Every figure on this page links to the organization that produced it, and each was re-checked against that source before publishing. How senior living communities, nursing homes and home care agencies use video and market themselves, and the evidence behind it: our own read of 284 senior living and care provider homepages; how many communities, agencies and workers there are; occupancy and advertising spend from Census data and SEC filings; where leads come from and how few families take virtual tours; who chooses a community and what care costs; how older adults use YouTube and Facebook; the CMS, HIPAA, FTC, fair housing and Florida rules on resident photos, testimonials and referral fees; and where six popular senior living marketing numbers came from.
In our read of 284 U.S. senior living and care provider homepages on November 1, 2026, 30.6% showed a video player and 12.3% a virtual tour, while 80.3% linked to a careers page. (Our measurement)See details
78.5% of those homepages linked to Facebook and 20.1% to a YouTube channel, although 65% of U.S. adults 65 and older use YouTube (Pew, 2026). (Our measurement, Pew Research Center)See details
U.S. CCRCs and assisted living facilities spent $702.2 million on purchased advertising in 2024, 0.8% of revenue (our calculation from Census data). (U.S. Census Bureau)See details
Only 10.8% of senior living shoppers in a 2024 survey had taken a virtual tour, 50% in another named in-person tours the most helpful research, and in the one published test a photo beat a resident video (3.92% against 0.85%). (A Closer Look, U.S. News, VWO)See details
In Aline's Q2 2026 CRM benchmark, assisted living web inquiries became tours 57% of the time, against 34% for paid referral and directory leads, 1.7 times the rate. (Aline)See details
Senior housing occupancy reached 90.4% in NIC MAP's primary markets in Q3 2026; Brookdale averaged 80.9% across its communities in 2025. (NIC, Brookdale 10-K)See details
Assisted living employment grew 15.2% and home health 19.0% from 2019 to 2025, and BLS projects aide jobs to grow 18 percent by 2035. (BLS)See details
"10,000 turn 65 every day" is Pew's 2010 projection for baby boomers, and "70% will need long-term care" comes from a 2005 model; HHS now says 56%. (Pew Research Center, ASPE)See details
How many senior living websites show video or a virtual tour?
About three in ten show video, and one in eight offers a virtual tour. On November 1, 2026 we opened the homepages of 400 U.S. senior living and care providers drawn at random from OpenStreetMap, the open map database, and 30.6% of the 284 we could read showed a video player (our measurement). 12.3% offered a virtual tour, and 37.7% had one or the other. The frame was every U.S. assisted living community, nursing home and other senior facility mapped in OpenStreetMap with a website: 2,958 distinct provider websites. Of the 400 sampled, 1 asked crawlers to stay away in robots.txt and was not visited, 13 showed a bot wall, 54 failed to load and 48 were no longer senior care sites.
The careers link is more common than the tour button. 80.3% of homepages linked to a careers or jobs page, against 48.6% with a "schedule a tour" or "plan your visit" call to action and 23.2% linking to pricing or floor plans. In a sector that hires constantly (see the workforce section below), the homepage works as a recruiting page as much as a sales page.
On the homepage (284 readable U.S. senior living and care provider sites, Nov 1, 2026)
Senior living video is mostly content rather than template decoration: only 8.8% of homepages played a muted background clip, and of the pages with any video, 54.0% used only embedded players from YouTube, Vimeo or similar hosts. Assisted living homepages did slightly more than nursing homes: 32.6% of 89 assisted living sites showed video, 15.7% a virtual tour and 57.3% a tour button, against 30.9% of 139 nursing home sites, 10.8% and 46.8%. Facebook is the default social link, on 78.5% of homepages, while 20.1% linked to a YouTube channel, although YouTube is the platform most adults 65 and older use (see below).
A hand check of 30 random sites agreed with the automatic video classification on 28 of 30 (93.3%) before we fixed the two misses. OpenStreetMap is volunteer-mapped, so this is a random sample of mapped providers that list a website, not of every U.S. provider; nursing homes are a large share of it, and chains (Brookdale, Visiting Angels) count once each. The method, code and one row per site are public: homepages.csv and crawl-summary.json.
