so many times when you ask people, well, what is your goal housing-wise, they don't have a clue. and so a lot of -- sometimes the work is how do you narrow down what they really want? and putting it into the must-haves and the challenges, sometimes is easier way for people to -- oh, okay,... >> that we've done. remember i said that we couldn't get off the dime on the monthly meetings? we realized what we need to do is we need to do three months. in other words, if you sign up for a meeting, you come for

three months because that allows you to really dig in and get deeper and we have all kinds of different writing exercises to help clarify your thinking because that's really what it's about. sometimes occasionally you might meet somebody that you say, let's explore this living together and, in fact, that has happened in our groups and i know of a couple of people, a few people, actually, who are doing some test runs. in other words, they're spending more time socially, they global market action overnight they may go away for a weekend and if they go away, they might go for like three months and you have to have contracts about this but i will let ana mary talk about that. [laughter] >> if people need new consideration for housing, if

they're pressuring organic farmings, their own local gardens, for example, the city of richmond allows chickens but no where else in the entire common wealth of virginia sta -- that's permitted, so i think that's kind of interesting. >> that is kind of interesting. again, new york city. this is a point. it's something that we should be thinking about. yes, thank you. >> i guess this is address to both of you, just a little bit of information on how that works do individuals buy their houses, do they buy a plot and have a common area, maybe there's different ways of doing it. if you don't mind a little more

info on all that. >> great, by all means. >> cohouseing, it's been a movement been in the u.s. since the 90's from denmark and future residents invest together to create it, building new, there are some cases that we call retro fit or organic cohousing and you build community where you are and that's something that anybody can do. there are benefits doing it and design for aging as senior cohousing does but, of course, there's all the costings of new building and it is mostly market race and home homeowner and rental housing. >> rental. >> i want to mention on topic of

tinny homes, we can fill the room in 24 hours if we whisper tinny home village. the doll-house effect. it's mostly younger. there's no where i believe in the u.s. where it's legal currently to create a whole neighborhood of tinny homes. you would have to create rv, trailer camp. it's one of the places where it's been happening in oregon, alternatives to homeless em emcampments and get it more diverse option for more people. >> you said there was a trust, do you have a prototype that

people can subscribe to? >> yeah, what's the name of the land trust? >> there's a couple. northern california land trust and bay area land trust is working with some of your members. >> right. [inaudible] >> this is a model. >> it's a model that you can connect them. look at the bay area community land trust and get in touch with the -- i can't remember his name. do you remember it? rick lewis and ask him about it and once you find that out perhaps you can create something like that in texas. anybody else? yes, thank you. >> i wanted to follow up on the tinny home that keeps coming up. i'm also in love with the tinny home movement, my only reservation about this relative housing for elders is the

physical demands, we see hipsters climbing up and down, ladders on top of the bathroom, it's easy to jump into that and say that's a perfect solution. i'm more interested in perhaps going back and making sure that the -- the solution for adaptable living unit that could go in a backyard could occur in what's keeping that from happening in many areas of zoning. a lot of families can't have that solution, the backyards there, the house is there and the zoning aren't there. >> yeah, exactly. >> that's the push that needs to happen. >> i agree. i agree. there's someone -- yeah. >> and talking about zoning, are you seeing big implication with homeowner associations?

in virginia there were 200 home owners association and by 20,097,500. it's a real issue. we have to get the builders out of our life. >> good point. >> it's interesting that you brought that up. they're doing changes in allowing the -- adlu -- [inaudible] >> yes, so colorado is a real progressive state and the cost of real estate has been inflated because of legalized marijuana, they can't put their money in banks so they put it in real estate and we've essentially developed legalized money laundering. [laughter] >> we are an innovative group

out there. >> i love it. [inaudible] >> aren't we? [inaudible] >> people have the land and the big house to accommodate that because it can help families across the whole entire continuum that little unit can be the place where, you know, you're 20 something and doesn't know what to do with his or her life stay and that's where you stay down the road. >> i love that idea, that the parents move into the -- >> your family members or community members. >> yeah. >> okay, how are we doing for time? >> okay, so you also have on your table a card that if you

fill out your name and e-mail address we have some books, a few weeks, smart women don't retire, they break free and we would be happy to give them out. this is a a raffle. it's not bingo but it's a raffle . are there any more questions? okay. thank you so much. i hope this was helpful. but you see how valuable the questions are. this is what i mean by brain-storming when you're dealing with our population, the people who are coming because they want something, they want something from you, they have a lot to give and it's important to be engaged. thank you so much for coming. i appreciate it. don't forget to stay for the shared housing because i know that's going to be informative

and the shared housing cuts across living in community, aging in place. so this is my home team. [applause] >> and if you want to get in touch with me or with us to find out more about how to build a program in your area here is how to reach us. so thank you. [applause] >> thank you so much, mona and again there are two more sessions and just a reminder that everyone this evening is invited to the president's reception so please join us and on behalf of positive csa thank you for attending and thank you mona. >> thank you. [applause] >> so let's collect these. you don't want one for betsy?

[inaudible conversations] >> i appreciate it if you fill out the feedback form, thank you . >> the society of senior advisers is hosting the wellness and aging conference. there's one more presentation coming up in about half an hour with authors written a book on shared housing. the economic news from the hill, federal reserve chair janet

yellen said that steady economic gains have made a stronger case for raising interest rates soon. she indicated strongly today that the central bank could raise rates before 2016 is over and painted the economy continuing slow but steady crime. the case for increase has strengthen in recent months, she said, chairwoman yellen hosted in wyoming, more on that from the hill.com. by the way on the news the stock market has trended lower. the dow down 90 points at this hour. in about half an hour or so before this conference reconvenes, here is a portion of today's white house briefing with press secretary josh earnest. >> good morning, everybody. happy friday. before we get started, i will just do a -- one piece of news you may have seen already, as part of the president's commitment to protect the natural beauty of the united states, we announced today that

president obama is building on this leadership by taking a historic step in creating the world's largest marine protected area to coast of hawaii. the designation -- the designation will more than quadruple the size protecting coral reefs, deep sea marine habitats and other resources in the waters of the northwest hawaiian islands, all together president obama has protected more public land than any other president and coastal marine environments, areas for outdoors they offer and sites help tell a story of significant people or extraordinary events in american history. in fact, studies have shown that every dollar we invest in our national parks generates $10 for

the national economy, most of which states and local communities and our national park forest and other public lands attracts tourists from all over the world, 640 billion-dollar national outdoor economy. so i'm happy to take your questions on the national marine monument or anything else on your mind today. >> i wanted to ask you about economy growing at 1.1%. a little bit of revision downward. is that concerning to the white house or not particularly given the, you know, assessment from chairwoman yelle, in that the economy looks like it's strong for interest rate hike?

