This past week, Seth Gregg (President of Clutter Cleaner SC) and I had the opportunity to meet with a Senior Living Advisor at a senior living community in Charleston, SC. What was shared with us regarding their availability wasn’t surprising……they currently have a 3-4 year waiting list (depending on the unit type) for new residents. However, what smacked us straight in the face was this: they recently had a 49 year old inquire about getting on the waiting list. 49 years old. As a 55 year old who just went through the process of getting my parents settled in a new community, I can say with no uncertainty that I have given zero thought about looking into options for me and my wife. After looking at what we will be facing the next 10 years, we all may want to reconsider this. More on this later.
Over the next decade, the United States is heading into a historic shortfall of senior living units as demand from aging baby boomers and older cohorts collides with a limited development pipeline. For operators, investors, and service providers around the senior housing ecosystem, the 2025–2035 period is shaping up as one of the most compelling demand stories in all of real estate.
The coming age wave
By 2030, about one in five Americans will be 65 or older, with the 65+ population expected to reach roughly 72 million people and represent more than 20% of the total U.S. population. Behind that headline, the fastest growth is in the 75+ and 80+ cohorts—the exact groups that most directly drive demand for independent living, assisted living, and memory care.
Record demand already showing up
The demand surge is not theoretical; it is already visible in occupancy and absorption data. In the primary U.S. markets tracked by NIC, the number of occupied senior living units reached a record high of roughly 618,000 in late 2024 and climbed again to about 621,000 units in early 2025, even as new construction remained muted.
Average senior housing occupancy has recovered into the high 80s, with independent living near 89% and assisted living around 86%, and industry analysts expect average occupancy to push back above 90% by 2026 if current trends continue. Historically, that 90%+ level has only been achieved a few times in the last two decades, underscoring how strong today’s demand really is.
Supply cannot keep pace
The defining feature of the next 10 years is not just strong demand—it is the widening gap between demand growth and new supply. Rising construction and financing costs have slowed development to the point that, in many markets, the number of units under construction has fallen to the lowest levels since the early 2010s, even as occupancy and move-ins accelerate.
Analysts estimate that simply maintaining today’s penetration rates will require more than 250,000 additional senior housing units by 2027, nearly 500,000 by 2029, and close to 600,000 by 2030. At the current development pace, the industry is on track to deliver only a fraction of that need, implying an extended period of tight supply, rising occupancies, and strong pricing power in
well-positioned communities.
Why demand will be “massive,” not modest
Several structural forces make the coming decade fundamentally different from past cycles. First, the size of the boomer cohort, combined with increasing longevity, means there will simply be more older adults living longer with complex health and social needs that are difficult to meet in single-family homes.
Second, many older adults and their families are increasingly favoring purpose-built environments that combine housing, services, and social connection—demanding more than what traditional age-in-place models can offer. Third, a meaningful share of the 75+ population remains in the labor force and financially active, which supports private-pay communities and higher-acuity options as their needs increase over time.
What this means for owners,operators, and partners
For existing communities, the next 10 years are likely to bring rising occupancy, stronger rent growth potential, and greater selectivity in resident mix, particularly in well-located, well-operated assets. For developers and capital providers, the data point to a multi-hundred-thousand-unit development gap, translating into tens of billions of dollars in potential new projects to meet unmet need.
For adjacent businesses—move management, downsizing services, home sale preparation, and in-community wellness and concierge offerings—the surge in move-ins and transitions should translate directly into more clients and higher transaction volume. In short, the combination of an unprecedented demographic wave, record current demand, and a constrained construction pipeline is setting up a decade where the primary challenge in senior living will not be finding residents, but finding enough units to serve them.
Conclusion
This thesis is exactly why my partners and Ilaunched Silver Gen Holdings. There has been an ongoing expectation that the baby boomer market was about to take off. When Silver Gen Advisory Board member Connie Hallquist (who founded a high end consumer platform focused on the baby boomer generation over 20 years ago) first looked at our Silver Gen presentation, her immediate comment was, “this looks like the exact same deck and thesis we had 20 years ago”. But, as my favorite saying goes---“Numbers Never Lie”. It is undeniable that the “Silver Tsunami” is getting ready to take off.
As for Seth and I, well, let’s just say thatwe are taking things under advisement. We haven’t started looking……yet.