How many senior living communities and home care agencies are there?
About 32,200 assisted living and similar residential care communities operated in the U.S. in 2022, the latest national count from the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics: 32,200 communities with 1,313,600 licensed beds (NCHS). The same survey counted about 14,700 nursing homes, 11,500 home health agencies and 3,100 adult day services centers serving about 182,000 people (NCHS). In 2020, before that wave, about 68,150 regulated long-term care providers in seven settings served roughly 7.3 million people (NCHS).
Federal statistics count the same industry in different ways, and the totals differ. The table puts them side by side, with what each one counts.
The gap between NCHS and the economic counts is mostly definition: NCHS counts state-licensed communities of four or more beds whatever their tax status, while QCEW and County Business Patterns count establishments by industry code, and a CCRC with an assisted living wing is one establishment. The no-employee count has grown fastest: 23.3% more home health nonemployer businesses in 2024 than the 358,291 of 2019 (our calculation from Census data).
Revenue follows the same split. U.S. CCRCs and assisted living facilities with employees took in $91.3 billion in 2024, up 8.4% on 2023 (Census AIES), against $73.2 billion in 2019 (Census). Tax-exempt operators accounted for $32.5 billion of the 2024 total (Census AIES). The 2022 Economic Census put the industry at $79.9 billion, with $38.9 billion in assisted living alone (Census). Home health care is larger: $132.5 billion in 2024 (Census AIES), up from $97.5 billion in 2019 and $114.2 billion in the 2022 Economic Census (Census).
How full are senior living communities?
Fuller than at any time since before the pandemic. Senior housing occupancy across NIC MAP's 31 primary U.S. markets averaged 90.4% in the third quarter of 2026, the 21st straight quarterly gain (NIC). Assisted living stood at 89.1% (NIC). NIC MAP sells its data to operators and investors; it also estimates that new building runs at only 10,445 units a year, far below what holding occupancy at 90% would need (NIC).
The operators that file with the SEC report the same climb. These are company-reported occupancy rates, each defined slightly differently (owned, leased, managed or same-store communities), so compare each line with its own past, not with the next line.
Brookdale's owned and leased occupancy fell every year from 2015 to 2019, before COVID-19 (Brookdale 10-K). So the post-2022 recovery is a return to, and for some a move past, a level that was already slipping. A move-in is worth a lot to a community: Brookdale's average was $6,347 a month per occupied unit in 2025, and CareScout's national median for assisted living was $6,200 a month in its 2025 survey (CareScout), up from $70,800 a year in 2024 (Genworth and CareScout). CareScout is owned by Genworth, which sells long-term care insurance.
How much do senior living operators spend on advertising?
Less than 1% of revenue. U.S. continuing care retirement communities and assisted living facilities spent $702.2 million on purchased advertising and promotion in 2024 (Census AIES), 0.8% of their revenue (our calculation from Census data). Home health care spent $485.5 million, 0.4% of revenue, and nursing homes $424.0 million, 0.3% of their $156.4 billion (Census AIES). The whole nursing and residential care sector spent $1.36 billion (Census AIES).
That counts purchased advertising only. It leaves out the salaries of sales counselors and marketing staff, and the fees paid to referral agencies, which a community records as a sales cost, not advertising. BLS counted just 4,210 market research analysts and marketing specialists employed by CCRCs and assisted living facilities in May 2025, at a median wage of $64,970 (BLS OEWS); community sales counselors and directors sit in other job codes.
Filings show the same small numbers, company by company:
Sonida's reported advertising fell 71.8% between 2019 and 2025 (our calculation from its filings) while its central team turned to "digital traffic and leads" through its website, national referral partners and social media (Sonida 10-K). Brookdale lists "digital advertising, social media, print advertising, e-mail, direct mail" among its channels (Brookdale 10-K) and names "paid referral organizations" among its referral sources (Brookdale 10-K). All its online forms and many calls go to the Brookdale Connection Center, which books visits (Brookdale 10-K). In 2019 it described "hundreds of thousands of customer inquiries" reaching its communities and website (Brookdale 10-K). AlerisLife said in its 2021 10-K that investment in digital marketing infrastructure cut its cost per digital lead by about 70.0% (AlerisLife 10-K), alongside website work, targeted content and search engine optimization (AlerisLife 10-K). Capital Senior Living's 2019 strategy included "the production of creative media" (Capital Senior Living 10-K). Home care sells differently: Addus says it uses "consumer-directed" marketing for personal care, while home health referrals come from other providers (Addus 10-K).
