09/03/2026
Senior Housing and Health Options
My dad showed me the $2500 per month rental price of the condo he wanted to move to. He had been researching for months and found this one outside his neighbourhood because he couldn’t find anything affordable in his. I checked with the Affordable Housing Club and this is what I found.
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My name is Martin. I’m 41. I work for a housing charity that finds housing for the low income. I am aware of the real estate and housing market in the GTA
My father is 71, retired teacher and lost his wife and my mother two years ago. He has a big house in Mississauga with only him living there. He finds the carrying costs, trying to keep up with medical appointments and looking after the property difficult on his own.
Recently, his financial advisor said to sell the house and move to a rental condo or maybe a retirement villa.
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$2500 a month. The real estate market has been going down since 2022 so he might not get as much as he hoped to cover future costs if he needs in-home care or an expensive assisted living facility.
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He didn’t tell me until after he put a deposit on the unit and called a real estate agent to market his house. He knew I'd ask questions. He was right.
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I went to his house for dinner, and he showed me the brochures of the condo and the amenities. He was excited and said the real estate agent could get him the best price for his property.
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And I sat there watching him and thinking there is no way that he will afford assisted living from the sale of his house. He has no guarantee that the landlord would not renew the rent if the market picked up and he wanted to move in his family. The agent and financial advisor had no information on options or projections of future costs.
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So I asked him if I could get some other options with cost estimates before the condo deposit period expired and he signed the listing agreement. He said I could but didn’t look very hopeful.
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I had seen some postings and heard about the Affordable Housing Club from my colleagues. It is a forum for people looking for affordable housing and people providing affordable housing solutions (patreon.com/affordablehousingclub). I went to the Patreon channel and found references to several YouTube videos about a variety of options. One video dealt with a single senior living in a large home deciding what to do. I hadn’t heard of ADUs (backyard homes) and co-ops. One possible solution was to build a backyard home and rent it at market rates through a social agency that guarantees the rent and manages the tenant. The whole thing is cash flow positive and provides someone close by in the event of an emergency and maybe become a friend. It also allows him to stay in his house while the market recovers. He could also switch the house with the ADU by moving to the ADU and renting the house to a family at market rent and hiring a property manager. This made lot of sense to me. He could be up tens of thousands of dollars over time. I wasn’t thinking of my inheritance, really.
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I want to be precise about what this means and doesn’t mean.
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It does not mean that the housing market is cheating anyone. Housing has become unaffordable because land and building costs have outpaced wages, mainly due to a shortage of housing units. Government workers, architects, engineers, accountants, bankers, lawyers, trades, installers, contractors, real estate agents, mortgage brokers and the list goes on - all have their hands out for decent pay, good working conditions and profit. While there may be an attempt to build cheaper, it is not happening partly due to increasing building code requirements and a true attempt at cost reduction. The historic cycle of house price increase and decrease keeps repeating with both winners and losers. Anyone can be a victim or a victor in a system beyond their control. Not thinking outside the box in the real estate industry also prevents innovative ways to utilize housing as a basic need rather than an investment. What is a scandal is that no one told my dad there is another way.
I dug into some of the videos on Patreon and did my own AI research. A few companies offer turn-key solutions to backyard units. They look after everything including initial assessments, cash flow projections, design, permits, tenant search/lease, grants, financing, serving, utilities, landscaping and construction. They are factory built and installed in a few days, not months. For him, I found a two-bedroom unit for $260,000 that would produce a positive cash flow of $12,000 a year. Also, the consultant discussed forming a co-op that would buy the house with my dad as a member with a take-back mortgage so he could stay on the property and find where to go next on his own time frame.
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I drove back to my dad’s house on Sunday
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I gave him a summary of my research and showed him he could be much better off keeping the property and building equity so that he could cover any future financial challenge. He was able to take control.
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I am writing this because my dad asked me to. He said: “You told me this just in time. I cancelled the condo rental and real estate agreement. Now I want every senior to know this.”
So here is what every senior – and their kids, needs to know. Selling your large house and moving to a condo is a poor decision without any plan for ongoing housing and health concerns. You may net a million dollars that would be invested and give you $54,000 a year after tax and then pay $30,000 for rent plus living expenses. When you look at assisted living of $5,000 to $10,000 a month or $60,000 to $120,000 a year, you will have to burn through your capital that may only last 4 or 5 years. Instead, staying on your property with appreciating assets, rental income and socialization in your neighbourhood can keep you there longer and finance the next step much more easily.
