When you’re looking for the perfect home to move in during your retirement years, you need to think about what will be perfect for you today and stay that way as you age. Bungalows are among the most popular home style for seniors for a reason – and now you can learn about all the advantages that contribute to that popularity.
What is a Bungalow?
A bungalow is a house that only has one story. While there’s no second or third floor in a bungalow, they may or may not include a basement, depending on how strictly you adhere to the definition. Most of the bungalows that seniors own tend only to have one large main floor. The reason for this is that bungalows present two main advantages to seniors:
- There are No Stairs
- Less Space to Maintain
Freedom from Stairways
You might not mind having stairs in your home at the moment, but you’ll want to consider the possibility that you might rather own a home without stairs later on. Whether or not you find using stairs a challenge today, it’s more likely that you will experience more difficulty ascending or descending a staircase as you age.
If you live with a partner, the chances that stairs will become a problem in your home increase further. Alternatively, you may also want to avoid stairs for the sake of friends or relatives that frequently visit your home. In any of these cases, the opportunity to live in a bungalow will be welcome.
Less Maintenance
It goes without saying that you have less to maintain when your home takes up less space. If you’re raising a family, a large home with many rooms might be necessary for the sake of one’s ability to gain more personal space and privacy. But when your kids grow up and move out on their own, extra rooms become more of a burden than an asset.
The easiest way to ensure that you have the perfect amount of space for your needs during retirement is to downsize to a more manageable option.
The Freedom of Living in Your Home Longer
While assisted living homes are a necessary and welcome advantage for many people, there’s no substitute for the privacy of your own home. As people age, mobility is one of the most significant factors in determining their ability to live independently.
Living in a bungalow contributes to one’s ability to live in their home unassisted for longer. Consequently, owning a bungalow can increase your chances for both happiness and longevity.
Bungalows and Active Adult Lifestyle Communities
Since active adult lifestyle communities tend to cater to those who are 55 and older, they also usually contain homes built with seniors in mind. Given all of the reasons why seniors love bungalows, communities designed to encourage active lifestyles for seniors also tend to contain bungalows.
If you’re looking to find an adult lifestyle community near you, you should first find a company that builds custom bungalows in such communities. Buying a newly-built custom bungalow designed to include everything you have in mind for your ideal retirement plan is the best way to guarantee success in carrying out those plans.
Open-Concept Designs
There’s probably no one feature of home design that has maintained its popularity in the last 20 to 30 years as open-concept living has. Bungalows and open-concept designs go hand-in-hand purely due to the large layouts that bungalows offer.
If you’re looking for a home that offers more space in your main living areas and the ability to allow everyone in your home more time together, a bungalow will provide the perfect structure for an open-concept home. Open-concept designs also lend themselves well to seniors who wish to age in place in their homes.
Versatility
Homes that include multiple floors require more complicated structural features. Comparatively, a bungalow is easier to alter or add to. This is one of the main reasons that custom home builders usually offer many bungalow designs. Whether you want to take more control over what’s included in a newly built home or you’re the kind of person that thrives on changes, even to the structure of your home, a bungalow will be perfectly suited to your needs.
Lower Cost of Living
While a bungalow doesn’t necessarily have to be a smaller house, it is a design that well-suited to those looking for less square footage to maintain. If you’ve planned to downsize to a smaller home, you’ll also gain the advantage of saving money on the cost of your property. Likewise, these savings will yield other cost-cutting advantages like lower property taxes and fewer maintenance costs.
For anyone looking to downsize from a large family home to one better suited to retirement living, you’ll find everything they need on one floor in a bungalow. The best first step you can take in planning your retirement is to consider the type of home you want to live in and what area you want to move to.
Choosing a bungalow in an active adult lifestyle community is one of the best guarantees of a long, healthy, and fulfilling retirement. Contact a custom home builder today to get started on your way to the retirement of your dreams.
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