Find Board and Care Homes Near You

In California and Nevada, board and care home is the everyday name for a small residential care home serving older adults. These homes are literally homes: a single-family house on a quiet street, usually with four to fifteen residents, round-the-clock caregivers, home-cooked meals, and a shared living room where residents watch television together in the evening.

What sets a board and care home apart from a large assisted living community is scale and feel. Assisted living communities often serve eighty to two hundred residents in an apartment-building format, with a cafeteria downstairs and a printed weekly activity calendar. A board and care home serves the same population (older adults who need help with activities of daily living but don't require skilled nursing) in a setting much closer to a real home. Staff-to-resident ratios are higher, caregivers know every resident by name, and meals come out of an actual kitchen rather than a commercial galley.

Board and care homes often specialize in quiet ways. Some focus on early-stage dementia. Some are run by families from specific cultural backgrounds and serve meals and conversation in a shared language. Some welcome ambulatory residents only; others are comfortable with wheelchairs, two-person transfers, and more complex care. California alone has more than 6,000 licensed small board and care homes (formally called RCFEs), and they exist in every county and every price range.

The right fit depends on the person. For an older parent who would feel overwhelmed in a large community, who cherishes a quiet dinner table and a familiar face in the morning, a board and care home can feel like a soft landing rather than a move into an institution. Search our California directory below to browse licensed board and care homes by city, capacity, and care level. Every listing links directly to the official state licensing record so you can verify each home's status yourself.