Where do senior living leads come from, and how many tour?
In Aline's Q2 2026 benchmark from its senior living CRM, the web was the largest source of inquiries: 51% of assisted living inquiries, against 26% from paid sources (Aline). Web inquiries also converted to tours more often, 57% in assisted living, against 34% for inquiries from paid referral agencies, directories and lead aggregators (Aline), 1.7 times the rate (our calculation). 46% of assisted living tours led to a move-in (Aline). Per 100 assisted living units a month, communities averaged 36 inquiries, 10 tours and 4 move-ins (Aline). Aline sells CRM software to operators and says the benchmark draws on surveys of more than 95,000 senior living researchers in 2025 (Aline).
Prospects start online but many never reach a community's own site. In the American Seniors Housing Association's Spring 2026 consumer survey, run by ProMatura, the internet was the leading first source of information: 45 percent of operator lead-list respondents and 36% of general-market adults 55+ (ASHA/ProMatura). Yet only 33 percent of the general-market group had visited a specific community's website, against 90% of people already on a lead list (ASHA/ProMatura), and across care types a majority, 54–61 percent, had visited none (ASHA/ProMatura). Nearly 1 in 10 had already used AI to explore communities (ASHA/ProMatura); 69 percent had heard of AI comparison tools (ASHA/ProMatura). The sample was 2,138 general-market adults plus 256 from members' lead lists (ASHA/ProMatura); ASHA is the operators' trade association.
Follow-up is where communities lose people. In A Closer Look's 2024 survey of 733 people, 57.9% said a community followed up within a business day, and 8% got no follow-up at all (A Closer Look); 71.2% had contacted or toured a community in the past year (A Closer Look). Phone calls (74.8%) were the most common contact (A Closer Look). A Closer Look sells mystery shopping to operators. In Caring.com's 2015 survey of 1,181 people who had toured, 18% heard nothing after the tour (Caring.com), and 68% said the community was nicer than its flattering photos online had led them to expect (Caring.com). Caring.com is a referral business paid by communities.
Do families use senior living virtual tours?
A minority do. In A Closer Look's 2024 survey of 733 senior living shoppers, 10.8% had taken part in a virtual tour, against 68.4% who toured in person (A Closer Look). In U.S. News & World Report's 2024 survey of 754 adults involved in a senior living move in the past 12 months, half (50%) said in-person tours were the most helpful way to research a community (U.S. News), and 15% named a community's own Facebook page (U.S. News).
Virtual tours entered senior living's public filings as a pandemic measure and mostly left with it. Capital Senior Living's 10-K, filed in March 2020, said in-person tours had dropped and it had created "virtual tours" (Capital Senior Living 10-K). Brookdale redesigned its sales process in 2020 to include "virtual tours, video engagement, and outdoor prospective resident meetings" (Brookdale 10-K), and several of its large markets were still "virtual-only" for prospect visits at the end of 2020 (Brookdale 10-K), when 89% of its communities were accepting move-ins (Brookdale 10-K). Healthcare Trust, a REIT that operated senior housing, listed "virtual tours for potential new residents" among its COVID-19 responses (Healthcare Trust 10-K). A Place for Mom launched a live virtual tour app in May 2020 with about 300 of its 15,000 partner communities using it (A Place for Mom).
Across all industries, the phrase "virtual tours" appears in few 10-K filings, and the count peaked with the pandemic (SEC EDGAR full-text search, by filing year; the senior living filers among the hits are 2020 and 2021 only):
Year filed
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
10-Ks containing "virtual tours"
5
7
25
24
14
15
18
The 2021 count was 5 times the 2019 count (our calculation); after 2022 the hits are mostly apartment REITs and homebuilders. No senior living filer we read reports a virtual tour conversion rate, a video budget or leads by source. The only published senior living video test we found points the other way: on Brookdale's "Find a Community" page, a version with a photograph lifted community searches 3.92% over two months and 30,000-plus visitors, against 0.85% for a version with a two-minute resident testimonial video (VWO case study). It is one page and one test, and the only measured senior living result we found.
