A checklist for staying in your home as you age

Baby boomers are united in their intent to stay put in their homes.

A 2018 AARP survey reports that about three in four participants (all at least 50) want to stay in their current home as long as possible, and 46% expect to never budge.

But desire is not the same thing as a plan. Anyone who wants to age in place should start planning now

Will your retirement income easily cover your home’s insurance, property tax and maintenance? A clear-eyed assessment today can save you (and your family) anxiety and headaches down the line. You want to avoid realizing five or 10 years into retirement that you can’t keep up with the costs of staying in your home. Your 50- and 60-something self will be more resilient emotionally and physically to take on a move — if financially warranted.

On the financial side, keep in mind that starting with your 2018 federal tax return, the maximum deduction for state and local tax is capped at $10,000 per household. That includes your property tax. If you typically have deducted more than that, your housing costs essentially are rising due to the tax law. It’s one thing to be able to handle that when you are still working, but are taxes going to eat up too much of your retirement income?

Are you car-dependent? Will the house you love today be a great house when you are in your 80s and 90s and don’t want to drive, or can’t?

It’s not just about your mobility; what about your friends? This is why so many baby boomers are moving into cities; they can rely on public transportation — and Uber and Lyft — and socialize without any great effort.

Is your home age-inplace friendly? The odds suggest the answer is no. Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies estimated that by 2035 there will be 17 million older households where the current layout of their home will become a problem. Stairs that can no longer be easily navigated. Narrow doorways and bathrooms that can’t easily accommodate a walker or wheelchair. The JCHS says less than 4% of U.S. housing is age-in-place ready, with such features as zero-step entrances into the home, single-floor living, and wide doorways and hallways.

That’s not necessarily a reason to move. There are renovations you can do now to make your home age-in-place friendlier. The time to do it is before you need it. Consider this scenario: You are 75 and have an illness or injury that makes it impossible to navigate the stairs — at least temporarily — but there is no bed or bath on the first floor. So you end up in rehab, rather than able to quickly return home, with care that comes to you.

Age-in-place projects can range from small but vital — grab bars in the bathrooms — to larger projects, such as reconfiguring a bathroom to accommodate a walker and installing a shower that has room for a bench or stool. If you’re planning to renovate the kitchen, double down on great lighting; your age-80 eyes will thank you. And consider some lower counter space where it’s easy to pull up a chair. The grandkids will love that today, and at some point you may enjoy being able to sit to do kitchen prep.

A: Well, the fact that you didn’t get your security deposit returned to you and are now reduced to chasing the old or new owners in court doesn’t seem right to us.

The law firm that represented all of the owners has a duty to represent those owners fairly and diligently. You were not an owner, but a tenant in a unit sold by one of those owners. The law firm likely does not have any duty to you in their representation of the owner who sold the unit.

Your lease governs your relationship with the old owner and the new owner. We presume that your lease states that you put down an amount as security deposit under the lease. We also assume that the buyer would want proof that the security deposit was returned to you at or prior to the closing. Now, you say that you never got your security deposit back. Between you and your new landlord, your lease would still provide for the deposit of a security deposit.

Unlike some commercial leases, we think that the new landlord probably has assumed the duties of the old landlord and has the continued obligation to return the security deposit to you. Have you contacted the new landlord to tell them that you never received the security deposit?

You mentioned that your state law requires interest to be paid on your security deposit. Some municipalities have ordinances that are protective of tenants and require landlords to return the security deposit within a certain number of days following the end of the lease. Those same ordi