"She handed over ... $46,700 to a family member to build a small guest apartment in their backyard. The plan was to live there for the rest of her life, free from the stresses of an unaffordable rental market, and then leave the apartment to her family. Instead, the arrangement collapsed within a year. The unit was unfinished — with no kitchen or functioning laundry — forcing her to rely on the house."
In what recent decade could anyone even dream of $46,700 USD being enough for a quickly-built, furnished apartment to be built in a backyard with working laundry?
This sounds like it fell apart because it was never going to work and was an attempt by a family member to help an aged person who was in a bind of their own making via lack of planning.
Seems the article could make a better impact if it had some better examples of the issue. As presented, it sounds like "Nurse Joan" should have planned for retirement.
Australian family members are frequently able to setup the form work for a slab (with pipes and ducts) ready for a concrete pour, and can often rustle up a few friends to spend a couple of days propping up the walls and framework, bolting up, fixing in pre-built panels, etc.
I've done a few of these, one in the last five years, many over the last 50 - from residential to garage to barn, to tractor etc.
Start with suppliers such as: https://www.fairdinkumbuilds.com.au/products/residential-she...
brochure: https://www.fairdinkumbuilds.com.au/assets/Resources-Documen...
and hunt about - it's not fancy but doable.
With laundry? For the USD sum of under $50k? In under a year in someone's back yard?
Perhaps you might wish to re-read my comment.
I'm stating as a matter of fact that many people in Australia build out granny flats in their backyards for older relatives (or for themselves when their partners die and they pass the main house over to children) and Colourbond "sheds" are one of many available options.
A number of fabricators exist that build out trusswork and wall sections to spec. in industrial parks and ship them out for people to either put up themselves or to hire others (three, maybe four people) to put up for them.
Insulated sheds have pretty high R factors and can include regular doors, internal walls or mezzanine floors, large feature windows, etc.
I also stated (not suggested) that I've built multiple shed variations, some pretty damn slick, over the past several decades.
Do you not know how to pour concrete, plumb, pull cable, roof, cut sheet metal, etc?
My mother could tile a pretty decent floor, wall, and bathroom and she was mostly a bank clerk, accountant, school secretary, et al type.
I was discussing the article on this thread. Do you think Nurse Joan was able to pour concrete, install plumbing to code, pull cables, install a roof which implies climbing with heavy items (again, we're discussing an elderly person)... I'll stop before we get to cutting sheet metal as this is getting silly.
She handed over her pension savings of A$70,000 ($46,700) to a family member to build a small guest apartment in their backyard.
For $70K it's possible to get a pre fabricated human livable insulated decent looking Colourbond granny flat delivered .. and assembled by third party workers (if they can be found in the current skills shortage market) - it's not uncommon to bring costs down with self assembly and doing as much work as possible without labour hire.
> Do you think Nurse Joan was able to pour concrete, install plumbing to code, pull cables, install a roof which implies climbing with heavy items (again, we're discussing an elderly person).
I've never met her but I can state for a fact that many men and women in Australia do indeed do such things in their lives and continue to do them into their 60s, 70s, and in some cases their 80s.
The staging for a slab is to do the form work yourself and order a concrete pour .. a truck arrives and a couple or workers level it into place and leave again.
I have a 70 year old neighbour here currently solo building a large steel frame octagonal house that is presently being roofed; first using a crane hire to lift the steel beams that were prepped on the ground into place and now being sheeted using a scissor lift (so, no climbing) and ropes and pulleys to bring the sheets up.
My father turns 90 this year, as an elderly person he gave up climbing ladders last year, he has also given up maintenance of his section of a local 1,000 km walking track that he looked after for three decades, but he still walks 10 km or so daily and manages to load and unload our double axle trailer with tonnes of material (weeds, manure, wood, etc) on a regular basis.
> this is getting silly.
I'm guessing such things are literally foreign to you and you have little practical experience of either building or older Australians and yet you reject actual first hand experience from actual older Australians? Silly indeed.
I am still seeing a problem with the budget and timeline. It seems it isn't as easy to build an apartment in a backyard since the point of the article is that it didn't work out, and commonly most elderly people and their families don't have metalworking and foundation and plumbing and electrical experience. Even if your mother is excellent at tiling floors, which I don't doubt.
* the article is about financial pressures of younger Australians, this is a real problem.
* An example of that is this story of an older person handing over life savings to a younger family member to build a granny flat, the implication, to my eye at least, isn't that the budget was insufficient rather the family member didn't carry through on the promise due to issues they had, likely their own financial pressures leading to money being bled off and a lack of time to carry through.
* and commonly most elderly people and their families don't have metalworking and foundation and plumbing and electrical experience.
What do you consider elderly? I'm at retirement age ion Australia and I was born in a time when the demographics skewed non-urban .. most Australians of that time had rural experience which means most Australians of that era had exposure to hands on dirty work .. they might go to Uni to study Law but they still have hands on experience digging a trench and helping out building a brick wall, paving, etc.