Senior living video does reach families after the move. Sonida's memory care communities use an app through which family members get "real-time photos, videos and updates" about residents (Sonida 10-K).
Who chooses a senior living community?
Usually a family, and often an adult child. In September 2025, 10% of all U.S. adults told Pew Research Center they were a caregiver for a parent 65 or older (Pew), and 24% of adults with a parent that age saw themselves as that parent's caregiver (Pew). 42% of parent caregivers regularly help manage the parent's health care, such as appointments and medication (Pew), and 16% help with bathing or dressing (Pew). 47% of women caring for a parent, against 30% of men, said it had hurt their emotional well-being (Pew).
The wider pool is large. AARP and the National Alliance for Caregiving's Caregiving in the US 2025 counted 63 million U.S. family caregivers in the past 12 months, nearly 1 in 4 adults (AARP/NAC), 59 million of them caring for an adult (AARP/NAC) and 51 million for someone 50 or older (AARP/NAC). Caregivers of people 50+ have been at it five years on average and give 26 hours a week (AARP/NAC); 74 percent live with or within 20 minutes of the person (AARP/NAC), and 44 percent give high-intensity care (AARP/NAC). Only 11% have had medical training for the tasks (AARP/NAC). The survey covered 6,858 caregivers through Ipsos's probability-based panel (AARP/NAC). AARP also says caregivers spend about $7,200 a year of their own money (AARP).
Families decide fast and feel unready. In A Place for Mom's 2024 survey of over 1,000 unpaid caregivers, 79% said they were not fully prepared for the role (A Place for Mom). In its January 2025 release, 69% secured care within weeks, although most had expected months or longer (A Place for Mom), and only 18% felt they understood care costs well (A Place for Mom). When it launched its virtual tour app in 2020 the company said more than 50 percent of families need buy-in from several family members, without publishing a method (A Place for Mom). A Place for Mom is a referral service paid by the communities it refers families to.
Once a family has chosen, satisfaction is high. In J.D. Power's 2025 U.S. Senior Living Satisfaction Study, family decision-makers for assisted living and memory care residents scored 867 out of 1,000 (J.D. Power), and rated staff care 8.89 out of 10, a record (J.D. Power). Independent living residents scored 753 (J.D. Power), with the biggest gain on price paid (+28 points) (J.D. Power). The study rests on 2,917 responses (J.D. Power); J.D. Power sells research and certification to the providers it ranks.
What does senior living and home care cost?
CareScout's 2025 Cost of Care Survey, built from more than 25,000 provider rates (CareScout), put the national median at $6,200 a month for assisted living, $35 an hour for non-medical in-home care, or $80,080 a year at 44 hours a week (CareScout), $315 a day for a semi-private nursing home room and $355 for a private one (CareScout), and $95 a day for adult day health care (CareScout). The 2024 edition, from more than 15,000 completed surveys (Genworth and CareScout), gave $77,792 a year for a home health aide and $75,504 for homemaker services (Genworth and CareScout); Two-thirds of agencies charged the same for both (Genworth and CareScout), and the 2025 survey merged the two into one category, so the years do not compare directly. A private nursing home room was $127,750 a year in 2024 (Genworth and CareScout). Surveyed assisted living communities reported occupancy rising from 77% to 84% (Genworth and CareScout). Genworth sells long-term care insurance.
Do older adults watch online video?
Most do, and YouTube reaches more of them than any other platform. In Pew Research Center's 2026 survey, 65% of U.S. adults 65 and older said they use YouTube and 59% Facebook (Pew). Fewer older adults use Instagram (21%) or TikTok (11%) (Pew). Daily use is a different picture: in early 2025, 27% of adults 65+ used YouTube every day and 45% Facebook (Pew).
