Can the Golden Girls’ fantasy really work?
Homesharing may be the secret to affordable rent and steadfast companionship
A lot of newly launched adult children have to live with roommates to make ends meet. Now, a growing number of older single women are doing the same in order to save on housing costs and have companionship later in life.
High rental rates, along with high rates of loneliness, are driving them to it. Consider that almost half of women over 65 live alone and two million women in Canada, many of them seniors, live in poverty.
Blanche, Rose, Dorothy and Sophia — from the popular 1980s show “The Golden Girls” — lived in Blanche’s home after her husband died and she posted a notice for roommates at the local supermarket.
They made it look easy and fun, living in a post-midlife sorority sister situation, sans partners or kids, where they traded wisecracks, sex tips and household chores.
Aging boomer women, single, active and with greater longevity than ever before, are enticed by the idea of a non-traditional living arrangement that involves pooling their resources and buying a home together.
On paper it sounds great: Share the cooking and cleaning; have someone to watch Netflix, share a meal or play games with; go to bed feeling safe because you aren’t alone; being able to age in place; having a built-in dog or cat sitter when you are out of town.
But there are a lot of “what ifs” to consider. What if one of you dies — who gets that share of the house? What if you don’t agree on a new co-owner? What if there’s a major home repair one of you can’t afford? What if you don’t get along?
Homesharing, in which a householder rents out space in her home, or a group of women rent space together, is a less risky option. It’s certainly catching on, with new national homeshare platforms such as Happipad and Sparrow capitalizing on the fact that there are more than 10 million empty bedrooms in this country. For a fee, they match home providers and home seekers and conduct background checks.
“Sparrow offers older women a unique opportunity to combat loneliness, secure additional income and provide affordable living options for renters, embodying the spirit of Golden Girls in today’s housing landscape,” says Sparrow CEO and founder Oren Singer.
When Marion (who asked that her real name not be used for fear of reprisal from her landlord) was faced with a rent increase of $400 last year, which bumped it to $2,200 for the ground floor of a house with three bedrooms, she hired Tara McEwen of HomeShare Alliance, a Hamilton/Halton home-sharing service, to help her find a suitable roommate. It worked out perfectly. “She’s become like the daughter I never had,” says Marion, a 67-yearold retail worker in Hamilton whose 30-year-old roommate is a teacher originally from South Korea.
The two share some meals together and also play chess occasionally. Marion charges her roommate $900 a month. The extra income has been a godsend.
“I’m three years away from 70 and I’m stressed — what am I going to do? Work for the rest of my life?”
The amount of her rent increase was unlawful, but the landlord told her the house might have to be sold if there wasn’t more money forthcoming.
“I could have fought it, but then where would I go?” asks Marion.
Renters who share common spaces are not covered under the Landlord and Tenant Board, which may offer peace of mind to homeowners who are concerned they may have difficulty getting a tenant out of their house, but it puts the renter in a vulnerable situation since they might have just 30 days to vacate if there’s a falling out.
That’s why it’s so important to determine lifestyle compatibility upfront, says Pat Dunn, 74, who runs the Ontario non-profit, Senior Women Living Together (SWLT), which has matched almost 60 women over age 55 who have found homes to rent together. “You need to take a few months to work things out together before moving in to ensure the fit is right.”
Dunn founded SWLT after she struggled financially when her husband died 10 years ago at the age of 66, and she couldn’t afford a place to live. There was a three-year waitlist for geared-to-income housing, co-housing units and tiny house communities required capital she didn’t have and the boarding houses she checked out were shabby, dangerous and offered no protection for illegal eviction. She considered living in her car.
Today, she’s in a three-bedroom Peterborough home with a large backyard with two other women where her share of the rent is $800 a month. Landlords are eager to rent to women like her who live together because “we make great tenants compared to some of the horror stories landlords have had to deal with,” she says.
Being single is a prerequisite to join SWLT. Having romantic partners sleep over could make things awkward for all involved. What happens if somebody gets a boyfriend?
“At our age that becomes less likely which each passing year,” says Dunn.
Mention “The Golden Girls” and she bristles.
“That show was a comedy, but there is nothing funny about what we are going through — being so poor that you can’t afford to live anywhere,” she said, notingthere are 350,000 women living alone in Ontario and 30 per cent living in poverty.
“These women (who are homesharing] are happier and healthier and no longer living in fear of homelessness,” says Dunn.
“We’re providing an innovative and effective service that solves the lack of affordable housing and the loneliness that single senior women are experiencing.”