Housing for care: A response to the post-transitional old-age gap?

Abstract

This article examines the trade-off between owned housing and old-age care in Slovenia where the population has been found outstandingly willing to enter residential care and also consume housing wealth for this purpose. To explain this peculiarity, a case study as a holistic in-depth analysis was conducted, combining multiple sources of quantitative survey data and qualitative interview-based insights and accounting for the institutional context and individual decisions. What was found was a modernised version of the traditional ‘inheritance for care’ exchange, whereby the inheritor partly finances the parent’s residential care. This family-mediated trade-off between old-age care and housing wealth was found to serve as an informal equity-release scheme which in Slovenia helps bridge the post-transitional old-age gap, the syndrome of low pensions, underdeveloped care services and owner-occupied housing un-adapted to seniors. Moreover, it is hypothesised that this structural gap is common to other post-transitional countries.