Why an Eldercare Facility Turned to Employer-Provided Housing

Jamie’s Place is the only long-term care facility in Washington state’s vast Methow Valley, and its ability to care for elders was threatened last year when caregivers struggled to find safe and affordable housing.

“They were worried they [would] need to move due to lack of housing,” said Rana Clarke, the executive director of Jamie’s Place.  “One had been couch-surfing for over a year. . . . We have an older caregiver living in a trailer without running water.” Another employee commuted more than 30 miles over a mountain pass due to lack of local housing—time-consuming, hazardous, and unsustainable in the face of high gas prices.

In all, 5 of the facility’s 14 caregivers were housing insecure.

Unlike businesses that can shorten work hours or close for a day or two each week to address staffing shortages, Jamie’s Place couldn’t as it provides care for seniors 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  The nonprofit—formally known as the Methow Valley Family Home Center Association—operates two homes, each occupied by six older adults. “We had some real concerns about being able to stay open if we were going to start losing our workforce,” says Clarke.

Staff and board members scoured the community in search of existing housing for the caregivers, even reaching out to local hotels and looking for accessory dwelling units, those smaller, more affordable units that are often called ADUs, granny flats, or mother-in-law apartments. But those avenues didn’t pan out. The vacancy rate in Methow Valley is low, less than 1 percent. A “healthy” rate—where home seekers have some choices available to them—falls in the 3 percent to 7 percent range.

The conversation then turned to the possibility of providing housing on-site at Jamie’s Place, and that’s when the team began to consider tiny houses.

Getting to a ‘Yes’ for Tiny Houses

With the notion of tiny houses in hand, Jamie’s Place staff approached ...