Why older houses are tight
The median owner-occupied home in the US is about 41 years old, according to the 2023 American Community Survey, and only about 10 percent of homes are ready for aging, by Census Bureau analysis. Older houses tend to have narrow bathroom and bedroom doors and halls with tight turns. Those were fine on two feet. Nobody built them with a walker or a chair in mind.
What we measure
On the assessment we measure the doors on the routes that get used every day, which means the bedroom, the bathroom, the kitchen and the main entry. We check hall widths and turns, the thresholds a wheel or a walker has to cross, and where a rail along the wall would help. If a wheelchair is in use or likely, we also measure the floor space it needs to turn around once it's through the door.
How it gets fixed
A door can be widened, rehung on offset hinges that gain some width without touching the frame, or given a lever handle that opens with an elbow. Thresholds come out or get ramped, and hall rails give a steady hold on a long walk. Most doors in the house can stay as they are. The report names the ones on daily routes and leaves the rest alone.
When a wheelchair or walker is new
Often the problem shows up the day a walker or wheelchair arrives, after a surgery or a hospital stay, when the family finds out the bathroom door is too narrow and the hall turns too tight. Tell us what equipment is coming home and we measure for that exact walker or chair. In a rental, offset hinges and portable threshold ramps come back out, and we write the request to the landlord for anything that doesn't.
Which doors come first
The bathroom door usually comes first, because that's the one trip nobody can skip. Then the bedroom, then the main entry. Halls get rails where the walk is long or there's nothing to hold on to. The report puts all of it in order, so the doorways used most get fixed before the rest.
Questions families ask
Does every door in the house need widening?
No. Only the doors on the routes a person uses every day, usually the bedroom, the bathroom and one entry. The report lists exactly which ones.
The fix
Wider frames, level thresholds and hall rails, sometimes with a lift where the route has to change floors. The work lives under wheelchair ramps and home access, with help from stair lifts and mobility and flooring and fall prevention.