Accessible Living Blog

How to Make Your Home More Visitable

• By dwaldman
• April 8, 2014
• No Comments

How visitable is your home? Can people using wheelchairs, walkers or canes visit inside or would they have trouble even getting to the front door? Making a home visitable ensures that it will be a welcoming and inviting environment for everyone, from grandparents to babies in strollers. What are some basic changes you can make to make your home more welcoming? The answer is a national movement called Visitability.

The Visitability initiative was started by the nonprofit Concrete Change, which advocates for individuals with physical mobility disabilities by promoting visitable single-family housing through policy change. Many municipalities nationwide have enacted Visitability Laws for new home construction to ensure that they are constructed with accessibility in mind. Eleanor Smith, the founder of Concrete Change, noted the need for visitable homes, “When someone builds a home, they’re not just building it for themselves – that home is going to be around for 100 years. Accessible entrances hurt nobody – and they help a lot of other people.”

Visitability consists of three core principles:

1. A home should have a zero-step entrance

2. Door widths need to be at least 32-inches

3. A home should have a usable half-or full-bathroom located on the first floor

A zero-step entrance can be achieved at any entrance to the home. When constructing a new home, the front entrance can be graded to create a gradual slope from there to the sidewalk or driveway. If community standards require steps at the front of the home, a zero-step entrance can be similarly created at the side or back of the home. When renovating an existing home, creating a zero-step entrance can be more challenging. Many older homes feature a high front entrance with several steps, necessitating that a ramp be built up to the front door or up to the porch level of a back entrance.

Installing doorways that are at least 32-inches wide ensures that individuals using mobility devices, such as a wheelchair, can enter a home. When constructing a new home make sure to work closely with the architect and builder to install 32- to 36-inch doorways. Wider doorways are preferred and can be built at minimal extra cost. In an existing home, widening the doorway may not feasible or may be cost-prohibitive. In either case, consider installing swing clear hinges. Swing clear hinges have an offset pivot point that allows the door to swing completely clear of the opening. These hinges can add up to two inches of clearance to a doorway, making them easier to navigate when using a mobility device.

A half- or full-bathroom on the first floor is a necessity for individuals who cannot navigate stairs. The bathroom needs to be large enough for a wheelchair to maneuver in: a 60-inch turning radius is sufficient for most wheelchairs. Additional accessibility features can be incorporated into the design so that a person seated in a wheelchair can use the sink and toilet. The sink should be no higher than 34 inches and should be open underneath so an individual using a wheelchair can roll under. Installing grab bars by the toilet will provide stability to a person with a mobility disability. Avoid placing rugs or mats in these bathrooms as they can cause tripping hazards or become stuck in wheelchair wheels.

Whether you are building a new home or renovating an existing one, consider adding the three features of Visitability. Planning ahead helps to reduce the costs of improvements and makes sure that they can be easily integrated within the design of the home.  Making a home visitable makes it more accessible for everyone and provides lasting benefits for current and future homeowners.