Living Arrangements of Seniors

Living Arrangements of Seniors

In 2008, over half (54.6%) of older persons living in private residences share the home with their spouse. That includes approximately 11.3 million or 72.0% of older men, and 8.6 million or 41.7% of older women who live with their spouse. The proportion decreases with age, especially for women. Only 28.9% of women 75+ years old lived with a spouse.

About 30.5% (11.2 million) older persons lived alone in 2008 (8.3 million women, 2.9 million men). They represented 39.5 of older women and 18.5% of older men. The proportion living alone increases with advanced age. Among women aged 75 and over, for example, half  lived alone.

Approximately 681,000 grandparents aged 65 or over maintained households in which grandchildren were present in 2008. In addition, about 959,000 grandparents over age 65 lived in parent-maintained households in which their grandchildren were present. A total of about 1.89 million older people lived in household with a grandchild present in the house. About 471,000 of these grandparents over 65 years old were the persons with primary responsibility for their grandchildren who lived with them.

While a relatively small number (1.60 million) and percentage (4.1%) of the 65+ population in 2008 lived in institutional settings such as nursing homes (1.44 million), the percentage increases dramatically with age, ranging from 1.3% for persons 65-74 years to 3.8% for persons 75-84 years and 15.4% for persons 85+. In addition, approximately 2.4% of the elderly lived in senior housing with at least one supportive service available to their residents.

Figure 3: Living Arrangements of Persons 65+, 2009

(Based on data from U.S. Bureau of the Census including the 2008 Current Population Survey,Annual Social and Economic Supplement and the 2008 American Community Survey. See: March 2009 Current Population Survey Internet releases, Detailed Tables and unpublished data from the 2007 Medicare Current Beneficiaries Survey.)