Paying for Care in England

Paying for care in England is means-tested: what you pay depends on your savings, your income and, for a care home, usually the value of your home. If your capital is more than £23,250, you pay your own fees as what is known as a self-funder; below that, the council may help, and you pay a contribution worked out by a financial assessment¹. The financial assessment looks at your income, including pensions and benefits, and your capital, including savings, and works out how much you contribute towards the care the council has assessed you as needing².

The sums involved are large. A Joseph Rowntree Foundation analysis published in September 2026 found that the average amount someone going into residential care is liable to pay starts at £1,000 a week and could be as high as £1,400, and that a high-income single homeowner with savings over £100,000 faces costs of £73,000 a year³. There is no cap: a planned £86,000 lifetime limit on personal care costs was dropped by the government in 2024.

How paying for care works in England

Adult social care in England is charged for under the Care Act, which allows councils to charge adults over 18 for the care they provide⁶. Unlike healthcare, which is free at the point of use through the NHS, social care, which includes help with washing, dressing, eating and living safely, is means-tested from the start. The system has three stages: a care needs assessment, which decides what care you need; a financial assessment, which decides how much of the cost you contribute; and then the arrangement of the care itself, either by the council or by you as a self-funder².

Where you receive the care matters as much as what you need. For care in your own home, the value of your house is not counted while you live in it, so many more people qualify for council help at home than in a care home. For residential care, the value of your home is usually counted, subject to important exceptions, including when a partner or certain other people still live there. The page on whether your home counts towards care home fees covers those rules.

Some care is funded by the NHS rather than the council and is free regardless of your means. NHS continuing healthcare is for people with complex ongoing health needs, and NHS-funded nursing care pays a weekly rate towards the nursing part of a care home fee, £267.68 a week in England for 2026/27, but not the accommodation costs. If you pay your own fees, that money is normally paid directly to the nursing home; if the council pays for your care, the funding goes straight to them⁵.

The rules have been subject to repeated reform plans. The previous government planned a cap on care costs and changes to the financial assessment rules, including a £86,000 lifetime cap on personal care costs, but these were dropped in 2024⁷. A commission on social care is now expected to report its recommendations a year earlier than previously planned, so the charging rules may change again³.

The care needs assessment is free for everyone

The care needs assessment is free, and it is the gateway to everything else: to get any help from the council, regardless of your finances, you must first have one¹. Your local council's adult social services department will carry out a free assessment of your care needs, and with your permission your carer, GP or district nurse can refer you for it on your behalf². Even someone who expects to pay for all their own care can ask for one, and it is worth doing: it establishes what care you need and creates a record of it.

The assessment looks at what you struggle with day to day and what you want to achieve, and it can identify anything you may need help with¹⁰. If the council assesses you as needing equipment or adaptations at home in England, the equipment will be free, and adaptations will be free if each one costs less than £1,000¹¹. The council must then draw up a care and support plan setting out what help you get.

If you are eligible for help, the next step is the financial assessment, which works out how much you will contribute towards the cost of the services the council has assessed you as needing². The dedicated guide to care needs assessments and financial assessments goes through both in detail.

The means test: £23,250 upper capital limit

The financial assessment counts two things: your capital, which means savings, investments and, in a care home, usually your home, and your income, which means pensions and benefits¹. The thresholds are the same across England, and they decide who pays at all.

Capital over £23,250 results in having to pay the full cost of care services, and if your capital, for example your savings, is more than £23,250, you pay your own fees as a self-funder⁶. The upper capital threshold for getting help with care costs in England is £23,250, and the lower limit is £14,250¹³. These figures have been unchanged for years, which is part of why the charging system is under strain: with typical care home costs now over £1,000 a week, savings of £23,250 can be exhausted within months¹⁴.

For care at home the same upper limit applies: with more than £23,250 in capital you may have to pay for all the care you receive, though the value of your home is not counted while you live in it¹¹. Only your income and capital are looked at, not your partner's, if you have one¹. The value of joint savings is halved, and a partner's earnings and pensions are left out of the calculation.

Between £14,250 and £23,250: £1 a week for every £250

In the middle band, the council helps with the cost but treats your savings as generating an income, called tariff income. You are treated as having an extra £1 of income for every £250 of capital you have between £14,250 and £23,250¹. The tariff income assumes you have an extra £1 per week in income for every £250, or part of £250, you have in capital between those two amounts¹².

