“You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”

— Mahatma Gandhi

Photo for The Union by John Hart

Greg Zaller removes a piece of siding on a house he is refurbishing for senior housing.

I'm just sticking my neck out because I think it needs to be done.

It's a common dilemma — as Americans age, they find it difficult to reconcile the desire for independence with the need for social and medical support.

A senior, living alone, often ends up needing a little extra help. But for people who don't qualify for subsidized assistance at home, few interim steps exist between living in their own house and moving into a care facility.

Greg Zaller aims to change that.

Zaller, a community organizer and builder, and Laurie Porter, a teacher at Nevada Union High School, saw the need for seniors to have an active, meaningful and independent life within the safety of a family-like atmosphere at affordable prices.

Zaller, who often buys distressed properties to fix up and resell, said he first got the idea for his nonprofit CoLiving Network after looking at "huge houses" that no one wanted.

They're starting in Nevada County, which has one of the oldest populations in California and hundreds of large houses on the market.

The multi-bedroom dinosaurs seemed like the perfect solution for a problem that Zaller noticed while visiting his mother-in-law in a local seniors-only neighborhood — care facilities don't always provide an environment in which seniors can thrive.

"There's nothing for them to do except sit around, maybe do some crafts, and wait for dinner," he said. "And the food's not that healthy."

Seniors need a sense of purpose and they need to maintain a healthy lifestyle, Zaller said. He conceived of the network as a place where people would help each other — a collaboration where each member's talents could be put to good use.

And a big piece of that puzzle would be creating homes where compatible groups of seniors could live and combine their resources.

Zaller bought a five-bedroom house in foreclosure on Gold Hill Drive and set about making it as "senior-friendly" as possible. Planned improvements include a wheelchair ramp and a wheelchair lift to downstairs bedrooms.

"I'm just sticking my neck out because I think it needs to be done," he said. "If it doesn't work, I'll try something else."

The house will be permanently leased to CoLiving Network, which will then sublet the rooms. The house might be inter-generational, with a single mother receiving help with child care while providing transportation assistance, Zaller explained.

Healthy meals and their preparation would be shared and household governance would involve each member. CoLiving Network will provide regular scheduled visits by volunteers or staff, assistance with finding, auditing and coordinating outside providers for home chores, bookkeeping, transportation or shopping, and guidance with making homes accessible and senior-friendly.

Since CoLiving Network provides no care, no licensing is needed, Zaller said.

More homes would be added as the project matures, he said.

Some have questioned the financial feasibility of the project, but Zaller is undaunted. By renting rooms out for about $500 a month, he hopes to show the arrangement can be profitable for other investors, using the Gold Hill Drive house as a test case.

"A lot of people say there will be a tremendous demand" for such housing options, he said.

An open house scheduled for Sunday will help Zaller assess that level of interest.

"We'll see where it goes from here," he said.

Zaller has been involved with several community projects, both locally and overseas. In 2006, he partnered with Habitat for Humanity, selling the nonprofit a parcel of land in Grass Valley on which they built five houses. More recently, he founded Little World Community Organization, which has opened 21 schools serving 2,100 Pakistani students, most of them women learning to read and write.

©2009 Swift Communications, Inc.