Publicly subsidized senior housing: the national profile of independent living models in South Korea

Understanding alternative senior housing arrangements is important because of the expanding global aging population, increasing cost concerns for long-term care, and the desire of older people to age in place (AIP). Using a convergent mixed-method design, we examined the South Korean case using national data on independent living models for older adults. We examined the socioeconomic and health characteristics of residents and the service and operational environment of their housing. Based on quantitative and qualitative information collected by the executive director and key staff in senior housing, we discussed areas of mismatch between aging individuals’ needs and housing resources. Our findings suggest that the current service delivery model of housing needs to be reformed to address (1) the heterogeneous support and care needs of residents, (2) limited operational capacity, and that the spatial design needs to be restructured to ensure privacy. We discuss several programmatic and policy-level reforms to build and expand sustainable publicly subsidized senior housing.