About the Lab

Citizen-Led Housing

Enabling Citizen-Led Housing: New Models for Seniors’ Housing Design and Development was an initiative funded by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) through the National Housing Strategy’s Solutions Lab program. The Lab was led by SHS Consulting, in partnership with Toronto Council on Aging, Collaborative Aging, and SvN Architects + Planners.

The Lab brought seniors, housing developers, subject matter experts, and other stakeholders together to co-create more collaborative planning and development processes to enable seniors to influence their housing in meaningful ways.

With the help of Lab participants, our design challenge was framed as:

How might we create housing opportunities where seniors and people of all ages can thrive, by rethinking the business of development as a vehicle for community stewardship and belonging?

Why focus on seniors?

Certain groups in the population are more likely to experience challenges finding affordable, suitable, and adequate housing to live with comfort, stability, and safety. Among these populations are seniors in Canada, as identified by the National Housing Strategy’s priority population groups.

Traditional housing options such as large-scale residential settings do not reflect all seniors’ desires or preferences to age in place in a multi-generational environment. The experience of the COVID-19 pandemic amplified the need to expand age-friendly, inclusive, and socially vibrant housing options.

According to Economic and Social Development Canada research, “the 2016 census identified almost a quarter of seniors lived below housing standards (24.9%; meaning below at least one of the adequacy, affordability, and suitability standards) regardless of their housing arrangement. Affordability issues were most common (19.4%), followed by adequacy issues (4.6%) and then suitability issues (2.6%). Core housing need (42.8%) and in particular affordability (39.7%) issues were common in households of seniors living alone.”

What are the intended outcomes of the Lab?

In addition to the design challenge, we identified five key desired outcomes from our conversations with our seniors’ design team and developers in the industry. 

  • Create a more balanced supply of housing: a range of affordable housing options that are affordable to older adults at different income levels

  • Support housing developers to create housing that can evolve with shifts in housing desires as people age

  • Enable the creation of more future-oriented housing options that support complete communities

  • Create housing models that value the contributions of seniors, where they may play different roles and find meaningful involvement in the development process and operation model

  • Support long-term “social sustainability” through housing options and communities that promote inclusion and belonging for older adults

FAQs

 

  • Who funded the Lab?

    This Lab, entitled “Enabling Citizen-Led Housing: New Models for Seniors’ Housing Design and Development,” received funding from the National Housing Strategy (NHS) under the NHS Solutions Labs program, however, the views expressed are the personal views of the author and CMHC accepts no responsibility for them.

  • How are the outcomes of the Lab being used?

    Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) and the Lab Team have made the report available online and continue to share the results with organizations seeking to develop housing with greater involvement of seniors and other populations across Canada.

  • How are the outcomes of the Lab being disseminated?

    The Lab outcomes are currently being disseminated by the Lab Team. For more information on the solutions, click here.

  • What was the timeline for the Lab?

    The Lab ran between approximately mid-2020 and early-2022.