What Did Residents Think?
1. Current Housing Situation
Many participants are satisfied with their current home and neighbourhood. They value their social networks, know the area well, and have no immediate plans to move.
2. Unfamiliarity with Alternatives
Before truly experiencing collaborative housing, many older people were hesitant about housing models they did not know well, mainly due to concerns about privacy and uncertainty about how such arrangements work in practice.
3. Experience Changes Perception
During the design sessions and visits to existing projects, participants became much more positive about what collaborative housing could offer. Key elements they appreciated included:
-
a private living space combined with shared facilities
-
opportunities for social interaction and mutual support
-
flexibility in how and when to participate in collective activities
Experiencing and co-designing housing concepts made the idea more tangible and appealing.
What Does This Mean for Policy and Practice?
This study shows that traditional questionnaires are often too abstract to fully understand what people want when it comes to new housing models. A participatory, design-led approach:
-
helps residents make unfamiliar options more concrete,
-
makes wishes and concerns more visible,
-
increases the likelihood that people become open to alternatives such as collaborative housing.
For policymakers, housing associations, and initiators, this suggests that experience-based participation can play a valuable role in developing new housing models. Actively involving older people in designing their future living environment leads to ideas that better align with their everyday realities and preferences.
Read the research
Key learnings
- Experiencing works better than choosing:
Older adults understand and appreciate alternatives more when they can see, experience, and co-design them.
- The social and physical environment both matter:
Location, shared spaces, and flexibility are at least as important as financial conditions.
- Participation is more than consultation:
It is a way to ensure that new housing models genuinely resonate with future residents.
Reference
-
Czischke, D. (2026). Living together in old age: Identifying preferences for collaborative housing through participatory design-led research. Berliner Journal für Soziologie (vol. 35, pp. 631–649). Open online.