A member survey held by Cooperation PGGM at November 2010 showed that 49% of the respondents want to live in their own house after retirement. Also 16% wanted to live in a more suitable home for their age and another 16% of the respondents answered that they didn’t cared where as long as it’s independent. The need to live independently for as long as possible is therefore very high and to match these needs several parties could develop new financial products to make that independent life easier.

Internationally there are a lot of possibilities concerning equity release products. Which possibilities are there already internationally and are these possibilities a success? Is there a need in the Netherlands to create such products as well? Which role can different players in the market play, for instance the government or the pension sector? All these questions will be focused on in this thesis.