No call lists. No pressure. No surprises.
How this works, start to finish
Most families land here mid-crisis: a fall, a diagnosis, a hospital discharge clock. Here's exactly what happens when you reach out, who you'll talk to, and how everyone involved gets paid. We'd rather over-explain than have you wonder.
The five steps
1 You tell us what's going on
Fill out the short form. Say it plainly: dad's falling, mom's forgetting the stove, the siblings disagree, the doctor said it's time. The mess is the normal version. Your information goes to exactly one person: the local advisor who will help you. It is never put on a call list or sold to anyone else.
2 You hear back within one business day
We work with vetted, independent, Westside-based senior living advisors. Independent means they are their own businesses: no community employs them, none owns a stake in them, and they place families across the whole market. The first call listens before it asks, and covers the practical questions: what daily help is needed, what the budget really is, which neighborhoods keep family close, how fast this needs to happen.
3 You get a short list, with the receipts
Three to five communities or board-and-care homes that fit needs, budget, and geography, each checked against its California inspection record first. Communities that don't fit, or whose record disqualifies them, don't reach you. A short list beats a directory of forty names every time.
4 Tour, compare, take your time
The advisor schedules tours, often joins them, and helps you ask the questions communities hope you won't (our touring checklist is the same one they use). Then the family decides. "Not yet" is a real option, and a good advisor says so when it's true.
5 Move in, and someone still answers the phone
After a move, the advisor checks in during the first weeks, when small problems are easiest to fix. If something isn't right, you have someone to call who knows the community's management by name.
How we get paid, in plain English
You pay nothing, ever. Here is the actual money flow, because "free" deserves an explanation:
- Senior living communities pay placement advisors a fee when a family the advisor helped moves in. This is standard across the industry, typically a percentage of the first month's rent.
- The advisor shares part of that fee with us for connecting you.
- If you never move anywhere, nobody pays anyone, and that's fine.
The honest tension in this model: a service paid by communities has an incentive to recommend whoever pays. We handle that tension in the open. Fees never decide a short list, communities are checked against state records before any recommendation, board-and-care homes with modest fees get recommended when they're the better fit, and we teach you to verify everything yourself. If we ever feel like salespeople instead of guides, walk away and tell us why.
What we never do
- Charge families anything, for any reason
- Sell your information or put you on a call list (one advisor, that's it; see our privacy policy)
- Recommend a community because of its fee
- Work with advisors who are employed by, or hold an ownership stake in, any community they recommend
- Refer to skilled nursing facilities (different licensing, different process; we'll point you to the right resource instead)
- Give medical advice (care decisions belong to your family and the doctor)
- Rush you (the timeline is yours; urgency comes from your situation, never from us)
Why local instead of a national platform
In 2024, a Washington Post investigation reported that more than a third of the communities the largest national referral platform promoted with "Best of" awards had recent citations for serious care violations, and the U.S. Senate's aging committee opened an inquiry into the industry's practices. We can't fix the industry. We can work one territory, with named local advisors, judge communities by the state's actual records, and show our math. Small and verifiable beats big and opaque, especially when it's your mother.