Again, it's not a case of skill shortage in the elderly ... it was a presumably younger Australian that likely lacked the skills to carry through and additional pressures that likely caused them to skim the budget despite best intentions.
Again, an insulated prefab kit shed variation modified to be habitable should cost less than AU $70K assembled .. the last shed I had built had the right footprint but was bare bones (no plumbing, no electrics, no insulation, no fridges, etc) and was AU $10K mostly built by others (my father, born 1935, did the ground work and form work for me as I was out of the country at the time) - I just funded materials and additional labour.
Currently I live in a rural West Australian town with a median age of 64 (half the town 64 or under, the half 64 or older) most people stay active into their 80s and many have hobbies such as raising sheep, miniature donkeys, maintaining vintage cars, building rat-trucks, fire and rescue services, etc.
In the past five years I've helped build (no charge, it's a friend of a friend thing) four habitable "granny flats" - single occupant outhouses on existing land with other houses - these have been revamped tool barns, fresh builds, "lean-to" extensions, etc. - all have come in under $50K total.
I have a background in pure applied math, traveled for work (geophysical exploration and mapping) to two thirds of the worlds countries (although some them only count as multiple entries in a survey aircraft flipping about while doing survey lines in a primary country), have some million SLOC of mapping and geophysical code behind me in addition to some funky abstract symbolic algebra coding on the CAYLEY|MAGMA system and other stuff, and paid my way through university working in mining companies (labouring, Haul Pak driving, etc) and cattle stations (mustering, etc).
I know a great many Australians my age with similar capabilities.
You may have read a little Greg Egan, for example.
No, I'm still focused on the article we're discussing here. However, by word count, you may have written more about the abilities of geriatric builders in Australia than anyone else to this point.
> In what recent decade could anyone even dream of $46,700 USD being enough for a quickly-built, furnished apartment to be built in a backyard with working laundry?
This decade, it's entirely doable, in Australia, by many but not all Australians that range in age from early twenties through to mid eighties.
> This sounds like it fell apart because it was never going to work and was an attempt by a family member to help an aged person who was in a bind of their own making via lack of planning.
It fell apart most likely because the family member that made a promise and took money lacked staging experience and was over confident.
> Seems the article could make a better impact if it had some better examples of the issue.
The article certainly needs a much better example of younger Australians ripping off older Australians as this doesn't appear to be a case of intentional deceptive fraud at all, more well intentioned incompetence.
> As presented, it sounds like "Nurse Joan" should have planned for retirement.
That's a bit harsh, she had super annunciation sufficient to get a simple small building together, access to land within the family, and due a pension at 67 onwards after a lifetime of service to others in heath care. Life being what it is it's likely various road bumps occurred along the way.
> you may have written more about the abilities of geriatric builders in Australia than anyone else to this point.
Given no one else responded a single word would have crossed that threshold - you're welcome.
Again, there's no requirement that the builders here be geriatric, just a note that many Australians in their 50s, 60s and older actively build stuff.
eg: Colin here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-12-01/australian-first-mini...
Again, post as many links of older people building a space ship if you'd like, it does not change the fact that most retirees aren't able to run their own plumbing for the laundry room Nurse Joan wishes she'd had.
It sounds like you have everything you need, including family help, to get a great business going in Australia building unbelievably cheap housing by and for the elderly. Could be a life-changing operation if you can pull it off, and based on your posts you seem extremely confident. Are you doing something more important than housing the elderly with your day to day life? If not, what is holding you back?
> I wonder why you are so sure it is easy & possible
Because I've done projects such as this on tight budgets on and off for many years and I'm familiar with Australia. It's possible, doable, but not by all and not "easy" as it requires planning, application and carry through.
Actual prior experience has already been mentioned, your AI must have missed that - tweak it a bit maybe, it's making you look inattentive.
> but the person in the article failed to even have a habitable space in the time and budget allowed.
there's always a spread of outcomes, this is the story they chose to tell, I'm not sure it serves the thesis of the article.
> it does not change the fact that most retirees aren't able to run their own plumbing for the laundry room Nurse Joan wishes she'd had.
Again, are you using an AI to respond? I've repeatedly pointed out the person who put their hand up to do the work wasn't a retiree.
Also Australia is awash with cashed up retirees, not all by any means, but thanks to superannuation, negative gearing, socialists in the 1970s, and a complex web of factors wealth is skewed toward the elderly.
> It sounds like you have everything you need
If you have a question, ask, spare me the projection.
> to get a great business going in Australia building unbelievably cheap housing by and for the elderly.
Not a business, just spare time stuff, usually with my father who's big on helping out communities; we've done St John's Ambulance (volunteer rural ambulance work, he drove, trained drivers, delivered first aid, general para medic stuff), SES, fire service, all the usual stuff.
Often he hears about people that need a hand via his church friends or other sources, scouts about for funding for materials, plans out work and orders and then brings together volunteers for a day or so of work, then a few meals and back to the regular grind.
> Are you doing something more important than housing the elderly with your day to day life? If not, what is holding you back?
What's with the attitude here?
wslh•4mo ago