DSHS assisted living locator: how it works, state by state

Last updated 2026-07-24

What is the DSHS assisted living locator

The "DSHS assisted living locator" most people search for is Washington State's Department of Social and Health Services tool for finding licensed assisted living facilities, adult family homes, and nursing homes. Washington DSHS operates a public search page where you enter a city, zip code, or facility name and get back licensed providers with address, capacity, and links to inspection reports ^[1]. The tool exists because Washington licenses long-term care settings under RCW 18.20 (assisted living facilities) and related chapters for adult family homes, and the state is required to make licensing status and some inspection data publicly searchable ^[2]. If you're outside Washington, you're probably looking for your own state's version. Nearly every state health or social services agency runs a comparable locator, sometimes buried under a different name like "provider search," "facility finder," or "licensing lookup." We'll get to how to find yours. For operators, the locator matters for two reasons. First, it's where prospective residents and their families will find you (or won't, if your listing is stale). Second, it's a preview of what the public sees about your compliance history, since most of these tools link directly to inspection reports and substantiated complaints.

What is assisted living

Assisted living is a licensed residential care setting for adults, usually seniors, who need help with daily activities like bathing, dressing, medication reminders, and meals but don't need the round-the-clock skilled nursing care a nursing home provides. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services describes assisted living as a type of "residential care community" that provides room, board, and personal care services in a home-like setting ^[3]. Most states require a specific license category for assisted living, separate from nursing homes and separate from smaller adult family homes or group homes. Capacity varies widely: some states cap smaller assisted living licenses at 6 to 16 beds while allowing larger campuses to run over 100 units, with the exact thresholds set in your state's statute. Staffing ratios, medication administration rules, and admission/discharge criteria (who the facility can and can't accept) are all defined by state regulation, not federal law, because unlike nursing homes, assisted living is not directly regulated by CMS. If you're building out licensing paperwork, the category you apply under changes almost everything downstream: staffing plan, physical plant requirements, and inspection frequency. Our assisted living guide breaks down how states define the category differently.

What is a group home

A group home is a small residential setting, typically serving somewhere between 3 and 10 residents, that provides supervision and support for people with intellectual/developmental disabilities, mental illness, substance use recovery needs, or in some states, seniors who don't need full assisted living licensure. Group homes are usually licensed under a different statute than assisted living facilities, often through a state's developmental disabilities administration or behavioral health division rather than its aging and long-term care division. The practical difference from assisted living is scope and intensity. Assisted living licenses tend to cover larger populations and heavier personal-care and medication needs. Group homes are often smaller, more home-like, and licensed around a specific population (IDD, mental health, or recovery) with staffing and programming tailored to that group. States use inconsistent terminology here, which trips up a lot of new operators. "Group home," "adult family home," "community residential facility," and "residential care facility" sometimes mean nearly the same thing in one state and completely different license categories in another. Always confirm with your state licensing agency which statute and license type actually applies to the population and home size you're planning.

What is an assisted living facility, exactly

An assisted living facility (sometimes shortened ALF) is the specific licensed entity, the building and the operating license, that delivers assisted living services under your state's law. In Washington, for example, an assisted living facility license is issued under RCW 18.20 and requires the facility to provide "housing, basic services, and assumes general responsibility for the safety and well-being of the residents" as defined in that chapter ^[2]. Most states require the facility to hold a distinct assisted living license (more than a business license) before admitting residents, and that license generally specifies the maximum number of residents, the level of care the home is approved to provide, and any special population endorsements. Memory care, for instance, is often a separate add-on certification with its own staffing and physical plant rules. The license also usually comes with a defined renewal cycle and a required inspection schedule, both of which end up feeding the exact same public locator databases we discussed earlier. So the assisted living facility isn't just a concept, it's a specific regulatory object with a license number, an address of record, and an inspection file that any locator tool pulls from directly.

