MEET the Mingles. They are the newest and the grooviest social group to hit the headlines since the invention of Generation Y in the middle of 2005.
More powerful than the Frugals, faster-growing than the Kippers (kids in parents' pockets eroding retirement savings), able to leap hippies, punks, dinks and yuppies in a single bound. Look. Up in the sky. It's a nerd. It's a plane. No, it's a flying middle-aged baby boomer who's newly single. A middle-aged single by any other name is a "mingle".
In 1976 the number of middle-aged Australians (aged 45-59) who were single was 381,000. These mingles broke down into three more or less equal categories: the widowed, the separated and divorced, and the never married. The latter group would have contained most of the gay community in this age group at that time.
Over the quarter of a century to 2001 the mingles managed to multiply to 834,000. In an era when the middle-aged population increased by 66 per cent, those ensconced in singledom soared by 119 per cent.
But importantly some categories of mingles multiplied faster than others: middle-aged widows of both genders shrank while the never-marrieds expanded. However, the real mingle action was in the meteoric rise of the separated and divorced, up from 130,000 to 519,000 over 25 years to 2001.
Do not dismiss the mingles. They're here; they're sincere. But best of all they demand property and, boomers being boomers, they also command the social spotlight. Almost half a million extra mingles over the final 25 years of the 20th century has underpinned demand for new housing by a group that has, or should have, the means to deliver what property players the world over shamelessly lust after - margin.
Young sexy singles in their 20s holed up in Melbourne's Southbank and South Sydney rarely have the means to demand anything other than a garden variety apartment. But a newly minted mingle emanating from Sydney's North Shore or from Melbourne's leafy east will want so much more. A strategic move by developers from single to mingle could see their margin grow.
But from where have mingles emerged? Some say the mighty mingle was born of our shifting social mores. Baby boomers are apparently more apt than previous generations to end unhappy relationships, even in middle age.
Generations X and Y are of course even more adept in the matter of "moving on". They dumped partners with guiltless and some say cavalier abandon during their 20s. It will surprise no-one that the outlook for mingles is especially bright, given the X and Y predilection for changing their personal circumstances when "things get, like, just so heavy".
But the mingle movement is more than the mere multiple begetting of the separated and the divorced. It now includes a large smattering of middle-aged gays (who I think should be known as the "greys").
Sydney's first gay and lesbian Mardi Gras in 1978 took what was then a distinctively youthful gay culture to the streets. Almost 30 years on, the gay Adonises of the late-70s have transcended into middle age. I think the needs of these greys are oddly converging with those of middle-aged heterosexuals: quiet place in a good suburb close to all facilities.
The shift towards singledom in middle age is a new social phenomenon. In previous eras marriages remained intact until one partner died. Part of the problem of living in the 21st century is that we live longer: the prospect of a husband's early death is not the escape hatch that it once was for women trapped in loveless marriages.
Today the pain of an unhappy marriage is too much to handle for middle-aged boomers contemplating their next 30 years. It is now or never. And for many mingles this means taking action now. Sell the suburban house, split the proceeds and buy two dwellings. Or, Mum keeps the house and Dad does a runner with the secretary to a love nest perched on the edge of the city's hippest precinct.
Either way, the property industry wins: demand for dwellings and love nests rises. (I am not sure what accoutrements are required to distinguish a love nest from a dwelling. Would someone please advise?)
But not all mingles are gaily single in any sense of the word. Some pine for a partner of the opposite sex, and this is where it gets tricky for middle-aged women. There were 447,000 single women aged 45-59 at the time of the last census; this compared with 387,000 single men in the same age group. Ladies, your market is 60,000 or 13 per cent short. And this assumes that these single men are all heterosexual and do not dip into the pool of available single women aged less than 45. And as we all know, ladies, men are apt to dip.
This issue of the numbers is bad enough. But there is also a wider concern. Our culture has evolved mechanisms and venues for the parading and the pairing of pert young singles. There is a market need for a similar service to pair up the frankly less than pert in middle age. And because the issue of singledom in middle age is a new social phenomenon, we have not yet adapted our culture to produce appropriate meeting places.
Yet the demand clearly exists, and swells each year. The opportunities for business to snuggle up to the mingles are endless. There's the need for housing and for finance as well as the need for venues and mechanisms to bring buyers and sellers together. There is also a segment of the mingles who would be happy to remain single and who may or may not engage in short-term relationships.
In either case, and however the mingle should emerge, the bottom line is that this life form is here to stay and will comprise an expanding part of our social fabric for years to come. Get used to the mingle; they're here for the long haul.
