The dark walk to the bathroom at night

Older eyes need more light for the same detail, take longer to adjust from dark to bright and get more trouble from glare. A hallway that looked fine at 50 can hide a rug edge or a step at 80. In a lot of houses the switches are also in the wrong place for how people actually move at night.

On the assessment we walk the night path from the bed to the bathroom and mark where the light runs out. We check the light on the stairs, over the kitchen counters, at the front door and in the closets, and the glare off bare bulbs and shiny floors. We also try the switches in the dark and look at whether each step's edge stands out from the step below it.

Light is one of the cheapest fixes in the house and one of the most often skipped. Motion lights along the path to the bathroom come on by themselves, so nobody gropes for a switch. Brighter, even fixtures replace dim ones in the halls and on the stairs, and under-cabinet lights cover the counter. The right fixtures and shades tame the glare. High-contrast switch plates and stair nosing make switches and step edges easy to spot. These are small jobs, and they usually go in early because they help every other room.

Lamps left on all day because the ceiling light isn't enough. Trips or bumps that happen at night, or always in the same hall or stairway. Someone who stops going down to the basement after dark. Glasses that work fine in daylight and not in a dim room. All of these point to light, which is one of the easiest problems in the house to fix. The assessment checks the light on every daily route, after dark as well as by day, and an evening visit shows us the hall at the hour it matters.