>> i don't think there's a whole lot of information revealed in the revisions. look, even in those underlying metrics, there is some optimistic data to take a look at. i think the most significant of those is that consumer spending grew at a strong rate. and that is consistent with the strong readings of consumer sentiments that we snee the economy, i think that is an indication that the president's optimism about the economy is shared pretty broadly by the american people. the president talked about additional steps to ensure economic opportunity is being enjoyed by people up and down the income scale and that's why the president has made expanding access to a college education high priority and the president

believes that robust investment? infrastructure while interest rates are low would have positive economic benefits for the country in the short-term but would also lay a foundation for a long-term economic strength. the president has plenty of ideas of what additional work could be done to strengthen the economy and to further strengthen economic growth but the president's optimism about the u.s. economy is widely shared and it should be. as it relates to comments from the fed chair, i understand that she gave a speech a little earlier this morning and i will let her assessment of the economy speak for itself. [inaudible] >> different legal system over there, it seems to mirror the debate that is we have been having in this country about religious freedom and intolerance and islam, if a u.s.

municipality were to ban the use of burkini the way a number have in france, what kind of view would the white house take? >> well, josh, i want to be careful for not weighing in policy decisions made by one of our closest allies particularly their assessment of national security and homeland security. what i can say affirmatively about the united states and certainly the approach that the president has taken is there's a reason that the united states is a beacon of freedom around the world. united states of america was founded to serve as a country where people could observe their religious faith and worship god without the fear of persecution or even intrusion by government authority. this freedom of religion is something that we hold dear in

this country and what's important about the right to a freedom of religion is that every american citizen enjoys it. every american citizen regardless of your faith, benefits from the protection that's provided by the united states constitution. the president certainly believes strongly in protecting the freedom of religion and believes that it's important that that -- that the commitment to that value and the commitment to that principle is reflected in the kinds of policies that are advanced by the federal government. for president also happens to believe that the commitment to those values actually strengthen our national security. >> we didn't have a chance to talk about the olympics while the president was gone on martha's vineyard. ryan lochte is being charged with filing false police report in brazil, the fact that we have extradition treaty with brazil, would the u.s. consider a

request from brazil to extradite one of our own citizens? >> listen, the united states will certainly adhere to the terms to any extradition treaty with any country we signed in the world. we remain committed to following those guidelines and allowing the guidelines of those treaties and the law here in the united states to guide those discussions and to guide those decisions. i can't speak to the details of the charges that have been reportedly filed against mr. lochte, so for more details on that, i think i would refer you to brazilian authorities or to attorneys that have been retained by mr. lochte. aisha. >> thanks. there are have been reports of missiles hitting saudi arabia's

facilities, i was wondering -- and oil prices are up. is the white house monitoring this? is there concern about the latest attacks? >> aisha, i have not seen the reports, what i can tell you in general is that the united states has expressed on a number of occasions our concern about potential instability along saudi arabian southern border. i think the only people that are more concerned about that are the saudis themselves and have expressed concerns about chaos and violence that they have seen in yemen could spill over into saudi arabia and saudi arabia has undertaken military action that they say are necessary to try to limit that threat, and the united states has provided

some limited support to those operations. we certainly do stand shoulder to shoulder with our partners in saudi arabia as they figure out the most effective way to limit the national security risk that they face from the chaos and violence in the country along their southern border. >> moving onto iran. so u.s. navy ship fired warning shots to warn iranians yesterday and this is the latest in the series of incidents this week. i was wondering, what does the white house think about the incidents that they seem to be escalating, does the white house consider that the tactics are planned or that these -- that this is an orchestrated --

orchestrated toward some end, what does the white house view on these incidents? >> aisha, you won't be surprised that the white house is well aware of incidents of iranian vessels approaching u.s. vessel who is are operating in international waters. the department of defense has reached their own assessment about a couple of these situations and determine that had the actions that were taken by the iranian vessels were unsafe and unprofessional. it's unclear what their intentions were or what their aims might have been but the behavior that we have seen is not acceptable. primarily because this is a volatile region of the world and in a compressed space it only increases the risk associated with possible miscalculations.

that's certainly something that we want to avoid and the truth is a more dangerous interaction was avoided because of the professionalism and skill of the united states navy and our men and women who represent our country in the united states navy. so obviously the situation is rather unique and our ability to discern exactly what their intent was, it's limited by the fact that we don't have diplomatic relations with iran. you know, there are some channels where we have engaged in some talks but no formal diplomatic presentation.

we had concerns raised, for example, by russian military vessels. we've got diplomatic channels that we can use to express concerns and try to reach an understanding of what exactly happened. we are limited in our ability to do so because -- because of the limited diplomatic relations between united states and iran. >> is there a concern that these are escalating, is there maybe a call now to maybe change tactics or to do something about these incidents that keep occurring? >> just make sure that the record is here, these are u.s. vessels who are operating professionally in international waters consistent with international norms and it's only because their professionalism that a more significant incident was avoided

and, you know, the behavior and actions that we have seen by these iranian vessel is concern because their actions were unsafe and unprofessional and because in territory that's compressed or international waters that are as compressed, the likelihood of miscalculation has increased and that's certainly something that we want to avoid. okay, michelle. >> we heard plenty of speeches this week from each presidential candidate specially just last -- just yesterday hearing from donald trump and hillary clinton, pretty much back to back. what you see is the nominee basically calling each other a bigot. you talked about the debates in this country and how that's good for america. do you still feel the debate is good for this country? >> well, i think the president himself has acknowledged that

there are certain aspects of our political discourse have gotten too polarized in a way that ultimately is counterproductive and only does feed greater dysfunction in our political system and the president has acknowledged that his own performance on this measure is not perfect, but it's been quite good. i would say i think that there's a risk of drawing an equivalence even among presidential candidates that won't with stand any scrutiny by an unbiased analyst and i think that people will consider the rhetoric and language that is used by the

presidential candidates to draw their own conclusions about that individual's fitness for office. but i think that's part of the case that people make about what presidential elections are all about. while running -- being a presidential candidate is different than being president of the united states, when you're a presidential candidate you do face some of the same challenges and stressors that the president has to face in difficult times. being in the spotlight, being asked difficult questions under pressure, being able to communicate clearly to the country, something that you believe even if the topic is something that's quite complicated. so i think it's entirely fair for people to listen carefully and to listen closely to the individual candidates toond draw some conclusions about the rhetoric that they use.

