), commissioned Sheffield Hallam University and the University of Sheffield to complete a rapid piece of desk-based research into older people’s housing preferences and choices. The explicit aim was to explore what older people want, and what they can afford, when it comes to their housing choices when looking to move.

The research involved three work strands:

• A review of existing research on older people’s housing preferences when moving.
• Desk analysis of existing data in order to segment older people by e.g. income, wealth, age, health/frailty.
• An assessment of the affordability of specialist older people’s housing options based on a comparison of the emerging evidence against information held by the Taskforce on the current types of older people’s housing and their typical cost/payment models.

The project team included Michael Marshall, David Robinson and Rhiannon Williams (University of Sheffield and UK Collaborative Centre for Housing Evidence (CaCHE)).