What does assisted living provide

Assisted living typically provides a private or semi-private room, meals, housekeeping, laundry, medication management or reminders, help with activities of daily living (bathing, dressing, toileting, mobility), social and recreational activities, and 24-hour staff availability for supervision and emergencies. It does not typically provide the level of skilled nursing, IV therapy, or rehabilitation services a nursing home provides. CMS's National Center for Health Statistics defines assisted living/residential care communities as places offering "room, board, and around-the-clock supervision" combined with at least two personal care services, such as help with bathing or medication ^[3]. Some states allow assisted living facilities to also provide limited nursing services (like insulin administration or wound care) under a nurse delegation model, and some states require an actual licensed nurse on staff or on call. A useful gut check for prospective operators: assisted living is built around supporting independence with a safety net, not around clinical treatment. If your target population needs frequent skilled nursing intervention, ventilator support, or intensive psychiatric stabilization, you're probably looking at a different license category (skilled nursing facility or a specialized behavioral health license), not assisted living.

What is the difference between assisted living and nursing home

Regulator	State health/social services agency	State agency + CMS certification
Medical staffing	Aides, sometimes on-call/part-time nurse	Licensed nurses on-site 24/7
Medicare coverage	Not covered as a residential benefit	Covered for short-term skilled care post-hospitalization [5]
Typical resident need	Help with daily activities, supervision	Skilled nursing, rehab, complex medical needs
Setting	Home-like, apartment or room-based	Clinical, hospital-adjacent feel	CMS is direct about this distinction on its own consumer guidance: nursing homes are for people who "need a higher level of care" than assisted living or in-home care can provide [4]. If you're choosing which license to pursue as an operator, the honest question to ask is what level of medical acuity you're staffed and equipped to handle, more than which license is easier to get.

Assisted living and nursing homes differ mainly in the level of medical care provided, staffing requirements, and the license each operates under. Nursing homes (skilled nursing facilities) provide 24-hour licensed nursing care and are certified by CMS for Medicare and Medicaid participation; assisted living facilities generally are not CMS-certified and provide personal care and supervision rather than clinical nursing care ^[4]. | Feature | Assisted living facility | Nursing home (SNF) |

Does Medicare cover assisted living facilities

No. Medicare does not cover the cost of room and board at an assisted living facility. Medicare.gov states plainly that Medicare "doesn't cover: Long-term care (also called custodial care)" if that's the only care you need, and assisted living is generally classified as custodial care ^[5]. Medicare will still cover medically necessary services a resident receives while living in assisted living, such as doctor visits, physical therapy ordered by a doctor, or durable medical equipment, the same way it would for someone living at home. It just won't pay for the housing, meals, or personal care components of the assisted living stay itself. Medicaid is a different story and is the main public payer for long-term residential care for people who qualify financially. Many states cover assisted living or group home services (not room and board directly, but the personal care and supportive services) through Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) waivers authorized under Section 1915(c) of the Social Security Act ^[6]. Coverage, waiver waitlists, and reimbursement rates vary enormously by state, so any specific waiver name or rate needs to be confirmed with your state Medicaid agency.

How to start a group home

Starting a group home generally means: pick your population and license category, confirm zoning, write your policy and procedure manual, build your staffing plan, apply for the state license, pass a pre-licensing inspection, and then operate under ongoing inspection and reporting rules. The exact sequence and paperwork are set entirely by your state licensing agency, so step one is always identifying which agency and which chapter of law governs your specific home size and population. A realistic checklist looks like this: 1. Decide your population (IDD, mental health, recovery, seniors) and confirm which state division licenses that population. 2. Check local zoning. Group homes are often permitted as a matter of right under the Fair Housing Act for small residential settings, but occupancy limits, fire code, and building type still apply. See our zoning-and-property content for how this typically plays out, and check with your county planning office directly. 3. Draft your policy and procedure manual covering admissions, medication management, emergency procedures, resident rights, grievance process, and staff training. 4. Build a staffing plan that meets your state's minimum ratios (these differ by shift, population acuity, and total bed count). 5. Complete any required fire marshal and building inspections before your licensing survey. 6. Submit your license application with required fees (fee amounts vary by state and license type, confirm with your state licensing agency). 7. Pass the pre-licensing survey and correct any deficiencies noted. 8. Get listed in your state's public facility locator, the same kind of tool DSHS runs in Washington. Building all of this from scratch, especially the policy manual and staffing plan, is the part that eats the most time for new operators. That's the gap our $299 State Group Home Licensing Kit is built to close: state-specific document templates so you're not drafting a 60-page policy manual line by line from a blank page.