>> there's been a lot of name calling in american politics, there were pretty nasty -- [inaudible] >> there's something about this cycle that has shocked many watchers. does the administration feel that this cycle has changed american politics for good? >> when you say for good for the better or permanently? >> has it changed american politics? >> listen, i think many people made the observation that plut -- political debate in this cycle is markedly different than the kind of race that has been run in recent presidential cycles and some of that is due to the rhetoric that we've seen

on the republican side of the aisle, there's just no denying that and not by any one candidate. there are a variety of republican candidates earlier in the primary process that had some quite shocking controversial and even offensive things to say. some of them about the president of the united states. so that being said, i think the president has a lot of confidence in the wisdom of the american people and the strength of this country's democratic institutions and i'm referring to our system of government as democracy and not democratic party to withstand additional stress but i would acknowledge that the american people and our

institutions are facing more stress than they have in years past. >> the reason i ask is because we often hear and you just said yesterday, that, you know, the debate is good for america, this is the debate that we should be having but the way debate has been conducted maybe on both sides through this cycle, has that been good for america, really? >> i think there's a great danger in drawing an equivalence between the rhetoric that we heard from both sides, but i will say is i think that there's no denying that some of the rhetoric that we have heard from presidential candidates has been counterproductive and it's been inconsistent with our country's values and the president is not pleased to see that. that said, the approximating -- president understands and has made the case on many occasions that running for president is tough business and there is

throughout american history, there are throughout american history any number of examples of harsh rhetoric on the campaign trail and it's not the first time that we have seen that in the context of american politics but i think it is fair to say that there seems to be something different going on this time around. john, nice to see you. >> i want to ask you about an interview that the parents of kayla mueller did. of course, kayla mueller was taken hostage and murdered by isis and the president met and during that visit the president promised to make a donation to a foundation that they set up in kayla's name, is that correct, did he make that promise? >> john, let me start by saying, obviously the who -- ordeal that

the mueller family has had to endure is unimaginable. their daughter kayla mueller was a special person who had a special calling in her life and i actually still remember the first time that we were in this room talking about reports of her death and her parents made public a letter that she had written and been able to deliver to them or have deliver to them where she talked about how her life had been fulfilled based on her passion to serve people in need and ting line that she used was that she recalled seeing god in the eyes of people who were in crisis. it's a profound statement for somebody who was just in her 20's when she was killed.

and her life and her example has had an impact on people all across the country. her life and her example have had an impact of people in the white house myself included and given all of that, i think the pain and grief that is -- that continues to be experienced to this day by kayla's parents i think it's entirebly understandable. i know that they have given an interview. what i will say is the president is aware of the foundation that's been to honor her memory. i do anticipate that the president would be -- would make a commitment to support this

organization moving forward. >> kayla's father said that the president in that meeting back in march of last year that he said he would be making a donation to the foundation and 17 months later he said that the donation has not been made. can you confirm that no donation has been made? >> well, listen, i wasn't part of the conversation, obviously mr. mueller and the president were. >> you wouldn't think he would lie about this? >> i'm just indicating that i wasn't part of the meeting and if i were this is a private conversation. the president obviously is aware of the foundation that's been set up to support the life's work of kayla mueller. you would anticipate that this is a foundation that the president and the first lady

would support. [inaudible] >> i can't speak to any promises or conversations between the president and the mueller family directly. >> the mueller family, both parents expressed disappointing with the amounts or the efforts that were taken to free kayla before she was murdered were inadequate, what carl mueller said that the president could have been a hero but he chose not to. >> this is a father who is grieving over the loss of his daughter. i think the grief and saddens that he feels about the fact that his daughter was not successfully rescued, i think, is an entirely human response and one that's entirebly understandable. at the direction of president

obama himself, a variety of national security agencies and the federal government expend significant resources and dedicate significant time to go into great lengths to try and rescue americans who have been unjustly held around the world and you will also recall, john, there were some weaknesses in that approach that were identified by the administration and there has been important reforms that have been made over that process in 18 to 24 months that have resulted more effective use of those resources and more effective use of the expertise within the federal government to sharpen our efforts to secure the return or to rescue american citizens held against their will around the world. there also has been effort to improve the way the federal government of the united states

communicate with families that are in this unspeakable situation like the mueller family was. and the president has been pleased by the way those reforms have improved the effectiveness both in terms of securing the release of american hostages but both in terms of communicating more clearly and directly with families that were in that difficult situation, but the president hope that is the pace of improvement will continue as the reforms take root. >> i remember one of those issues was the question of private individuals paying ransom and the mueller say says they will threaten with criminal prosecution to pay ransom payment that isis was requesting? >> the first is i'm just not going to get into private conversations between the government officials and families who were in this difficult situation. i can tell you that it is not

the policy of the obama administration to threaten families like this who are in this situation with prosecution. but certainly, the united states does have a policy that we have followed of not paying ransom and that is a very painful policy and it's understandable that families like the mueller would have grave concerns about that policy both as a policy matter and i can understand them raising some pretty moral questions about that too but the conclusion that president obama reached is the same conclusion that previous presidents in both parties have reached that to get into the habit ransom it would only make americans traveling overseas will make appetite and we have carefully followed the