The effect is that savings in this band are counted as if they generated a small weekly income. The council counts you as having £1 of weekly income for every £250 over £14,250 that you have¹⁵, and the same rule appears in official guidance on means-tested benefits: for every £250 of capital between the lower and upper limit, an income of £1 a week is assumed¹⁶. So someone sitting near the bottom of the band is treated as having only a pound or two of extra income, while someone close to the £23,250 upper limit is assumed to have considerably more, because every complete £250 within the band adds another £1 a week to the income the council uses in the assessment.

Between £14,250 and £23,250 you qualify for financial support from the council and pay a contribution from your income, plus this tariff income⁹. Below £14,250, the financial assessment will not consider your savings at all: you will not have to use any of your capital to pay for your care, but you will probably still have to contribute from your income¹¹.

What care costs: £1,000 to £1,400 a week in a care home

The headline figures are stark. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation's 2026 analysis found the average amount someone is liable to pay for residential care starts at £1,000 a week and could be as high as £1,400³. Age UK puts the average cost of a place in a care home at around £1,100 a week, and a place in a nursing home at around £1,450 a week¹². Which? reported in June 2025 that a typical residential care home costs an average of £1,402 a week¹⁴.

Costs vary by type of care and by where you live. London is the most expensive region, with an average weekly cost of £1,383 for a self-funded bed as of June 2024¹³. Live-in care, where a carer lives in your home, costs an average of £1,596 a week¹³. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation's worked examples show how circumstances change the bill: a single low-income homeowner with mid savings faces average care costs of £1,080 per week, while the same person who does not own their home but has high savings faces £1,000 per week³.

If you need nursing care in a care home, the NHS pays a weekly amount towards the nursing part of your fee, £267.68 a week in England for 2026/27, whatever your means. This pays for the nursing you receive, but not the accommodation costs, so it reduces rather than replaces the fee⁵. People with complex ongoing health needs may qualify for free NHS continuing healthcare, which covers the full cost of care.

For most people the cost is far above their income. The median weekly income of older people in England, after housing costs, is £300³, against a care home fee of £1,000 or more. That gap is why the family home, and savings built up over a lifetime, end up funding care for anyone above the means-test thresholds.

Paying for care at home

Care at home, sometimes called domiciliary care or home care, is charged for under the same capital limits, but with one crucial difference: the value of your home is not counted while you live in it¹¹. This means many people who would be self-funders in a care home qualify for council support at home.

The rules work like this:

• More than £23,250 in capital: you may have to pay for all the care you receive¹¹.
• Between £14,250 and £23,250: the council contributes, and you pay from your income plus tariff income of £1 a week for every £250 in the band¹¹.
• Less than £14,250: you will not have to use any of your capital to pay for your care, but you will probably have to contribute from your income¹¹.
• Equipment and adaptations: if the council assesses you as needing them, equipment is free and adaptations are free if each costs less than £1,000¹¹.

There is an important rule for people with good incomes. If your weekly income is higher than your care costs, you will usually have to pay for all your care yourself, as long as doing so does not take your income below the Minimum Income Guarantee amount set by the government¹¹. In other words, the council protects a floor of income, but above that floor a high income means paying the full cost of home care even with modest savings.

The amounts people pay for care at home are much lower than for residential care, because the council is funding care hours rather than board and accommodation. A single low-income non-homeowner with low savings will still pay £27 a week towards community care, and £1,350 a year in total, while a partnered person requiring the same level of care pays £7 a week³. Even so, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that people receiving the most state support in residential care still contribute about £9,000 a year on average in user charges, rising as high as £15,000 a year depending on savings levels³.

Personal expenses allowance: £31.80 a week to keep

If the council helps with your care home fees, it cannot take all your income. You must be left with a personal expenses allowance, set at £31.80 a week for 2026/27⁴. The allowance is a form of income protection for people in residential care, and the same figure appears in the charging regulations that councils must follow⁴.

The allowance is small, and it is for you to spend as you wish: it should not be spent on any aspect of care, board or lodgings¹⁵. In practice it covers haircuts, treats, clothes and phone bills. If you want a more expensive room than the council will pay for, a relative or friend may be able to pay a top-up fee, but that money must come from a third party, not from your allowance.