89% of adults 65+ use the internet, up from 14% in 2000 (Pew), and 79% own a smartphone (Pew); 16% rely on a smartphone without home broadband (Pew). AARP's 2026 Tech Trends survey of 3,838 adults 50+, fielded September to October 2025 (AARP), found smartphone ownership in that age group at 90% (AARP), 8 in 10 streaming video weekly (AARP), and 55% of family caregivers 50+ using technology to coordinate care (AARP).
How many older Americans are there, and where do they live?
64.6 million Americans were 65 or older on July 1, 2025: 64,617,088, up 16.2% since April 2020, in the Census Bureau's Vintage 2025 estimates (Census). In 2024 they were 18.0% of the population (Census), 61.2 million people after a 3.1% rise in a year (Census), and the age group grew 13.0% between 2020 and 2024 while the number of children fell (Census). The South's 65-and-older population grew fastest from 2020 to 2025, to 24,763,730 (Census).
The 2020 Census counted 55.8 million people 65+ (Census), after 38.6% growth in a decade, the fastest since 1880-1890 (Census), and 6,336,435 people 85 and older (Census). Maine had the oldest population, 21.8% 65+, with Florida next at 21.2% (Census). Older adults outnumbered children in 11 states in 2024, against three in 2020 (Census), in 112 metro areas (Census) and in 1,411 counties (Census). In the Bureau's 2023 projections, the 65+ share passes the under-18 share in 2029 (Census) and reaches 29.1% by 2100 (Census).
Few live in care settings. In 2020, 1.4 million people 65+, 2.5% of the age group, lived in nursing facilities (Census), rising to 10.2% of people 85 and older (Census). About 1.2 million people lived in nursing homes in 2022 (NCHS) and about 1,016,400 in residential care communities on a given day, though NCHS's FastStats page gives 988,800 for the same year (NCHS FastStats) (NCHS Data Brief).
Assisted living residents are old and need help: in 2022, 53% were 85 or older (NCHS), 67% were women (NCHS), 62% needed help with three or more daily activities (NCHS), 44.1% had a dementia diagnosis (NCHS) and 17% were on Medicaid (NCHS). Dementia was as common among nursing home residents, 41.1% (NCHS), and among home health patients, 34.8% (NCHS). At adult day centers, Medicaid paid for 79% of participants (NCHS). Medicare's fee-for-service home health users numbered about 2.7 million in 2024 (MedPAC), and 14,400 freestanding skilled nursing facilities served Medicare stays (MedPAC); Medicaid-certified nursing facilities fell to 14,232 by July 2025 (MedPAC).
Most people would rather not move. In AARP's 2024 Home and Community Preferences Survey, 75% of adults 50+ wanted to stay in their homes (AARP), against 77 percent in 2021 (AARP), though 44% expect to move at some point (AARP). Only 29 percent saw a continuing care community as a likely choice (AARP), and 32 percent an active adult community (AARP).
How many people work in senior living and home care?
About one million in CCRCs and assisted living, and close to twice that in home health. Private CCRCs and assisted living facilities employed an annual average of 1,019,068 people in 2025, against 958,817 in 2019 (BLS QCEW). The growth was all in assisted living, up 15.2% to 523,133 from 454,114 (BLS QCEW), while CCRCs fell 1.7% to 495,935 from 504,703 (BLS QCEW) (our calculations). Home health care grew 19.0% to 1,803,516 from 1,515,130 (BLS QCEW), and nursing homes shrank 2.7% to 1,547,697 from 1,591,181 (BLS QCEW). Census County Business Patterns counted 508,230 assisted living employees in March 2023 (Census CBP).
Pay is low and has risen fast. Average annual pay in CCRCs and assisted living was $40,714 in 2025, up 36.9% from $29,742 in 2019, before inflation (BLS QCEW). In May 2025 the industry's median wage across all jobs was $38,690 (BLS OEWS). Home health and personal care aides, the largest care job, earned a median $35,800 nationally (BLS OEWS), 70.2% of the $50,980 median for all workers (our calculation).