How do I start a group home (state-specific steps)

The mechanics of "how do I start a group home" are the same everywhere in outline, but every specific requirement, license name, fee, inspection frequency, and staffing ratio is set by your individual state, so there's no single national answer. Some states license small group homes through a developmental disabilities division, others fold them into a general "adult care home" category, and a few states require a Certificate of Need before you can even apply. A few things are worth checking early, before you sign a lease or make an offer on a property: - Whether your state caps the number of unrelated residents allowed under a group home license (commonly somewhere in the 6-to-10 range, but this is not universal).

• Whether your chosen population requires a specific program license in addition to the residential license (common for IDD and behavioral health group homes).
• Whether your state requires the operator or administrator to hold a specific credential or pass a competency exam before licensing.
• What your state's inspection cycle looks like (annual is common, but complaint-driven inspections can happen any time). Our assisted living facility and assisted-living-facilities guides go deeper on category-specific rules if you're deciding between an assisted living license and a smaller group home license for your population and bed count.

How do public locator tools like DSHS actually work

Public locator tools pull directly from the state's licensing database, which means they show whatever is currently on file: license status, capacity, address, and (in the better-built tools) a link to the facility's most recent inspection reports and any substantiated complaints. Washington DSHS's tool, for example, links out to facility-specific inspection and complaint history for assisted living facilities and adult family homes ^[1]. This matters to operators in a very concrete way. The day your license is approved, your facility typically becomes searchable to the public, and any deficiency findings from your licensing survey or later inspections usually become part of that public record too. Families increasingly use these tools before they ever call a facility, so an outdated address, wrong capacity number, or unresolved deficiency sitting in the public record can cost you inquiries you never even know you lost. If your state's locator tool shows incorrect information about your facility (wrong capacity, wrong contact info, an old administrator's name), the fix is almost always to contact your licensing agency directly and request a correction. These tools are rarely editable by the facility itself. Building this into your regular compliance calendar (checking your public listing quarterly) is a cheap habit that costs nothing and catches errors before a family does.

How do I find my own state's version of the DSHS locator

Every state runs some version of a licensed facility search tool, though the name, depth of data, and ease of use vary a lot. The fastest way to find yours is to search "[your state] assisted living facility license lookup" or "[your state] department of health licensed facility search," since the agency name itself (Department of Social and Health Services, Department of Health, Department of Elder Affairs, Office of Long-Term Care) differs state to state. A few naming patterns to expect: aging-focused states often route this through a Department of Elder Affairs or Aging and Long-Term Care division; states that combine social services and health under one umbrella (like Washington's DSHS) will host it there; other states split licensing across a health department for the facility license and a separate agency for the Medicaid waiver piece. If you can't find it through a search engine, your state's assisted living or nursing home association (many states have one) usually links directly to the official locator on their advocacy or consumer resources page, since it's the same tool families use to research options. And if you're building your own facility's public presence to match up with what a locator will eventually show, our senior assisted living facilities near me piece covers how families actually use these searches, which is useful context for how you present your license and inspection history publicly.

What to check before you rely on a locator tool's data

Locator tools are only as current as the state's own licensing database, and update lag is real. Some states update licensing status and inspection postings within days; others batch updates monthly or quarterly. Before treating any locator listing as gospel, confirm the last-updated date on the page and, if it's not shown, call the licensing agency directly to verify current status. Do this whether you're researching a placement for a family member or checking your own facility's listing. A few specific things worth double-checking rather than assuming from the locator alone: current license status (active, provisional, suspended), the facility's actual approved capacity versus what's listed, and whether any recent inspection findings have been resolved or are still open. States are required to make certain inspection and complaint data public, but the format (PDF scans, searchable database, summary only) varies enormously, and a clean-looking listing doesn't always mean a clean current inspection file. For operators building out a new facility, it's also worth understanding that the inspection data feeding these locators is exactly what future residents' families will read before ever touring your building. Getting your assisted living at home or facility assisted living documentation right from day one isn't just about passing your survey. It's about what shows up publicly for years afterward.

