Last year, 17% of homebuyers purchased a home for multigenerational living, making it the highest share recorded since the National Association of Realtors started collecting this data.

There are a lot of reasons buyers might purchase a home with extra space for family, such as caring for aging parents or kids that move back in after college. But for Savannah Melendez, 27, buying a home for herself and her mother in Anchorage, Alaska, was born out of necessity.

After a cancer diagnosis in 2015 and a partial pelvic reconstruction in 2023, walking became a challenge for Estela Melendez, Savannah’s mother — let alone getting up the three flights of stairs to their apartment.

“The home purchase felt so unobtainable at that point for a 20-something-year-old,” Melendez said. “But I really wanted to intervene and make sure that my mom was taken care of the way that she had taken care of so many people her entire life.”

To hear more of Melendez’s story, click the audio player above.