ᐅ Building Accessible Homes – What Are the Key Considerations?

We have built mostly barrier-free. Barrier-free design does require space. In the bathroom, you need enough room to turn around with the help of an assistant. This requires either sufficient space or features like shower walls that can be fully folded back against the wall. There are guidelines for this: a turning area should be at least 1.50 m by 1.50 m (5 feet by 5 feet). In the bedroom, wide walkways must take the furniture layout into account, otherwise it won’t work. I find elevated dishwashers both affordable and useful for everyone. Here, elevated means about 40 cm (16 inches) higher. The model by Leicht offered two different pedestal heights. The only requirement is that the pump capacity matches, which is usually the case. I believe light switches and electrical outlets are more of an issue since they are at child height and can look odd—especially when multiple frames are installed. A few months ago, I had the chance to see the “barrier-free” but rather small apartments of the local community before they were occupied. Less than half of the barrier-free features had been implemented, and even that was already an improvement.

Best regards,
Gabriele

haydee schrieb:

What about couples where one partner is fit and the other has a physical disability? They don’t even have to be elderly. An accident in their 30s, a stroke in their 50s.

However, the discussion was about accessible / barrier-reduced housing for seniors – and a larger number of such apartments.
What you are describing means fully accessible and disability-friendly housing. This is quite expensive, as it requires a lot of space. Small apartments usually don’t allow for this, since they need wide hallways, wide doors, turning circles for a wheelchair in the bathroom, and so on.
This adds about a 20% cost increase compared to barrier-reduced housing, which is the standard construction.

I don’t think you will get a reply anymore, the thread is from January 2019...

Not every person with physical limitations uses a wheelchair.
Yes, it takes up space.
After all, I often complain when a 10 m² (108 ft²) home office and a 4.5 m² (48 ft²) guest bathroom are considered essential for old age.

kaho674 schrieb:

This wasn’t really about subsidies. I just wanted to find out if it makes sense to plan one or two accessible apartments in advance when doing a full gut renovation including ceilings, and what exactly is needed for that. I will take another look at the 159 information sheet.

Hello Katja, you should try contacting a local home care service and/or assisted living facilities. These are the people who deal with this every day. Gather their advice and then look specifically at who offers funding for what. It will definitely be a huge amount of research work.