The demand for retirement communities is about to grow rapidly, and the space isn’t there. That’s the conclusion of a report from the National Investment Center for Senior Housing and Care (NIC). As the wave of baby boomers begins to hit their 80s, the growth in retirement facilities is not keeping pace. 

Extrapolating from the 2020 census, there are currently about 13 million US residents who are 80 and over. The baby boomer generation is just about to reach that age bracket. The result is that the 80+ group will grow by an additional 1 million during the 3-year period from 2023 to 2026, and by about 2 million more from 2026 to 2029 according to the NIC report. Those are annual growth rates of 3.4% and 5.8%.

The companies in the retirement industry have expansion plans, but they aren’t nearly enough to handle the growth that the boomers will create. Current plans would handle only a third to a half of the growth, the NIC report says.

The report suggests that demand for assisted living and memory care will be particularly high.

Implications of the boomer wave. The rapid growth of the 80+ group, along with the slower growth of available retirement spots means that high occupancy and long waiting lists will become more common (as we are already seeing at KCC). It could also lead to more demand for “aging in place” services and other alternatives to traditional retirement communities.

The bulk of the baby boomers are in their 60s now. Given that incoming residents of retirement communities average in their early to mid-70s, it will still be a decade before the wave subsides and retirement communities will need to consider how they’ll deal with a declining (rather than increasing) population of prospects.