I don't know if you'll see this or not but I just came across this thread. I'm about to hit 5 years of owing a non medical senior care business. I bought a franchise so I had training provided, materials and now we have support and a national advertising program. The goods of the business.
1) It is a growing market as nobody is getting younger and the baby boomers just started retiring to the tune of 10k a day so the market is huge.
2) The relationships you will gain with your referral sources and clients is great.
3) The money is pretty good. The difference being that with owning a franchise, of course I give away 8% right off the top every month. If you are going independent with set up assistance and no ongoing royalties, you can make money. I give up $5-6000 a month in royalties and ad fund. Even with royalties though, I still make about 8-12000 a month. The franchise is a blessing in the beginning to help get set up and avoid pitfalls. It sucks later as you get established and successful and you are giving up 8% a year in revenues. Part of that 8% does go a national ad fund so we do have national advertising programs but it is in it's infancy so I don't have any results to speak of.
4) This can be true of owning any business but being my own boss is the only way to go. I could never go back to working for someone else. I have freedom to do what I need to do to make the business successful. I don't waste time doing busy work for someone else. I only work to drive my business. I came from pharma so I know the time wasted there, call plans set for us even with customers who are giving us business, etc.
The bads of the business
1) Depending on your area, there is lots of competition. There are big name players like Home Instead, Visting Angels, Always Best Care, Synergy, Right at Home, etc. These are all franchises and typically have national advertising behind them. There are also several mom and pop shops but I see them getting squeezed out by the franchises over time. You could have an advantage having a wife as your RN. Some states require an RN, some don't so you will need to check on the state regs where you live. You could also have a price advantage since you don't have to charge to cover 8% royalties.
2) Staffing can be a nightmare. This business is full of good, hard working people who care. It is also full of trash and scum that want to say they have a job, but they don't really want to work. You will have last minute call offs, no call no shows, people who show up but aren't very good at the job. You will hear every excuse in the book from they don't have gas to go to work, sick child, have to go to grandmother's funeral even though they've already buried a grandma 4 or 5 times this year. The one I got Friday night was that they couldn't go to work because their cousin got shot and killed. There is a lot of drama in alot of these people's lives. You just have to weed through them. You can get a good staff which I do have now but in the beginning, it was a challenge. I basically threaten my new hires with prosecution for elder neglect and abuse if they even think of doing a no call no show.
3) If in a licensing state, you will be under govt scrutiny at that point. I'm in Texas so we are required to have a license. I am subject to surprise surveys by the state at any time. It's a typical govt operation in that the left hand usually has no clue what the right hand is doing. I've had one survey in 4 years and it wasn't that bad however I only had about 8 or 9 clients at the time so the sample size they were looking at was pretty small and survey was quick. Now, the survey will probably last 3 or 4 days. I do dread that.
Here is the low down. My first six months in business, I did $45,000. That's from June to December. The next year was a full year and I did $425,000. The next was $640,000. The next was $650,000 and this year I will do a little over $800,000. It takes time to grow it and it requires the willingness and ability to really market the business. You can't just open an office and wait for the phone to ring. Nobody will know about you. Face to face marketing works the best for me. I've tried local ads and got nothing from them. Getting out and beating the bushes has been the key for me. I would be leery if someone is telling you that you will have 100 clients in your first year. I guess anything is possible but I don't think that is accurate. I don't even look at number of clients. The key is the number of billable hours. You could have only 10 clients but they are 24/7 clients and that is all you need to be successful. Or you could have 30 clients at 6 hours a day. You can still be successful like that too but think more in terms of billable hours versus number of clients because each client's needs will be so different.
In our franchise system, we have about 175 offices. The biggest office does about $2 million a month. Yes, that is a month. A big agency is $2 million a year. The office is not the norm. They tapped into some type of govt assistance program so this is not the norm. We have probably 10 to 15 offices over $1 million a year and the rest are less than a million but more and more will reach the million dollar mark. I should get there next year so it's not impossible.
You can make money in this business. It does take alot of work especially when you are getting started. Once established, the demands do diminish and I am working typically 40 hours a week. Some weeks, I don't work that much, others more. It's not for everyone but if you can hold it together for the first year and get it going, it is a goo business. In my area, it is somewhat seasonal. Summer time is typically very slow with fall and spring being the busiest.
If you decide to do this, get in an area with high income and affluence because they have to be able to pay for this service. Some people will have long term insurance however that typically only covers a portion depending on how much the policy will cover. Good luck to you on whatever you decide to do.