policy of not paying ransom even to secure the release of americans who are being held against their will overseas. >> one last question, josh. just to be clear, the first part line of questioning here. can the mueller family expect that the presidents, the obamas will make a donation to the foundation of their daughter kayla mueller soon? >> as i mention, i can't speak to any previous conversations that they had. but the foundation that kayla hands that has been established in her memory, it's the foundation that the president and first lady supported in the past and i would suspect they would make a contribution to support it. >> i want to ask you about the -- [inaudible] >> i was wondering if you can give us any update on where the conversations are going and also if you can confirm coordination

between russia and u.s. on air strikes is part of that deal? >> we certainly know that russia is -- has expressed some interest in greater military cooperation. the concern that we have expressed is that too much of the time and attention of the russian military is being devoted to propping up the assad regime n some cases aiding and abetting the horrific tactics of the assad regime. we know that government military assets including aircraft with full support of the russians and iranians have been used to

target civilians and to target medical facilities. as a practical matter the actions that we see from the assad regime are indefensible from a moral perspective but for people who aren't interested in morality even practical matter they only put off the kind of solution that even the russians themselves acknowledge as necessary to deal with the situation outside of syria. as long as russia is willing to support assad regime tactics that often claim lives of innocent women and children, the more difficult it is for a political solution to be reached. it's also more difficult for

humanitarian relief to be delivered to these communities that so badly need it. so that's the crux of the problem here and i recognize that it's a problem of the united states and has prevented the kind of political progress that we would like to see inside of syria but even bigger problem for the russians primarily because it calls them to question their integrity and effectiveness to deal with the puppet regime that they're maintaining in syria, but it also raises questions because there's an internal contradiction in the strategy that they have failed to resolve. they say that a political transition is necessary but yet they are deeply invested in propping up the assad regime and the more they prop up the assad regime the more difficult it is to effect the political transition. i believe it's been an impediments of the united states making progress in the direction

that we would like to see which is end of violence inside of syria, trying to get the chaos under control and thereby make it more difficult for extremist organizations to operate there, because of the russians and inability or refuse -- refusal to exercise some influence over the assad regime, it's only continued to fuel the kind of extremism that the russians i think are rightly worried about. this is ongoing discussion between secretary kerry and russian counterpart. i don't have a detail update of the conversations. we have been clear about what it is we need to see and what we

need to see is we need to see a clear commitment demonstrated in real life on the ground that the russians and the syrian government are willing to live up to the commitments that they made almost six months ago. >> i guess i'm trying to understand how to read that wind-up, whether it was indication that you -- that the talks are going in a direction where you don't think that the russians and the assad regime are making the type of concessions that you would need to see for the type of military -- [inaudible] >> again, i probably don't speak the kind of blunt diplomatic -- let me say it this way, i probably don't speak the nuance diplomatic talk that maybe valued in other agencies, but we

have been pretty clear about this. we are not seeking concessions. we are seeking the russian government living up to the commitments that they've made. they've made commitments six months ago and for several weeks, there's skepticism when they made commitments about their willingness or ability to follow through on them and i think everyone was pleasantly surprised there did seem to be a commitment on the part of the russians both in terms of their own activities and both using influence of the assad regime to scale back military activities in a way that allowed for much improved, though not perfect humanitarian access and created

space for diplomatic and political negotiations. but over the last several months, we've seen the commitment to hostility fray in far too many communities particularly around elapa and that has led to a situation where the humanitarian situation that was already terrible has somehow gotten even worse. the political talks are struggling if they're doing anything and the russian activities only fuel extremism in that country. now, because of the efforts of the united states in counterisil coalition, we have been able to address a lot of that and isil is under a lot of pressure in syria and we have made important

progress on the ground. >> the sharing housing option aging in place with company and we are delighted to have andy with us on behalf of the society of certified senior advisers and positive aging, thank you for being here. i would like to share a little bit about anne mary. she advocates for adults, specially older singles to having a home mate, someone they can share cost, company and comfort. her book sharing housing, a guide book for finding and keeping good house mates gives readers to select right home mates, 20 years of personal experience of living in shared housing and combined with experience and inner personal relationships. as an instructional designer, training professional, she has

worked with clients in fortune 100 firms, small businesses, the federal government as well as nonprofits, currently she offers a patient sympathetic coaching services to seniors and other in managing their digital devices. she found cheering housing and educational organization dead -- dedicate today providing resources to individual, finding and keeping good home mates and maintains a blog at sharinghousing.com. please join me in welcoming anna marie. [applause] >> thank you, mic is on? everything is good? okay. >> the question always starts with how did i get here and why. the answer is i spent over 25 years living in shared housing. the first picture up there is kind of like the triple decker i

lived in summerville for eight years, post graduate school and i had an apartment i adored and i shared it with two other people and it was a four-bedroom apartment and i just stayed, other people got married, moved on, did things but i was there for eight years until i finally left and actually moved to washington, d.c. for a relationship, when that relationship broke up, i was like, what do i do now, and in my community a single mom whose boyfriend was leave forking a year and i lived at a ranch house that looked like that. he came back from hungary, okay, time to do something else, what am i going to do, i was like, i know i don't like living alone so that's unusual, i knew i didn't want to live alone. i was like, a, i get it. i buy the house, i find the

house mates. the bottom picture is actually my house in silver spring. i lived there for ten years. it was a four-bedroom house and i had two house mates in it. one guest room, two house mates for over the ten-year period. sometime in that period of time, my dear friend deb was complaining about her finances on the phone with me and i said, well, you have an asset, use it. rent a room in your house. she's like, i don't know how to do that. and i snapped and went, well, i do. she said, will you coach me and that got me thinking about it and it's true that literally the next day i wrote the outline for the book. i was on a bus from silver spring to new york. i remember it well. i wrote the outline and then it sat around for five, six years and there was the day when i said, are you going to do that

project or not. i was like, okay, i will do it. so i wrote the book. after writing the book did i ask myself who is this for. [laughter] >> it's not for the millennials. they don't know that they have to have a process. what i realized was that it's for us and i wrote the book -- oh, i'm ahead of myself. here we go. these are the objections to sharing housing. okay. so i put this right at the beginning of my talk because i want you to know that i know this. these are the objections and i

think it's a full set. anybody have one that's up -- that's not up here? it's not allowed. [inaudible] >> okay. if people are thinking for themselves, these are generally the ones that they think about. so i have answers to them, i'm not going to answer them right now but i want you to -- go ahead. [inaudible] >> she said i'm fearful of having a stranger in the house. perfect. that's what my book is about. it's how do you actually select somebody that would be what i call a home mate, how do you go from stranger to home mate. there are some really -- oh, i'm going backwards. come on.

