Growing old together

Unlike a nursing home, group decides how they want to live’.

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Retired teacher Tesha Martinez and her husband swapped their home in the bustling city for a new life in Mexico’s first cohousing project for silver-haired citizens.

It was a decision motivated in part by a wariness of nursing and retirement homes in a country whose family-oriented culture means relatives have traditionally cared for the elderly.

On a plot of land surrounded by forests and mountains, a group of 30 senior citizens have built six houses in Malinalco, a peaceful tourist town about 100km from Mexico City.

Six of them already live at “La Guancha” – where there are plans to build nine more houses – while the rest come and go, but hope to eventually spend the rest of their lives there.