Frequently asked questions

What is assisted living?

Assisted living is a licensed residential setting, usually for seniors, that provides housing, meals, and help with daily activities like bathing, dressing, and medication, along with 24-hour staff supervision. It's less medically intensive than a nursing home. CMS describes it as a type of residential care community offering room, board, and personal care services ^[3].

What is a group home?

A group home is a small licensed residential setting, typically 3 to 10 residents, providing supervision and support for people with intellectual/developmental disabilities, mental illness, or substance use recovery needs. It's usually licensed under a different statute and state division than senior assisted living, with rules specific to the population served.

What is an assisted living facility?

An assisted living facility is the specific licensed building and operation providing assisted living services under state law, with a license number, defined maximum capacity, approved level of care, and a set inspection schedule. In Washington, this is licensed under RCW 18.20 ^[2]; every state has its own governing statute.

What is the difference between assisted living and nursing home?

Assisted living provides personal care and supervision in a home-like setting; nursing homes provide 24-hour licensed skilled nursing care and are CMS-certified for Medicare and Medicaid. CMS notes nursing homes are for people who need a higher level of care than assisted living or in-home care can provide ^[4].

Does Medicare cover assisted living facilities?

No. Medicare does not cover room and board or custodial care at assisted living facilities. Medicare.gov states long-term custodial care is not covered when that's the only care needed ^[5]. Medicare will still cover medically necessary services like doctor visits or therapy received while living there.

How do I start a group home?

Pick your population and confirm which state agency licenses it, check local zoning, write your policy and procedure manual, build a compliant staffing plan, submit your license application with required fees, pass a pre-licensing inspection, and then operate under ongoing state inspection rules. Every specific requirement is set by your state licensing agency.

What does assisted living provide?

Typically a private or semi-private room, meals, housekeeping, laundry, medication management, help with bathing/dressing/mobility, social activities, and 24-hour staff availability. It does not typically include skilled nursing, IV therapy, or intensive rehabilitation, which fall under nursing home or hospital care instead.

What is the DSHS assisted living locator specifically?

It's Washington State's Department of Social and Health Services searchable tool for finding licensed assisted living facilities, adult family homes, and nursing homes, showing address, capacity, and links to inspection reports ^[1]. States outside Washington have their own equivalent tools under different agency names.

Is a group home the same as assisted living?

Not exactly. They're both licensed residential care settings but usually fall under different statutes, agencies, and population definitions. Assisted living tends to serve larger populations of seniors needing personal care; group homes are often smaller and built around IDD, mental health, or recovery populations.

How much does it cost to start a group home?

Costs vary enormously by state, population, and property, covering licensing fees, facility modifications, staffing, insurance, and startup supplies. There's no honest single national figure; confirm licensing fee amounts directly with your state licensing agency since they differ by license category and bed count.

Do all states have a public assisted living facility locator?

Most states maintain some searchable database of licensed facilities, though the name, depth of inspection data, and update frequency vary widely. Search '[your state] assisted living license lookup' or check your state health or social services department's website to find yours.

Can I look up a facility's inspection history online?

In many states, yes. Locator tools like Washington DSHS's often link directly to a facility's inspection reports and complaint history ^[1]. Availability and format (searchable database versus scanned PDFs) differ by state, so check your specific state agency's site for what's actually published.

Sources

1. Washington State DSHS, Search for a Facility: Washington DSHS operates a public search tool for licensed assisted living facilities, adult family homes, and nursing homes with inspection report links
2. Washington State Legislature, RCW 18.20: Washington licenses assisted living facilities under RCW 18.20, defining the facility's responsibility for resident housing, services, and safety
3. CDC National Center for Health Statistics, Residential Care Community FAQ: Definition of residential care/assisted living communities as providing room, board, and personal care services
4. Medicare.gov, Nursing Home Care: Nursing homes provide a higher level of care than assisted living or in-home care
5. Medicare.gov, Long-Term Care: Medicare does not cover long-term custodial care, which includes assisted living room and board
6. Medicaid.gov, Home & Community-Based Services 1915(c): Medicaid HCBS waivers under Section 1915(c) can fund personal care and supportive services in residential settings