Guides

How senior placement agencies get paid, and why it's free for you

By Jordan Green, Founder

Every "free" senior placement service, including this one, is paid by the community your parent moves into. I want to explain how that works, where it can go wrong, and what we do differently, because you deserve to know who's in the room with you.

The basic deal

When a family finds a community through a placement agency and moves in, the community pays the agency a one-time referral fee. Across the industry it's commonly a percentage of the first month's rent, sometimes as much as the whole first month or more. Communities pay it because filling a room is worth a lot to them and because agencies bring families who are ready. The family pays nothing to the agency. That part is true of us and of the big national referral websites alike.

Where it can go wrong

• Steering. If an agency is paid more by some communities than others, or only by some, there's a pull toward the ones that pay. You may never hear about the place that fits best but doesn't pay.
• The lead blast. Some referral websites take your phone number and send it to a dozen communities at once. Your phone rings for weeks. You were the product.
• The clock. Agencies are paid when you move, so there's a pull toward a quick decision, a "special that ends Friday," the first place that said yes.
• The quiet part. Many families never learn the agency was paid at all.

What Arizona requires

Arizona law, A.R.S. 36-446.14, requires a referral agency to disclose in writing that it receives compensation from the facility. That's the floor. It's why our referral disclosure is a real page, why it's in the email you get before any tour, and why we ask you to acknowledge it on your shortlist, not in a link nobody clicks.

How we do it

• Same fee regardless. Communities that work with us pay a standard referral fee. We don't take a bigger fee to rank anyone higher, and the default order in our directory is neutral.
• Every licensed place is listed, paying or not. If the best fit for your dad doesn't work with us, we'll say so. We'd rather lose the fee than the trust.
• Your information goes only where you send it. No community hears your name or number until you choose to tour there. This is the opposite of the lead blast, and it's a promise, not a setting.
• No rush. We're not paid until you move, and we'd rather you move once, to the right place.
• The disclosure is in writing, early, and acknowledged. Before you tour, not after.

The full description of the model is on how we work.

Questions to ask any placement agency

1. How are you paid, and by whom?
2. Do you show me places that don't pay you?
3. Who gets my phone number, and when?
4. Will you put the fee disclosure in writing before I tour?
5. What happens if I pick a place you didn't recommend?

You can ask us those five on the phone and we'll answer every one. That's the whole idea.

Why not just charge families instead?

Some advisors do, and that's an honest model too. We chose the referral model because the families who need the most help are often the ones who can least afford a fee on top of a move, and because, handled in the open, the community-paid fee is how this industry has worked for decades. The fix for the problems above isn't who pays; it's transparency about who pays, and what you do with a family's trust. So: we're paid by the community, we tell you so in writing, we list everyone, and your number is yours until you decide.

Questions families ask

• So is the community's price higher because of your fee?

  Communities budget referral fees as marketing, the way they budget online ads. Rates are set by the community and are the same whether a family comes through us, a website, or the front door. If a community ever quoted you a higher price because of us, tell me; that's not a community we'd keep working with.

• Do you only recommend places that pay you?

  We show you every licensed place in the directory, paid or not, and we'll tell you when the best fit is one that doesn't work with us. We're paid a referral fee by many communities; that's disclosed on every shortlist.

• What does the disclosure say?

  Arizona law (A.R.S. 36-446.14) requires a placement service to tell you in writing that it receives a fee from the facility. We send that in writing before you tour, and we ask you to acknowledge it on your shortlist page, not buried in a link.

• What if I just call the community myself?

  You can, always. Our job is to make it easier and more honest, not to stand between you and the place. If you call direct after reading our page, that's fine with us.