some of the data, look what's true. so single people by themselves, living by themselves, ages 55 to 59, these are percentages, you can see what happens. there's an enormous amount of people who are living by themselves. why? well, for a number of reasons, i'm going to get ahead of myself again. we just do it in our culture and you can see how high the 60% of 80 and over are living by themselves. that's because spouses have died and they don't know other options. the reasoning why this is so important to me in part is because of this, so on the left-hand side those three columns are what it costs for a single person to support their daily living expenses by the

month. this is 2014 data from an organization, i have it written down. no mortgage 16,000 -- 1600, rent 1900, with mortgage 2,400. here is the average social security payment for a man 1200, almost 1300, for a woman it's a thousand. this is averages, of course. there is a crisis coming and actually i already feel it. i'm getting my -- i'm getting emails from people. i'm going to be on the street in two weeks, i'm going to be on the street in six months. i don't know what to do. mona is nodding her head because she gets it. it's huge and even if you have more money, then that -- there's

a problem coming. so successful aging says that you should have good health, strong friendship, the ability to participate in activity and good family relationships. also that the living environment should be affordable and appropriate. so i am on a campaign to convince people that we could, in fact, share housing and that this is an individual decision. people like -- some people want to come and say, you know, can you find me a program that will find me somebody and i say, no, you're an individual, you need to do your own work, but what i want to do next is to talk -- have you explored the benefits and i promise an interactive exercise and here is the way it's going to go.

how many people in this room, everybody takes one, some of you are going to get two. thank you, mona. and on this card that i'm handing out you are given a reason, a benefit for sharing housing. and just keep passing them out and you can give people more than one. read your benefit and take it in, think about it for a second. think about how you relate to it, yeah, give him the last one. and now what i am going to ask you to do is to -- when i say go, stand up and find one more -- i want you to stand up because we are going to do this

more than once and even though the room doesn't -- isn't perfect. i want you to meet up with one other person, tell the other person what's on your card, what your benefit is and how you relate to it, the other person listens, absorbs questions and then you're going to turn it around so that the listener becomes the talker, you have it? you have three minutes for this whole series and then i'm going to yell stop and we will check out things are going, okay? everybody clear on what you're doing? [inaudible] >> you each get a minute and a half, you're self-regulated. i'm not going to yell in a minute and a half, maybe i will. we'll see. i should. are you ready? everybody got theirs? get up and go.

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

>> okay. that's a minute and a half.

[inaudible conversations] >> okay. time. stop, just stop. trade with the person you've been talking to, trade, trade your card. we are going to do the same thing but go and talk to somebody brand new. go.

[inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> ten seconds.

okay. stop. hello, everybody. that's two rounds. we are going to do one more round, trade cards again, go find somebody you haven't talked to yet. go.

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> okay, that's half way.

[inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> okay. that's it. find your seats. [inaudible conversations] >> where are you sitting? okay. all right. as you find your seats, what i'm going to do is hand out -- pass them to the front so it's easy for me to find them. i'm going to hand out one liners

on what i think are the 22 benefits for sharing housing, what you guys have been talking about, i think you each heard about four a piece, four, five? four. all right. and i will give you a chance to take a look at that. i gave one right there. anybody not have it? if you want a full write-up of all of those, i'm happy to e-mail them to you. i have this high-tech way of collecting emails but if you would put it down and then i will talk to you some more -- you're reading, i can tell you. i am going to let you read for a second.

>> so very powerful, but, she shared with one of her cards, you know, having an intern. intern. >> absolutely. >> even if it wasn't for long-term. just for them to do, maybe they need to landscaping or maybe they need to do whatever it is and then as we go forward, like advertise for students as an intern. >> excellent. other thoughts, reactions from this exercise? right behind you. >> the interesting thing is i

see a few of these things, without, in not such formal ways. and you're right. your list of objections was right on the button. the question is why can't us get past the barrier of those objections? so you move the conversation a little bit but i think the conversation is right on. someone breezily asked me if i did want a roommate, a guy who i know who is a nice guy who's looking for way to move out from the woman relationship he was with the didn't work and i have a spare room. i have all those objections are in the thing is, i might would like to have rick as a roommate so you're making me think very hard. >> good. we will talk more about objections in a bit. of the reactions, thoughts? >> i had not considered the

value of community in sharing a meal. but when i was single or about six years, i thought back to when i read that part and i thought back to my experience of finding people who would be my meal made. i love to cook. i hate cleaning out. i had a couple of friends, i guess a volunteer. i had a number of female friends who have volunteered to do that, and i would have of the '70s of the week i would usually at least five where i had, i had meal mates as i call them. >> lovely. lovely. good example. we thank you. >> i had not considered the sustainability green/reduced footprint, about the housing peace, about taken when building with its brick-and-mortar and

the resources to keep it warm and cool with the water running, but that's kind of responsible. >> absolutely. to say nothing of the toasters in the toaster ovens. i think the millennials armor onto that then we are unnecessary the other reactions? i'm going to move forward. i hope. so basically i put them, all of these benefits into these buckets. there is a financial bucket, the cost. i talked about earlier that's kind of obvious. and is, in fact, the reason why most people think about it, sharing housing. they get to a paying point where they go what am i going to do? right? because people don't like change. what did we hear this morning? movie is the third most traumatic event in a person's life. for any age. just imagine. however, hold on.

