It's Good To Be Cared For. It's Great To Be Cared About!
It's Good To Be Cared For. It's Great To Be Cared About!
Helpful content to guide you on your journey to becoming a home care franchise owner.
Learning how to start a senior care business begins with choosing your services, researching your market, and understanding the requirements for operating legally. From there, you’ll need a financial plan, qualified caregivers, reliable business systems, and a strategy for finding clients.
You’ll also need to decide whether to build an independent agency or purchase a franchise that provides training and operational guidance.
This guide focuses on starting a non-medical home care agency, rather than opening a residential senior living facility or skilled home health care business. It explains the steps prospective owners should evaluate before opening and what to prioritize once services begin.
“Senior care business” describes several different models, including in-home assistance, skilled home health care, adult day services, and residential care. Each has different requirements.
For a non-medical home care agency, services may include:
Your permitted services depend on applicable regulations, staff qualifications, and your agency’s operating model.
Non-medical home care generally helps clients with daily activities. Home health care involves clinical services, such as skilled nursing or therapy, delivered by appropriately qualified professionals.
The distinction affects licensing, supervision, staffing, and payment arrangements. Do not assume that describing a service as “non-medical” makes it unregulated.
The Briggs Home Care business model focuses on services such as personal care, homemaking, companionship, and respite support for seniors and individuals with disabilities.
A large senior population does not automatically make a market attractive. Your research should connect potential demand with families’ ability to pay, available caregivers, and local competition.
Examine:
Caregiver availability deserves as much attention as customer demand. An agency cannot sustainably grow its client base without enough qualified staff to cover the requested care.
Identify a practical starting service area rather than assuming you should cover the largest possible territory immediately.
Both ownership models require leadership, financial planning, and responsibility for service quality. The difference is how much of the operating framework you develop yourself.
Independent owners build their own brand, select technology, develop procedures, and arrange training and professional support.
This offers greater control over business decisions, subject to legal requirements. It also means taking responsibility for researching, implementing, and maintaining the systems needed to operate.
Franchise owners operate under a franchisor’s brand and contractual standards. Depending on the system, they may receive initial training, operating resources, approved technology, marketing guidance, and ongoing assistance.
In exchange, owners pay franchise fees and other required charges and accept restrictions on how the business operates.
A franchise does not remove ownership risk or guarantee clients. Its value depends on the support provided, the agreement’s terms, and how well the model fits your goals.
Explore why entrepreneurs consider Briggs Home Care to understand its healthcare industry experience, support approach, and protected-territory positioning.
If you pursue franchising, request the current Franchise Disclosure Document, or FDD. Review it with qualified legal and financial advisors.
Evaluate initial and ongoing fees, estimated investment, training, territory provisions, contractual obligations, and any financial performance representations. Speak with current and former franchisees about their actual experiences.
Your home care business plan should explain whom you will serve, how you will recruit staff, how clients will find you, and how the agency will meet its financial obligations.
Include your service area, permitted services, management structure, payment model, marketing strategy, staffing plan, and cash flow forecast.
Common startup expenses include:
Briggs Home Care’s published investment information lists a $50,000 initial franchise fee and an estimated total initial investment of $97,285 to $146,440.
Its published financial qualifications include at least $100,000 in liquid assets and a net worth of $250,000 to $300,000.
Liquid asset and net worth requirements are financial qualifications, not additional fees to automatically add to the investment estimate. Royalties, marketing contributions, and other ongoing expenses also apply.
Review the Briggs Home Care franchise investment requirements and confirm all figures against the current FDD.
Opening expenses are only part of the financial picture. Your agency must pay staff and other obligations even when client payments have not yet been collected.
Model slower-than-expected client growth, recruitment expenses, payment delays, and unexpected staffing needs. Include your personal financial needs separately from the agency’s operating budget.
Before committing to an opening date, identify the requirements for your state, locality, and service scope.
Depending on your location, this may involve agency licensing, business registration, administrator qualifications, background checks, training standards, and specific operating policies.
Requirements can also affect office arrangements and the order in which you complete applications. Verify them before signing contracts or making purchases based on assumptions.
Work with the appropriate licensing authority and qualified advisors to determine what applies.
Your agency’s policies should address client intake, service planning, caregiver qualifications, supervision, incident reporting, complaints, emergency response, and recordkeeping.
Discuss insurance with a professional familiar with home care businesses. Transportation services, employee injuries, professional liability, and sensitive information can create different coverage considerations.
Franchisor guidance can support this process, but franchise owners remain responsible for complying with applicable requirements.
A care rate needs to support more than the caregiver’s hourly wage.
Account for employer payroll costs, recruiting, training, insurance, scheduling, supervision, technology, overhead, and applicable franchise fees. Consider how travel, overtime, visit length, and scheduling requirements affect the cost of delivering care.