The figure has risen slowly. Some guidance still quotes older amounts, such as £30.15 or £30.65 a week, reflecting earlier years¹², but the current statutory amount is £31.80⁴. The allowance also differs sharply across Great Britain: £31.80 in England, £35.90 in Scotland and £46.35 in Wales¹⁸.

The full guide to the personal expenses allowance explains what income is taken and what is protected.

How your income and savings change what you pay

The means test weighs savings far more heavily than income. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation's analysis found that low-income individuals pay just £30 to £200 less than the equivalent high-income individuals at every savings level, while an older person with low savings may pay around £700 to £800 less than the same person with high savings at either income level³. In other words, having a pension of £400 a week rather than £230 changes the bill by tens of pounds; having £100,000 in savings rather than £10,000 changes it by hundreds.

How much you pay towards care is calculated from your eligible income, such as pensions or welfare benefits¹⁹. The worked examples show the range of outcomes in the current system:

The state's contribution varies too. For a single low-income homeowner with mid savings the state contributes 22% of care costs, and for a single low-income non-homeowner with high savings it contributes 26%³. User charges represent almost 20% of the total cost of care for people receiving council support³.

These figures sit against the backdrop of what older people in England actually have. Of the 12 million older people in England, 33% have a social care need, but just 25% of those with needs used formal carers³. 77% of older people in England are homeowners, with median housing wealth of £221,500, while median non-housing savings above £500 are £26,950³. Most older people therefore fall into the middle of the means test: too much in savings or property to get much help, far too little to fund years of care comfortably.

Where England's rules differ from Scotland and Wales

The care charging system is devolved, and the thresholds differ substantially between the nations. The capital limits for council help are:

Wales is the most generous: the upper capital limit for care home help is £50,000, and for care at home the council must meet the full cost if you have more than £24,000 in capital, not including the value of your home, or a weekly income greater than the cost of your care¹¹. Wales also guarantees a higher personal expenses allowance of at least £46.35 a week¹⁹. In Scotland and Wales, what you pay towards any aids or adaptations you need depends on your council's charging policy, whereas in England equipment is free and adaptations under £1,000 are free¹¹.

The dropped cap on care costs was an England-only reform. The previous government planned to introduce a cap on the overall amount any individual would spend on personal care in their lifetime, set at £86,000, along with changes to the financial assessment rules, but these were cancelled⁷. Until any reform arrives, England's £23,250 limit stands, and the pages on paying for care in Scotland, paying for care in Wales and paying for care in Northern Ireland set out each nation's rules.

Help for carers and where to get advice

Much of the care in England is provided not by councils or homes but by unpaid relatives and friends. If you care for someone at least 35 hours a week and they get certain benefits, you could get Carer's Allowance of £86.45 a week²⁰. In Scotland, Carer Support Payment has replaced Carer's Allowance for most carers, also paid at £86.45 per week, with an extra £10.40 per week for carers of more than one person²¹. The guide to money help for unpaid carers covers the full range of support.

For advice on paying for care itself, several independent organisations publish free guidance: Age UK on the financial assessment and on paying for a care home and home care², Independent Age on care home fees, home care and NHS funding¹, and Disability Rights UK on the rules for non-residential care¹⁷. Which? also publishes plain-English explainers on the capital limits and on what the dropped £86,000 cap would have meant¹⁴.

A few specific situations have their own rules and their own pages on this site:

• Whether your home counts towards care home fees, and the 12-week property disregard that can delay counting it.
• Deferred payment agreements, where the council pays the fees and recovers them later, compared with equity release for care fees. Equity release only helps if you receive care in your property; if you move out to a care home, you will need to repay the loan, usually by selling your property¹³.
• The rules on giving away your home or money before care, which the council can treat as deliberate deprivation of assets.
• Care home top-up fees paid by relatives, and the personal expenses allowance you keep.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation's 2026 analysis concludes that England's social care charging system is failing users, with the burden falling unevenly on people with dementia, on women and on homeowners³. Reform is on the agenda, with a commission due to report earlier than planned³, but anyone arranging care now does so under the rules as they stand: a free needs assessment, a means test with a £23,250 upper limit, tariff income of £1 a week per £250 in the middle band, and a personal expenses allowance of £31.80 a week.