so the financial is kind of obvious. except that i'm going to add that even if you can afford your housing and so on and so forth, what would an extra $6000 a year due? that dream trip? college education for somebody in the family, et cetera. i mean, what was that? [inaudible] might pay for their books, okay. and, of course, there's help, and there's help both with tasks and in emergencies. having a homemade makes it really easy for me to be here. i have a dog and a cat. guess who's taking care of them while i'm here. piece of cake. living by yourself now so easy. such as the task stuff, emergencies, how about the car brixton and i need help getting

to the mechanic? it's so much asia for somebody who is living with you to help you, then not, were picking up chicken soup. and on the aging scale, having a homemate, someone who's had a hip replacement and the like, they can go home because there's someone there who is going to shop. i'm not talking about how mates as caretakers. that's an important discussion but the basic nice things that we do that people come couples take for granted, and would you don't have that person in your life anymore, you go back, all those things i took for granted. and, finally, and most importantly for me is the companionship peace, and this is what it is becoming a social

mission for me. i we are wired to be socially connected. this is the way we lived as human beings until fairly recently in western european history. they were homemates. they were servants but they shared an effort but they shared a rough. they're engaged in each other's lives. it's really very, very recently an american time that we don't have this servant relationship at home. usually people laugh when they see that. thanks. this is the myth.

this is a pervading american myth. the cowboy and the west, the individualization. i can take care of myself. i am a grown-up, and as a grown-up i live by myself. but guess what. the west was not one by him. and west want to sort of a bad terminology these days anyway. the west was settled by people in covered wagon trains. there were people gather together. the house got built with barnraising and suchlike. this myth, this american myth is really hurtful and there's some very interesting research coming out about how important connectedness is too emotional health. this is what we have done.

there's lots of neighborhoods around this part of the world that look like that. not match where i live in vermont, but we kind of idealized the single-family house. but the problem, so the problem is that people start feeling left out. people who are by themselves start feeling like everybody else is having a grand time, not me. and it's a child is the motion. that's what i pictures of kids. it's that, nobody wants to play with me, kind of feeling. the thing is that being a lonely in our society is shameful. we won't admit it. we admit depression much more fast, quickly than loneliness.

and it is estimated that there are 24-16 million people in this country who are at risk for chronic loneliness. there are 27% of households of single occupancy. think there might be a connection? it's not perfect. but i think that there is a connection. so feeling left out, this shameful of people, everybody else is having a good time, i'm not, can lead to a kind of loneliness. and the loneliness that is felt, i actually owe this to psychiatrists who teach at harvard medical school who wrote a book called drifting apart in the 21st century. and what they realized is that

the students coming to them for counseling saying they were depressed, who were lonely. who were lonely, and that once they started building relationships, they started feeling better. so what does loneliness do? it's a deeply destructive hurt. it fires the same parts of the brain as physical pain. it fires the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex in the brain, and it's a physical pain. so what is the person supposed to do when you feel pain? fix it, right ?-que?-que x that's what you do when you're hungry. you go eat. how do you fix the loneliness? in this society.

>> medication. >> that's how you masked it. it's really hard and i think i'm so passionate about this because in my 30s, even with housemates i was desperate to get how to socialize. i was desperate. and i will admit that i finally found scottish country dancing, and that was my little group. unless you go to a bar, go to church for some people but an awful lot of people that doesn't work. so how do you have community, how do you get connected? the thing about being lonely is that it can lead to chronic loneliness. and chronic loneliness has huge health consequences. so five sort of overlapping

pathways, and i owe this to a book by dr. john -- i think that's how you pronounce his name -- at the university of chicago. his book is called loneliness. one is health behaviors but it turns out that people who are lonely are more likely to deal with their pain by inappropriate behaviors. defeat more fat. be more chocolate. people living alone drink twice as much alcohol per capita is people who don't. they are less likely to exercise, to take care of themselves, kind of the -- when they are exposed to stressors like an interaction with a neighbor, you are more likely to experience it as a negative event.

they become like that little dog that needs that you. they did aggressive towards others because they are so lonely. it's so sad. it becomes a vicious cycle. but their ability to understand that good things are happening to them is diminished. sal were that you might smile at somebody and someone who is not only smiles back at si, the only person says, why are they smiling at me? what do they want from the? really scary. we are not supposed to be so disconnected. they also experience helplessness and threat more often. so i was at -- were was i? i was that some kind of conferencing and i had a woman talk to me about how, she's living in a great big house by herself and she got totally

freaked out by is outside, so that she was hiding in a closet, called the police. the thing about having somebody else around is that you somebody to check in with, like that would have been? that's just mac downstairs. it changes your perception. right? along those lines slightly different, but elderly people are subject to all kinds of financial scams by telephone. how much better it would be to get off the phone and say, to somebody, hey, you know, this guy just called me. it changes the openness to the scam, i think, okay? they are less likely to be optimistic and engaged. i'm talking about chronic loneliness. i'm talking about the extension,

but i think that's where a lot of our seniors who are living by themselves get to, especially as they get less mobile. a lifetime network of friends begins to diminish, and spouses. it just happens. so there's all kinds of increased stress hormones that happen, which upset the chemical balances of the body with diminished immunity to disease, and also increased blood pressure. we know that people who are chronically lonely are more likely to think about committing suicide, for instance. and we know, i think you know this, that people who are

chronically lonely have a greater risk of early mortality than smokers. it's the real thing. chronic loneliness is a problem in this country, and it's very expensive. people t of lebanon are twice as likely to go to doctors. guess why. the doctor is someone they can talk to. i think it's one of the reasons why people go shopping so much in our society. you go to the mall and see people. i feel like i can see, because if they so much attention thinking about this, i feel like i can see the chronic lonely people in the supermarket. so sad. and they don't get the kind of arrest that non-lonely people get. they may sleep the same kind of hours, but they don't get deep

recuperative sleep. they don't. so where am i going with this? i got -- why do i have a truck? well, you know the boiling water analogy, most people here do. you throw the dog -- frog in boiling water, he wil would jump out. if you put the frog in and turn come into cold water and turn the heat up, he never realizes he is in danger and he doesn't jump. we are so much more advanced than frogs, but we are super adaptable. and my guess is that a lot of people start falling into the

loneliness thing without realizing it. and then it's really hard to get out of it once you were there. so my recommendation is that people get a housemate. i was happy you use the word just like the. it'that's the word i am trying o going because college in camp people have roommates, okay? we don't want roommates. we don't really want housemates. what we want is we want somebody who makes a home with us, when we can feel comfortable. so this is my definition of housemate. you have to like and respect the person, no question about that. then your way of living at home has to be compatible enough that

