Why future proof your home?
Liveable and easily adaptable housing design involves the inclusion of key easy living features that makes home easier and safer to use for all home users, including people with disabilities, ageing Australians, families with young children and people with temporary injuries. Assuring your home is LHA certified increases its resale value, complies with Australian guidelines and assures it can remain your home for many years to come.
The key features of a ‘Livable’ home are that
- It should be easy to enter
- Easy to move in and around
- Capable of easy and cost effective adaptation
- Designed to anticipate and respond to the changing needs of home occupants
Livable housing is not only intended for ageing Australians building a home for their futures, or a person with a disability building a home they can access, Livable housing is about creating a house that looks no different to standard house, but has key features built in that ensure it is or can be made accessible for any person, at any stage of their life regardless of changing health conditions.
Increase the resale value of your home
Receiving a Livable Housing Design certification can help improve the resale value of homes. It can increase the resale market by 30% to include people with accessability issues and the elderly.
Plan for the future
The cost to the homeowner of including key Livable housing design features is 22 times more efficient than retrofitting when an unplanned need arises.
What is ‘Livable Housing’
Livable Housing refers to homes that have been designed to meet the changing needs of home occupants across their lifetime, and is based on the “Livable Housing Australia Design Guidelines”.
The 8 core elements of Livable Housing design are as follows:
- A safe, continuous and step free path of travel from the street entrance and/or parking area to a dwelling entrance that is level.
- At least one, level (step-free) entrance into the dwelling.
- Internal doors and corridors that facilitate comfortable and unimpeded movement between spaces.
- A toilet on the ground (or entry) level that provides easy access
- A bathroom that contains a hobless (step-free) shower recess
- Reinforced walls around the toilet, shower and bath to support the safe installation of grab rails at a later date.
- A continuous handrail on one side of any stairway where there is a rise of more than 1 metre
- Stairways are designed to reduce the likelihood of injury and also enable future adaptation
What you can expect
If you are concidering building or remodelling your home for the future, consult us to review your plans and ensure it will be easy and safe for all home users in the future. A consultation with us would include:
- Initial discussion to evaluate how your home will serve you in the future
- A design consultation (if you are in the design phase of a new home) to ensure your builder or architect can facilitate Livable housing recommendations
- Review of architect or builder plans (if you have them) to identify any opportunities for accessibility improvements
- If your home is already established and you are looking to remodel we undertake a site visit and develop a report with key areas of consideration and improvement
- Follow up site meetings as required to ensure recommendations are being implemented effectively
Why wait? Design your home for your future.
Lauren Hart
Occupational Therapist
Lauren Hart is an Occupational Therapist and the founder of Optimal Living Therapy. Having graduated from Curtin University with a Bachelor of Occupational Therapy Lauren has worked in a variety of areas and with an extensive range of clients in her career. Lauren has also completed a diploma in Access Consultancy with the Institute of Access Training Australia, and works closely with builders and architects on receiving Livable Housing design certifications.
Get to know me better
