Inside the Singapore shophouse where assisted living comes with a social club

This is the story of seven older adults who live together in a shophouse in Singapore.

Some days, the space fills with people beyond its residents. On the Tuesday morning I visited in September, Camino House, their assisted-living home, was a flurry of activity. Preschoolers had come for a painting session, filling the shophouse with chatter and laughter.

This was exactly the kind of interaction Mariel Chee and Bennett Lee, both 32, hoped to foster when they founded Camino House.

"One that's beautiful and welcoming, not clinical or institutional. Somewhere we'd want to grow old ourselves," Chee told Business Insider.

Chee, an artist with a background in early childhood development, and Lee, an engineer, were childhood friends who later married. Lee also grew up around eldercare: his parents are both doctors and founded another assisted-living provider in Singapore.

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For Chee, the project was also personal. Her father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in his mid-60s. Chee and her siblings were still in school at the time.

In 2026, Singapore became a "super-aged" society, with 21.4% of its citizens aged 65 or older. About 152,000 citizens are now 80 and above, up by 60% from 91,000 in 2016.

For older Singaporeans who can no longer live entirely independently, care has traditionally fallen to family members, sometimes supplemented by home-based services, or to nursing homes.

Camino House is part of a small but growing private sector in Singapore that serves older adults who need some daily support but not nursing care.

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