you are both comfortable living together. so for instance, i was once interviewed on the radio by a woman who said when i got divorced i thought i might like living in a group house. it didn't work out so great. i said, can ask you about that? this is live radio. she said sure. so she says, i set them so how it happen? she said i went to the interview. i fell in love with this house, a great big old victoria kennedy amherst mass., a great location. i saw dirty dishes in the sink and i thought i could handle it. six months later she was moving out. because she can't stand dirty dishes in the sink. and once she moved and she felt like she had a right to insist on her standards. of course, she did. so what i'm about is helping people make the selection process appropriately so that it

works, okay? and that's what my book does. i'm going to tell you about some people. so here's are -- try to the best person i have on my blog post, i tried them on collecting interviews of people who are actual sharing housing with him and someday there will be hundreds of these up there. arnie lives in concord, new hampshire. is run for governor twice, unsuccessfully. she is spent her life in public service. she does the progressive radio show now. she has what she calls her accordion house. it's a three-story big georgian mansion that in and bought once upon a time, and the and left it, she took care of the aunt

who lives on the second floor and then a transvestite and she and her did with her husband, and then her husband died. life in public service, no money. so what did she do? cheeselike okay, got to rent space. the second floor she brings out to law students. it's four blocks away from her house. she went to the same law school and they come and they go and they come from all over the world. she even rinse a wall in the living room of the second floor of to a labor organizing group and they come one day a week and use the desk which is on the wall in the bulletin board in the have a printer. ..

what happened was she was, add messy divorce. she was dean at northwestern. they shared a room on traveling for conferences, and the other dean said to her, you don't want to rent an apartment come live with me. 30 years. 30 years. we never talked about it, and the friend i was staying with, i

was shore they were a couple. some people thought that, and that's not the way it was. >> wonderful, my point is, there have been people and are people who do share housing without being a big deal. they just do it. it's just normal, they fell into it, in a good way. one of the things pat said when she got invitedded the dean said to her, i know you're neat, because they shared their hotel room. just stay out of my kitchen. that was fine with her. she didn't like to cook. her house mate cooked for her and she would clean things up. so, those are two stories, questions, comments?

irony having that, air b & b and the other with pat and i call it a life mate. those are radically different. i imagine that those are the two extremes on the continuum, although maybe it isn't much greater than that. but those are, how do you find those situations closer to the life partner type because i can imagine that has to be a challenge to have that air b & b, where you don't like the person, and they can be gone in three days. >> perfect. i'm headed in that direction. find out if the there are any other comments. questions or thoughts? >> how do you find a good mate. i'll come back to to you.

>> you don't want that to happen, right? that's literally the first image that my nephew drew from my book and we don't wanna to happen. so, i'm going to give you the brief overview of the system. the process, which is fullly documented. so i have in new monna kwer called places. the physical piece is the real estate piece. how big is the room. does it have closets and all that kind of stuff. and then you have likes, and mona talked about the must haves and deal breakers. and, the can't live withs. but, what's so incredibly

important is that you know what those are. because those are what give you your road. anything that doesn't go that road, didn't work. so, i want to have a sat and a dog. if somebody says no, that's a deal-breaker. that's the primary and first place i think is to get clear on two you are, and what makes home comfortable for you. yeah. then there's again nation requirely ads, and, how do you tell people that you're looking. >> some people use craig's list.

>> all that is goal-setting stuff. what is it you're looking for? who are you looking for? what are you offering? who are are you and then the financials. i like craig's list because i think it has become the place where everybody goes. there's all kind of built in anonymity, and use it safely. the next one is contact.

contact for me is you, either an email or a phone conversation where you first, you get that first feel for the person. now, in lewis' case he knows the person so the ad doesn't work but getting clear on must haves and can't live with and the other persons. if somebody is only looking for a place to live and not thinking about the relationship. that's a problem. and then you have the whole evaluation phase. that is big phase. first piece of the evaluation phase, is a telephone conversation, if this is somebody you never met before. but a basic who are you, why are you looking? what is going in your life?

because you're talking to the person, you're getting a feel for who they are. if your gut is the saying, don't like this person, that's when you just stop. it's not going to get better. trust your gut. the telephone conversation makes it easy to say, you know i don't think this is going to work out. good luck, thank you. >> much harder to do face-to-face. in the personal area, i think that i might be looking at well, why don't we try this out for a month? let's do a probation kind of thing. i totally believe in that testing territory. should there be a green light on the telephone conversation and,

the a red light for me, is i'm being thrown out of where i am. okay. obvious things. also, in the evaluation phase two people in the space, that they would be sharing so, the person coming in, sees the space, get the house tour, what if they take one look at the room, no way, i can't live here. stop. that's happened. my friend has a group house. she had had a wonderful conversation with the woman on the phone. the woman she opened the door, and went no. it was mutual. they did a fake house tour.

so, the next piece of the evaluation is the one that i think is so critical and it's so critical that i created something that i call the home make compatibility assessment. and the idea is that, it allows people to think through the basic stuff about what does it take to live comfortably in my house? what am i? the other person takes it is and then they share their answers, it makes for deep conversation. i have watched t. i'm blogging about it, i'm writing a story of two people because i think people don't quite understand it. finally, is security. and what security means to her is, reference checking. absolutely very important. i don't care if you have known

the person for five years. who has lived with them? who else knows them? beat ways. my sister didn't do it, my own sister. i'm a good judge of character. six weeks later she continue wait to get rid of the person. >> this is not credit checking, it's what is this person like to live with? you want somebody to say they're wonderful. i was so sorry when they moved across the country. and then the final piece of security is the exchange of money for key. money has to stay clean. so money key. okay. that was a quick one. go ahead. >> what do you mean, and the

change of money for keep it go clean? >> so, what i mean is that, if, so whatever the financial arrangement might be. first month and last month, deposit for smoke, whatever that is. it shouldn't be, i don't quite have it, i'll give it to you in two weeks. that's way mean. the money piece needs to be non issue. by clean i mean non issue. this is what i offer. this is sharing housing. the book, the work book is available in the store. i'm starting a class and doing a video conference class, four sections discovering sharing housing. and i'm going to keep going

