The results of the were released last week. or signup to continue reading The census is run in collaboration with the Property Council and provides a comprehensive overview of the retirement village sector including data on village characteristics, resident demographics, financial structures, and future development plans. The census shows that the majority of retirement villages are single level, broadacre or horizontal (71 per cent) with just 15 per cent being vertical or multilevel buildings and 14 per cent being a combination.
The average age of villages across the country is 29 years, the Northern Territory has the youngest village age of 12 years and South Australia has the oldest village age with an average of 39 years. The census also shows that villages are getting smaller with the average number of homes in villages built in the last 10 years being 84 compared with 100 for villages built 10-15 years ago and 94 for villages that are more than 15 years old. The average age of current retirement village residents is 80, with only 3 per cent aged between 65 and 74.
While the legislation typically sets a minimum age of 55 to move into a retirement village, there were no reported residents under 65 years of age and the average age of people moving into villages was 75. The average number of residents per home is 1.26, with residents on average staying for around nine years.
The majority of resident contracts (76 per cent) are either lease (44 per cent) or licence (32 per c.