Directory by Category

Senior housing is sorted by the level of care it provides, and the names vary from state to state. Each directory below covers one type. If you aren't sure which you need, start with the description and work from there.

• Independent Living Directory Age-restricted apartments, cottages, and retirement communities for older adults who manage daily life on their own. The draw is what gets taken off your plate — maintenance, yard work, cooking if you want it — and the company of neighbors in the same stage of life.
• Assisted Living Directory Residential communities where help with the activities of daily living — bathing, dressing, medication, meals — is available around the clock, and residents keep their own apartment. Licensed by the state, but not nursing homes: the care stops short of skilled medical treatment.
• Memory Care Facility Directory Communities built for people living with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. Secured entrances and exits, staff trained in memory support, and a daily routine designed around orientation and calm. Often a wing of a larger community rather than a separate building.
• Residential Care Home Directory Small homes caring for a handful of residents at a time — often an ordinary house on an ordinary street. They go by many names depending on the state: adult family homes, board and care, personal care homes, adult foster care. The appeal is the ratio of staff to residents.
• Skilled Nursing Directory Nursing homes providing 24-hour licensed nursing care, rehabilitation, and medical monitoring. This is the level of care for people whose needs have moved past what assisted living can meet, and the setting most often used for short rehabilitation stays after a hospital discharge.
• Continuing Care Retirement Communities Directory Campuses offering independent living, assisted living, and skilled nursing in one place, so a change in health doesn't mean a move across town. Usually involve an entrance fee alongside the monthly cost — read the contract closely, because what that fee buys varies a great deal.
• Private Home Healthcare Agencies Agencies that send caregivers to the home rather than moving anyone into a community. Hours range from a few a week to live-in. Most of this is paid privately, which is what separates it from the home health a doctor orders after a hospital stay.
• Visiting Home Healthcare Agencies Home health agencies whose nurses, aides, and therapists visit on a schedule. When the visits follow a hospital stay and a physician has ordered them, Medicare often covers a defined period — ask any agency to explain exactly what is and isn't covered before you start.
• Visiting Home Healthcare Agencies - Hospice Hospice agencies caring for people near the end of life, wherever they are living. The focus moves from treating the illness to comfort, pain relief, and support for the family. The Medicare hospice benefit covers most of it, including equipment and medication related to the diagnosis.
• Skilled Nursing - Hospice Directory Hospice providers serving residents of nursing homes and other care settings. Hospice is a service rather than a place: a resident can stay where they are and have the hospice team come to them, working alongside the community's own staff.
• Skilled Nursing - Hospice Directory Hospice providers serving residents of nursing homes and other care settings. Hospice is a service rather than a place: a resident can stay where they are and have the hospice team come to them, working alongside the community's own staff.
• Adult Day Care Services Daytime programs offering supervision, meals, activities, and often health services, with everyone going home at night. They exist largely to give working family caregivers a workable week, and to give the person attending somewhere to be among other people.
• Placement Advisors Advisors who help families shortlist and tour communities. Nearly all are paid a referral fee by whichever community a family moves into — free to you, but it means an advisor's list is usually limited to the communities that pay them. Ask any advisor which communities they work with, which they don't, and how they're paid.