Home › Guides › Council-funded care homes: who qualifies and what you top up
Two separate assessments decide this, not one. And the council must offer you at least one home at its own rate.
The care needs assessment decides whether you need a care home at all. It is free, it is your right under the Care Act 2014, and the council must carry one out on request regardless of your savings.
The financial assessment then decides how much you pay. Above £23,250 in capital you pay the full cost. Below £14,250, capital is ignored entirely and you contribute from income alone. Between the two, the council adds tariff income of £1 a week for every £250 of capital — which is why the sum is usually more than your pension alone.
Not “the cost of the home”. The council pays its own rate for your assessed level of need. Among councils we have checked, standard residential rates for 2026/27 run from £768 in Hertfordshire to £1,182 in Devon’s top band. Some publish nothing at all: Staffordshire states plainly that it has not had set fees for care home placements for years. See what councils pay.
The council must offer you at least one home that meets your needs at its own rate. If it cannot, it has to pay more. That obligation is the most useful thing to know in this whole area.
A top-up is the gap between the council’s rate and a more expensive home you have chosen.
You normally cannot pay it yourself. A third party — relative, friend, charity — pays. Three exceptions: during the 12-week property disregard, under a deferred payment agreement, and where care is section 117 aftercare under the Mental Health Act 1983.
No top-up is lawful where the higher cost comes from your own assessed needs, or where the local market offers no genuine choice. In those cases the council must increase the personal budget instead. Manchester City Council’s own top-up policy states this in terms.
An affordable placement must be offered first. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has held since 2015 that a home at the council rate must be genuinely available before any top-up is requested. If told there is nothing, ask for that in writing.
Whoever signs is committing for as long as the placement lasts, through annual increases. If they stop, the resident may have to move rooms or homes.
On a permanent move, the value of a property is ignored for the first 12 weeks. It is ignored indefinitely if a partner, or a relative aged 60 or over, or a disabled relative, still lives there.
In week 13 the property counts, capital exceeds £23,250, and most people become self-funders overnight. Those twelve weeks are the window for arranging a deferred payment agreement.
Before your savings reach £23,250, not after. Assessments take weeks and shortfalls are not usually backdated. Councils say this themselves: Hampshire advises getting in touch at £40,000 remaining, Staffordshire at least four months ahead.
Everyone in council-funded residential care keeps a personal expenses allowance of £31.80 a week in 2026/27, for clothes, toiletries, haircuts and anything else personal. It is set nationally, not by your council.
One thing to weigh: Attendance Allowance usually stops once the council funds a care home place. Self-funders keep it — £76.70 or £114.60 a week in 2026/27, and it is not means-tested. If you are paying for yourself and have never claimed it, that is the largest single sum most families overlook.
Reviewed 11 August 2026. Figures are for 2026/27 unless stated. This is information, not financial or legal advice.
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