Then compare your proposed rates with local market conditions and the services you provide.
Before care begins, establish written procedures covering service charges, billing frequency, payment arrangements, cancellations, schedule changes, and other applicable terms.
If clients expect to use long-term-care insurance or another funding source, clarify documentation and payment responsibilities. Do not assume that every policy or program covers your services.
Briggs Home Care describes a model focused primarily on private-pay and private long-term-care insurance clients.
Begin recruitment early enough to complete required screening, onboarding, and training before assigning caregivers to clients.
Your process should include clear role descriptions, qualification checks, applicable background screening, and training aligned with the services staff will provide.
Do not assume caregivers can be treated as independent contractors. Have qualified counsel review worker classification and applicable employment requirements.
A list of applicants is not the same as available service capacity. Track where caregivers can work, their qualifications, and the days and times they are available.
Plan for absences and last-minute changes. Accepting a client without reliable coverage can damage trust before the relationship is established.
Retention also matters. Dependable communication, realistic scheduling, respectful management, and ongoing support can help reduce avoidable disruption for caregivers and clients.
Before the first visit, test the full process from inquiry through payment.
Your systems should support:
Protect client and employee information through appropriate access controls, secure systems, and staff training. Determine which privacy and recordkeeping requirements apply to your agency rather than assuming every home care business has identical obligations.
Briggs offers training and operational support for franchise owners, including guidance involving management, client service, compliance, billing, and technology.
Your marketing plan should explain how families will discover the agency and what happens after they make contact.
Create clear website content describing your services, service area, and inquiry process. Maintain accurate business information and, when eligible, a Google Business Profile that follows Google’s requirements.
Use helpful local content and authentic reviews rather than repetitive city pages or exaggerated claims.
Introduce the agency to relevant community organizations, senior living communities, rehabilitation providers, and other professionals who serve older adults.
Explain which needs your agency can support, where you operate, and how inquiries are handled. Follow applicable referral, privacy, and marketing rules.
Avoid promoting services or coverage you cannot deliver. If inquiries concentrate in a location or schedule your team cannot cover, address that gap before increasing advertising.
Track inquiry sources, qualified inquiries, assessments, and new clients so you can see which activities contribute to business growth.
The first 90 days of operation should begin after required approvals and essential launch preparations are complete. Licensing and initial staffing should not be treated as tasks to finish while already serving clients.
Confirm required approvals, insurance, caregiver readiness, service agreements, scheduling, billing, and backup procedures. Test how the team will respond to a missed visit or urgent family call.
Focus on dependable visits, accurate documentation, responsive communication, and correct billing. Check in with clients and caregivers to identify early problems.
Review referral activity, inquiry follow-up, staffing gaps, service coverage, and cash flow. Resolve operational issues before adding demand your agency cannot support.
Compare actual results with your assumptions. Review delivered care hours, caregiver retention, client feedback, collections, and operating expenses.
Use those findings to adjust recruitment, marketing, scheduling, and financial forecasts.
Start by defining your service model, researching state requirements, and assessing your management and financial readiness. Arrange industry education and qualified professional guidance. A franchise may provide a structured framework, but training does not replace required qualifications or responsible oversight.
Costs depend on location, services, licensing, staffing, and ownership model. Briggs Home Care publishes an estimated total initial investment of $97,285 to $146,440. Confirm current requirements and assess whether your circumstances require additional working capital.
Requirements vary by state and service. Non-medical services can still require agency licensing, registration, training, and supervision. Verify requirements with the responsible authority before providing care.
In some non-medical home care models, owners do not need to be nurses. However, administrator qualifications, staffing requirements, and permitted services vary. Confirm both the franchisor’s qualifications and applicable regulations.
There is no universal timeline. Licensing, financing, office requirements, recruitment, training, and franchise approval can affect opening. Build a readiness-based schedule for your market rather than relying on a generic launch estimate.
Common channels include local search, community outreach, professional relationships, advertising, and family recommendations. Prompt follow-up and the ability to staff requested care are essential to converting inquiries into clients.
Profitability depends on care volume, pricing, caregiver costs, overhead, collections, and operational efficiency. National demand does not guarantee local results. Franchise buyers should review any financial performance representations in the current FDD.
Starting a senior care business requires more than identifying demand. It means building an agency that can recruit dependable caregivers, serve clients consistently, and meet its financial and regulatory responsibilities.
For entrepreneurs who prefer not to develop every process independently, Briggs Home Care offers initial training, marketing guidance, technology resources, and ongoing operational assistance.
Request franchise information from Briggs Home Care to discuss available markets, investment requirements, and the steps toward ownership.
