Housing built with the special needs of the elderly in mind probably started with sheltered housing and most of that was and still is provided by philanthropic groups and charities together with the various local authorities throughout the country. Almost all of this will be for rent on a weekly or perhaps monthly tenancy. Most of these local authorities will have their own web-sites. Other useful sites for locating rental properties are:-

www.broadlea.com
www.jephson.org.uk
www.westlea.co.uk

The number of private owner occupied sheltered housing properties compared to the number of those rental properties mentioned above is exceedingly small. So the number of properties for sale at any one time is very small indeed. Sheltered housing properties do not provide nursing care and they do not pretend that they do. What they do provide is an additional level of assistance and in many cases quite personal assistance that would not normally be available in a run of the mill block of retirement apartments. In the event of a resident needing proper nursing care then in most cases the management would be able to obtain it from an agency although the cost would be somewhat higher than the in-house cost of a close care development.

What does this mean in practice? Well if you are a youngish 60 year old couple or perhaps a reasonably supple 70 year old couple, not very much. Couples, whilst they still remain a couple have a much better chance of not requiring nursing care, simply because in many cases one can care for the other. In those circumstances the additional cost of the annual service charge of a close care property over that of a sheltered housing property will be wasted whilst for others it will provide essential peace of mind. However it has to be said that even though only a small proportion of those living in sheltered housing do eventually have to move into a residential nursing home, the majority do not. On the other hand, had they been living in a close care property the likelihood of having to move into a residential nursing home would have been much smaller still.

Unfortunately at the moment all of the properties that we are dealing with are at the same time both difficult to sell – certainly at a price which keeps pace with the housing market generally - and probably even more difficult to buy particularly if location is a factor and it usually is. Generally it seems that most residents move before they really need the extra facilities that are provided. For the chances of finding what you want just when you want it is extremely remote.