Guide · Cost by state

How much does it cost to start a home care agency in Illinois?

The state lines

In Illinois, the state fee for the Home Services Agency License is $1,500. The bond picture: no state bond minimum in the published rules. Insurance: State sets no minimum Timeline to budget against: Two-stage: IDPH acts on a provisional license first (the Code as amended by Public Act 103-0257 sets a 240-day provisional period, with a 90-day provisional renewal window), and the agency operates provisionally while IDPH surveys it before full licensure.

The lines the state doesn't set

Formation (~$300 planning figure), a policies-and-procedures manual ($0–$2,500), screening at roughly $75 per hire, and — the line that decides whether the opening works — payroll runway: your caregivers' weekly pay multiplied by the weeks your clients and Medicaid take to pay you. At 3 caregivers, 30 hours a week, $17 an hour and a 30-day payment lag, the runway alone is about $7,650.

Your number, computed

Run the true-cost calculator with Illinois selected. It uses this state's published fees from the dataset — checked October 22, 2026 against Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) — and prints every assumption next to its line, so you can argue with the inputs instead of with a stranger's blog total.

Against the anchors

For this state as for every state: the ~$3,000–$4,000 'fully legitimate' PDF figure omits payroll; the $40,000–$80,000 consultancy range assumes an office-first model plus the consultant. Your computed number will land where your model puts it — which is the entire point.

Dataset pages behind this guide: Illinois state page · the full 50-state dataset (checked October 22, 2026).