because i am passionate about this. what are you going to do? i want you to take this message, and i want you to talk to people. it's not an easy sell. moving is hard. thinking about changing your life. privacy, yes. but you can have privacy in certain rooms. people need to be able to make the change.susyn said no, and she says, i think i'm going to buy a copy of your book and she add roommate and this is fabulous. she sold her condo and living in

somebody else's house. so the first time people hear it, they are not going to say yes. they just need keep hearing t. so that's my final idea from margaret i think there's someone, who is concerned when you don't come home at night. >> i'm watching the time so i didn't ask for questions before. >> thank you so much. on behalf of the positive aging conference and the society of senior advisers, we're grateful. just a reminder, everyone is invited to the reception that begins at 7 p.m. i also want to make you aware of a special executive briefing

that will happen at 5:30 in the california room with the director of public policy for the aferlds association. please join me and then you can move onto the president's reception afterwards. so again, thank you very much. and thank you all. >> sharing housing is the key to the dilemma to our age group. there's two issues, the importance of contracts.

and the other has to do with overcoming people's resistance. it's like your friend, i would never think of it. i would never do that. i like living alone. i don't want anybody in my house. can you say a few words about those things? >> okay, so, contracts. i'm not a lawyer. so i'm very careful about what i suggest to people and not suggest to people. i think that coming out of the compatibility conversation you will then have a whole bunch of agreement that's, and you can document them. i have a couple here. i'm a little less, and this is just ana marie talking, i never had leases with my home mates.

and part of the reason for not having leases was, that, it changed some of the balance, and, if things went bad, the person who the lease could say i have a lease and i can be here. so, but i also never felt the need for it. >> no, i was in silver spring maryland. so, that's, you know, i'm sure that, a lot of people would argue about that. what was the other one? overcoming objections, resistance, they come and they listen and they walk. and they're isolated. how do you overcome? >> you just have to keep talking to them. so here's my big idea, i want to, i would love to see our

congress, no just the house, does taxes, the house make it, that the income that a person might gain from having somebody live with them, be tax-free. really? >> wouldn't that be interesting. because that would send a big message. how do you overcome objections. except for the fact, that many of us have great experience, memories of the 20s, when we lived in group houses. so the generation that's 80-plus which got married, and moved in with family and never lived with anybody else is one group of people.

but the common group is a group that did super experience living in group houses and many had happy experiences. and so the resistance may not be quite so strong. i think the resistance is about moving and stuff. >> yeah. >> anyway i'll pass the mike. what's unique with the issue of aging? so, what we're talking about here is, a home mate but not the distinction that might be unique around aging. do you see the inner again rakessal or same generation? >> when the shift from having a

home mate to needing care. i'm working on a book and that's going to be a chapter. okay. other than that, i'm not sure there is anything unique for aging people except for the fact that two people might be really wedded to their own houses and they don't want to leave their own houses. but, prison sill will a, i was hoping to come back to her. two moved into her house. and she said you know, yeah, it was a big pain to clean out the rooms. but it was so much less than cleaning out the whole house. moving into a smaller apartment or something like that. so, i don't know whether that

answers your question or not. >> two things, one that just came up, it's not unique to aging, and if you are going to be older and you would like to create a home, with this home mate, issues of design that make it more convenient for aging or less obvious for injury, and, more convenient for care giving should be consider as you're preparing this home. as that person becomes burdensome with health problems, earth one, if the home can help mitigate the problems, and that puts an advantage. >> lou wuz and i met through louise and karen, they sold it d

now live in florida together and hired lewis to help them create an apartment that is designed, to let them age, until they have to go in a coffin. >> i wrote a forward to their book and i got to be friends with them. the other thing is when people find out what i do, they pigeon hole me, and say, this is what i want. it's a combination, i want to live in a group house with, like college but nicer, cleaner, and, more respectful for privacy and it becomes something we were just talking about, more like a compound. because it is small scale co-housing. is there a compound, that, a

neighbor hood in fill, where it can be built. there's an organization in minnesota that are converting a convenient for group living. fabulous idea. any others? >> sorry. >> that's all the time we have. we have another session coming in, so, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> continue. [laughter]

>> so many things going wrong, if, in that opening speech, he said something, if we don't stop

this now it will be too late. >> on sunday at 7:30, urban radio network, april ryan moderates race in america, and, in relation to the news. including a examine nation of the rise in racial incidents and solutions. and then at 10 eastern, martinez, former twitter add surpriser talks about his book, which gives a perspective of the tech world. also this weekend, the washington post report's america's nuclear arsenal, he recounts his missions, and, international vice-president, on the movement to increase work

worker's wages. >> the founder for millennials, and, this is from the tech correct me if i'm wrong new york conference in early may. put down that coffee. for those that don't know, you should know, maybe you're at the wrong conference. griffey is a search engine for gifts, it lets you share gifts and create gifts and everything else you can do, so i guess, how i wanted to start the chat,

gifts have been around for a long time. why are not only publishers, and, platforms so excited about it, but consumers. it has been extraordinary. i'm wondering why now. >> the essential nature of gifts, they're videos. those have been around. we're always rernls scenes from movies, and, alluded to imagery, and t.v. that's it. the technology hasn't been there to share it. the printing press was invended and we could put out books and we wanted to capture, and you had to paint. and now they could put out givens the dee demand was there,

and the technology, hadn't caught up. you can see, we serve about over a billion gifses a day, and they want to share these moments to reference themselves to this kind of information and share them out and express themselves. >> you know, when we got on the phone to prep for this. we could talk about competition, and let's not do that, i think it's a good time talk about

competition. [laughter] >> google, run, everyone wants to be a part of this market. and you are dominant. but, you just acquired capture. awesome tool. you just put it our your screen. >> so you can buy it, but you can't buy like google. >> some day.

>> we're trying to make the entire space popular. anyone who is working in gifs technology, we want to work with you. and we want to work with everything. we've acquired gifs, and, now capture. so if you are working in gifs, it's a huge industry that's going to happen. we're making photographs move, and, if you think about the photo, and how many parts of the company are part of it, there's room for all of us. in terms of the gifs search engine, we're the largest and that's what we do. other people are keyboard and social networks. >> let's tab