Creating Community-Centric Housing Solutions for Seniors

The U.S. senior housing market is poised to shift from a surplus to a shortage in the next five years, as the oldest baby boomers turn 80 by 2030. In this Upzoned episode, Abby is joined by Norm Van Eeden Petersman, Strong Towns’ director of Movement Building. They unpack the implications of this market shift and discuss what building more options for older adults could look like.

• “Aging Boomers Are About to Rekindle the Senior-Housing Market” by Peter Grant, The Wall Street Journal (February 2025).

• Read more:

  • “Seniors Have Large Suburban Houses To Sell. Does Anyone Want Them?” (Strong Towns).

  • “The Great Senior Short Sale or Why Policy Inertia Will Short Change Millions of America's Seniors” (Journal of Comparative Urban Law and Policy).

• Abby Newsham (X/Twitter).

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn).

• Theme Music by Kemet the Phantom.