HN: New incentive system aims to boost senior housing

Prague, Aug 7 (CTK) - Czech towns as well as private investors will get credits totalling half a billion crowns for building flats for seniors this year and the sum will probably rise in the years ahead as the regulation of rents is ending and the Czech population is ageing, Hospodarske noviny (HN) writes yesterday.

The 30-year credits that may help build some 30 apartment houses are destined for small easy-access flats within reach of the community care service, HN writes.

"It is very a very important step. There is a big lack of small flats. The Czech Republic is behind the times," HN quotes Zdenek Pernes, head of the Czech Seniors Council.

The subsidised flats are to be minimally 25 square metres large, which is a trend of senior construction in New York, for instance, HN writes.

Until now people over 70 could gain a contract, now the age level will be lowered to 65 yeas of age, HN writes.

It says there are thousands of those who need to move flat while the size is not the sole problem.

Many people do not live in suitable conditions while the new flats will have larger windows from which even sitting or lying people can look out and doors will be broader for wheel-chairs, HN writes.

It says the new houses, in which the rents are to be reasonable unlike in commercial projects, will also offer assistance in cleaning or securing medicines.

HN writes that suitable senior building is of key importance for keeping elderly people outside expensive state-run and not much comfortable institutes.

Besides, these facilities are completely full already now. In Prague alone, there are 8,000 applicants per one free place.

($1=20.327 crowns