Where's a Nexer to Go?

A few years ago, we began to see a change in the active-adult market. The nexers (leading-edge baby boomers) were turning 50, and their attitudes and lifestyle were clearly different from the active adults that came before them. In order to understand where they are going, we continue our research by showing focus group participants actual site designs, product and floor plans that seem - from what we know so far - to appeal to nexers.

Taking what we learned from the nexers as they shared their perspective of their future and how their housing needs fit into that, we developed a number of product ideas. We put these ideas into tangible concept statements that described new community formats and supported these concepts with renderings of site designs, elevations and floor plans that might appeal to the nexers.

Our second-phase interviews using these test materials began with nexers in the Philadelphia/southern New Jersey area. We are excited about the way they were received and the new insights we were able to draw from this group.

Next Stop: Washington.
Our next interviews will be in Washington, an area culturally and environmentally very different from the Philadelphia/southern New Jersey market and also considerably different in home types and existing community development. We expect to find very interesting idiosyncrasies reflecting the culture of Washington-area nexers.