MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
The U.S. has not built enough new homes for years. That means millions of people are living in places that are just old and falling into disrepair. Many of these people are seniors, struggling to stay put as they age. NPR's Jennifer Ludden reports on what that looks like for one couple.
JENNIFER LUDDEN, BYLINE: Pat Haskins' red brick home in Silver Spring, Maryland, is about as old as she is - 72. There are family photos everywhere and walls painted her favorite color.
PAT HASKINS: Purple. Purple. Purple.
LUDDEN: Purple, just like her toenails and slide-on sandals. Pat bought the house two decades ago, but living here has gotten harder as her partner, James, has suffered from diabetes.
P HASKINS: James has one leg. And he's blind, and he has kidney failure.
LUDDEN: Sitting outside on their steps, Pat shows how, for years, they struggled together to get him into the house.
P HASKINS: So he would sit down and just go one by one with his butt.
LUDDEN: Hauling himself up one step at a time while Pat grabbed under his arms to pull him up.
P HASKINS: That's why I have arthritis in my back, you know, because of helping him.
LUDDEN: They desperately needed a wheelchair ramp. Plus, the basement had started flooding when it rained. But like so many in older, cheaper housing, Pat could not afford those fixes. She'd been an elementary school science teacher with a small pension, but...
P HASKINS: I took my 30,000 out, and I put my daughter through college. I don't regret it, but if I had kept the money, I wouldn't need the help that I need.
LUDDEN: She's gotten help from a national nonprofit called Rebuilding Together, which makes repairs people need to stay put, especially seniors.
CHLOE BERNARDI: We are seeing it increase in terms of the need, but also the issues are becoming more significant.
LUDDEN: Chloe Bernardi heads the group's local chapter in Montgomery County, Maryland.
BERNARDI: We go in maybe for one issue, and we can identify four or five other issues that, if we're not fixing then and there, will become more magnified.
LUDDEN: One older couple, living with a son and grandchildren, spent a year with a hole in the roof, catching rain in buckets. And she says letting problems go gets expensive.
BERNARDI: We had replaced, last year, an HVAC system for a woman who was 100, living with one of her relatives, but didn't have heat so was running off oil, so her bill was 7-, $800 a month.
LUDDEN: Last year, she says requests for help shot up 400%. Nationally, most repair programs like this are underfunded, with yearslong waitlists. Todd Swanstrom, with the University of Missouri-St. Louis, says thousands of homes are lost to disrepair, making the affordable housing shortage worse. But it's a crisis that's often invisible.
TODD SWANSTROM: We don't see the black mold inside the house that gives a kid asthma or the fact that inadequate air conditioning means an elderly couple are suffering from heat stroke.
LUDDEN: Last year, Pat Haskins got a wheelchair ramp...
(SOUNDBITE OF RAMP CLANKING)
LUDDEN: ...And a fix for her basement flooding.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOOR CREAKING)
P HASKINS: I would come down the steps, and before I could get to the bottom step, it would come up past my ankle.
LUDDEN: The group Rebuilding Together patched a hole in the basement and directed water away from the outside stairwell where it had been gushing in.
P HASKINS: You want a pillow under your head?
JAMES HASKINS: Uh-uh.
LUDDEN: She checks on James in the bedroom.
P HASKINS: You just want to lay right here?
J HASKINS: Yeah.
LUDDEN: Pat doesn't know where they'd go if they had to leave. Even though plenty more things need fixing, her only plan is to stay here forever.
Jennifer Ludden, NPR News, Silver Spring, Maryland.
(SOUNDBITE OF SZA SONG, "SNOOZE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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