Guide · Cost
There is no national number, because the biggest lines are state-set and model-set. Across sourced 2026 figures, lean independent openings run roughly $10,000–$25,000 in low-regulation states and $40,000–$80,000 in heavily licensed states with an office — before any franchise fee. Anyone who gives you one number without asking your state, your services and your first hires is guessing in a confident voice.
1. The state's take: license or registration fee ($0 in no-license states to $5,603 in California), renewal, and state extras like per-aide registry fees. 2. The trust lines: surety bond premium and liability insurance — small yearly numbers that stall applications when the paperwork names the wrong entity. 3. The binder: your policies and procedures, $0 written yourself to about $2,500 purchased, and the line the survey actually reads. 4. The office: $0 home-based where the state allows it, first month plus deposit where it doesn't — or where referral sources expect one. 5. Payroll runway: the weeks you pay caregivers before client money arrives. For most founders this is the largest bucket and the least discussed.
A widely shared startup PDF claims a 'fully legitimate, compliant' agency for about $3,000–$4,000. That figure survives only by leaving payroll out. Consultancies quote $40,000–$80,000 — a range that quietly includes their own fees and an office-first model. Neither anchor is your number. Ours is computed: state fees from the dataset, labeled planning figures, and your own payroll math.
The true-cost calculator takes your state, your model and your first hires and prints the opening number line by line. Change the payment-lag input and watch the runway line move — that movement is the real startup-cost education.
Dataset pages behind this guide: California state page · Texas state page · Florida state page · the full 50-state dataset (checked October 22, 2026).
Guides are general; verdicts are specific. The license checker applies your state's rules to your service mix, and the cost calculator prices your opening from the same dataset this guide cites.
The free checkers give you the verdict and the number. The Kit gives you the working papers: your state's application packet walked through in filing order, the policies-and-procedures binder spec (what your binder must contain — never a boilerplate binder), the administrator self-audit, the insurance & bond spec sheet, the Medicaid gate map, the franchise-vs-independent 10-year worksheets, and the payroll-runway planner.
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