Watch Sara Connell interview Silvernest CEO Wendi Burkhardt for the Women Starting Movements Series.

Silvernest, Encore and Service Year Alliance are partnering to bring affordable housing to young people committed to a service year in San Jose, California!

Whether it's because of financial pressure or desire for social connection, millions of Boomers across the US are turning to homesharing. This TODAY Show segment with NBC's Geoff Bennett shows two real Silvernest housemates enjoying their shared living space and talking about why they made the decision to homeshare.

While renting out space in your home might get you into a lease, homesharing can give you a new lease on life. Denver residents Eileen and Jeanne discovered many unexpected benefits of co-housing when they signed up for Silvernest and found each other. “I’ve never lived with someone so interested in my life,” says Eileen. “It’s lovely to have a friend in the home. I’d be happy if Jeanne stayed indefinitely.”

Oil and water. Fire and ice. Teacher salaries and Bay Area housing costs. These are all examples of things that simply don’t mix.

At least for the last one, however, there is a creative solution available. Based on the success of our educator homesharing initiatives in Denver and Miami, Silvernest worked with Teach For America and Encore.org to help young teachers find affordable housing in an expensive city. This time we helped Teach For America educators in the notoriously expensive San Francisco Bay Area!

Silvernest, City Year and Encore.org are partnering to bring affordable housing to City Year AmeriCorps Members in Miami!

Silvernest and Teach For America partnered to bring affordable housing to educators in Colorado!

The San Francisco Bay Area is a desirable place to live, to say the least. Its natural beauty and thriving job market attract people from around the world. But with all the migration to the Bay comes a well-publicized housing crisis. One study recently proclaimed San Francisco's the highest rents on the planet. Single-family homes are selling for an average $1.35 million, and paying $3,500/month in rent is the norm. So what can be done? And is the solution right under our noses? 

In cities across the US, affordable housing is a major challenge. It's no secret that older adults on a fixed income struggle to contend with rising housing prices and property taxes, but plenty of other groups are impacted as well—including teachers, civil servants, veterans, and others. With its concentrated population and demographics, the city of Washington, DC is particularly hard-hit by these housing-related issues. What makes Silvernest and DC a good match? Let’s explore the benefits of homesharing for our nation’s capital.

Home is a very important, personal place. It’s where you feel secure enough to be yourself, unwind, and sleep at night. Sharing this space with another person can be a life-changing experience, but it’s not without complexity. Homesharing is about much more than finding a stranger to rent out a spare room—it’s about creating a living arrangement with a compatible housemate that offers financial, social, health, and many other kinds of benefits.