Caring.com’s 2023 Cost Data Methodology
With inflation dramatically affecting the cost of living for seniors, it’s vital for seniors and their loved ones to have an accurate understanding of the cost of senior living options as they plan for their financial futures. That’s why Caring.com is releasing proprietary cost data from its network of more than 75,000 senior living providers, revealing the average cost of assisted living, memory care, and independent living in states and cities across the United States.
According to Caring.com’s data, the average monthly cost of assisted living, memory care, and independent living in 2023 in the United States is:
- Assisted Living: $4,459
- Memory Care: $5,369
- Independent Living: $2,995
Data Sources
The primary source is Caring.com’s database of more than 75,000 senior living providers. By leveraging our relationships with these senior living providers, Caring.com has compiled actual costs that seniors pay to move into senior living communities at scale for the past 3 years.
As it takes time for Caring.com to gather and analyze this data, the average cost that it reports in a given location for the current year is based on data collected between January 1st and December 31st of the prior year.
Data Limitations
Due to sample sizes, this data is currently limited to the three most popular types of senior living: assisted living, memory care, and independent living.
Several states did not have enough data available – see the list below for details on which states had insufficient data for the different senior living types. To fill these data gaps, we incorporated data from third-party sites such as Genworth.com. Using these external data sources, we were able to estimate the average cost of senior living in those states.
- Assisted Living: Nevada and Alaska had insufficient data.
- Memory Care: Nevada, Alaska, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Hawaii had insufficient data.
- Independent Living: Nevada and Alaska had insufficient data.
For cities that did not have sufficient data, we used county-level data to estimate costs. When that was not available, we used a combination of third-party data and state data to estimate average costs.
Inflation Estimates
To calculate projected costs for the coming year, we used the current inflation rate as of June 2023 to project how much senior living costs would increase. Our projected average monthly costs for the three included senior living types for 2024 are:
- Assisted Living: $4,802
- Memory Care: $6,341
- Independent Living: $3,162