Design ideas so you can age in place
By Elaine Schiff

Thinking of selling your house because the staircase is getting too difficult to navigate? Or the bathroom has become a slip-and-fall zone? Or your kitchen cabinets and appliances demand too much bending and stretching?

Well, before you start even thinking of moving, get on the Internet and type in www.homemods.org. It’s the website for the National Resource Center on Supportive Housing and Home Modification. On it you’ll find the latest ideas on safe home design. And, as you’ll see, there are a lot of ideas. Want to remodel your bathroom? The site has links to dozens of designs for safe-entry bathtubs, hands-free faucets and grab bars ranging from the ornate to the purely utilitarian. Need a stair lift (prices start at about $2,000) or a small elevator (these go for $11,000 to $20,000)? No problem, you’ll find it here. There are literally hundreds of items on the non-profit group’s recommended product list.

Now, if you’re in the market to remodel your entire home, visit www.nahb.org, the website for the National Association of Home Builders. The group lists more than 1,000 construction experts across the country who have graduated from its Certified Aging-In-Place-Specialist (CAPS) program — a certification course for building professionals
developed jointly with AARP. CAPS graduates are trained to help you retool your home so that you can continue
living there comfortably despite the physical limitations you may develop as you get older. Hence, the term “Aging in Place.”

There’s another term for super-user-friendly home modeling — it’s called universal design. The idea is that interior design should work for everyone — regardless of your size, height, age or physical abilities. The target audience isn’t just older home dwellers, but children, pregnant moms, teens recovering from sports injuries and people with disabilities. Consider General Electric’s state-of-the-art universal design kitchen website
(www.geappliances.com). It includes special roll-out shelves, a raised dishwasher, a sink that can be raised or lowered as needed, and retractable cabinet doors that leave extra space for people in wheelchairs.

Other major manufacturers are joining in. For bathroom fixtures, try American Standard (www.americanstandard-us.com), or, if you want to go high-end, try Toto (www.totousa.com).

If you’re building a new home, you’re in luck. It’s easy and not insanely expensive to incorporate these design elements into the layout of your soon-to-be-built home. But if you’re remodeling an existing house, be prepared to dig deep into your pocket. Undertaking a full-scale universal design retrofit for your home can cost more than building from scratch. But many of the basic items ­­— e.g. larger cabinet pulls, hand-held showerheads and door levers — can be bought for a relatively modest sum. And, in the end, staying put in your own home is almost always cheaper and what most people say they prefer to do.

Safe home checklist
The basics

• Create “turning spaces” 5 ft. in diameter in every room.
• Make sure hallways are wide enough to handle walkers and wheelchairs.
• Doorways should be a minimum 32-inches wide — 34 or 36 inches are even better.
• Install thermostats with easily read gauges.
• Use luminous light switches.
• Levers are better than knobs — and more elegant.
• All flooring must be non-slip.
• Buy an emergency medical-response device for the bathroom.
• Get remote-controlled lights and appliances.
• Install brighter lighting.

For the bathroom

• Get a bathtub with a build-in seat.
• Make sure the shower’s edge has no lip.
• The toilet should be installed at least 18 inches away from any side wall, cabinet or tub.
• Counters should be no lower than 32 inches with plenty of knee space under the sink.
• Get faucets with lever-style handles.
• The shower head should be hand-held.

For the kitchen

• Buy an adjustable-height sink — a hands-free faucet is a big plus.
• Work surfaces and counters should be 28 to 42 inches high.
• If possible, get an oven with a swing door and a range with controls on the front.
• Use large cabinet handles and drawer pulls.
• Design sinks, counters and work surfaces with knee space underneath.

For outside

• Build at least one entrance without steps.
• Avoid more than a 1/2-inch rise at thresholds.
• Use plenty of lights along pathways and at all doorways.
• Install handrails for every step or porch.