Most aides do not work in a community at all. Individual and family services, which includes non-medical home care, employed 2,312,380 of them (BLS OEWS). BLS's Occupational Outlook Handbook puts 51% of aide jobs in that industry, 23% in home health and 6% in CCRCs and assisted living (BLS OOH). It projects aide employment to grow 18 percent from 2025 to 2035 (BLS OOH), from 4,677,100 jobs (a count that includes the self-employed, so it is higher than the OEWS figure), with about 760,500 openings a year (BLS OOH). Nursing assistants grow 3 percent (BLS OOH), with 203,300 openings a year (BLS OOH), and 11% of them work in CCRCs and assisted living (BLS OOH).
That churn is why recruiting video matters to operators. Brookdale employed about 33,000 people at the end of 2025 (Brookdale 10-K) and says it focused on hiring and "reducing turnover" to cut premium labor (Brookdale 10-K). Ensign Group's payroll was about 60.0% of its total expenses (Ensign 10-K). Sonida recruits through "local social media pages" (Sonida 10-K), and Addus says caregiver hiring was helped by "programmatic job advertising" and an AI scheduling assistant (Addus 10-K). Other employers' scale: Pennant 9,700 staff (Pennant 10-K), Aveanna 32,000 (January 2026) (Aveanna 10-K), Amedisys 19,000 (Amedisys 10-K), Enhabit 10,800 (Enhabit 10-K); Ensign's operators run 3,400 senior living units next to their skilled nursing beds (Ensign 10-K), and Addus served about 107,000 home care consumers in 2025 (Addus 10-K).
What are the rules on filming residents and advertising senior living?
For nursing homes, written consent. Federal rules give every resident of a Medicare- or Medicaid-certified nursing home a right to "personal privacy" (42 CFR 483.10) and to a "dignified existence" (42 CFR 483.10). CMS memo S&C 16-33-NH, issued August 5, 2016 (CMS), says photographing or recording a resident or their private space without the resident's or representative's "written consent" violates that privacy (CMS), and a photo or video that demeans or humiliates a resident is abuse "regardless of whether the resident provided consent" (CMS). States must investigate such allegations onsite within "two to 10 days" (CMS), report findings within 10 working days (CMS), and nursing homes had to train staff not to use cameras or "smart phones" that way (CMS); surveyors began checking policies 30 days after the memo (CMS). In CMS's State Operations Manual (Appendix PP, revised 2024), surveyors cite privacy under tag F583 (CMS Appendix PP), where the same "written consent" language now sits (CMS Appendix PP), and mental abuse through photos under F600 (CMS Appendix PP). Making residents seek approval before posting about the facility on "social media" is itself listed as a rights violation (CMS Appendix PP). These rules bind certified nursing homes; assisted living is licensed by states.
HIPAA adds a consent step for marketing by covered providers, such as nursing homes and home health agencies that bill electronically: "Authorization required: Marketing" (45 CFR 164.508), with a statement if "remuneration is involved" (45 CFR 164.508). Marketing means a message that encourages people to "purchase or use the product or service" (45 CFR 164.501).
Fair housing law covers the pictures in an ad. HUD's rule names "photographs" among the ways an ad can signal a preference (24 CFR 100.75), and Brookdale's 10-K notes that the "Fair Housing Act" may require it to change its marketing (Brookdale 10-K). HUD's January 9, 1995 advertising memo (HUD) lets ads describe accessibility features such as a "wheelchair ramp" (HUD) but expressly does not address "human models" (HUD). Age-restricted independent living has its own tests: housing for people 62 years or older (24 CFR 100.303), or 55+ housing where at least 80 percent of occupied units have a resident 55 or older (24 CFR 100.305), checked by survey every two years (24 CFR 100.307); HUD reads ads that say "adult living" as evidence against the exemption (24 CFR 100.306).
Testimonials and reviews fall under the FTC. Its consumer reviews rule took effect October 21, 2024 (FTC) and bans fake reviews (section 465.2) (16 CFR 465), review incentives conditioned on sentiment (465.4) (16 CFR 465), undisclosed insider reviews (465.5) (16 CFR 465), company-controlled "independent" review sites (465.6) (16 CFR 465) and review suppression (465.7) (16 CFR 465). The FTC gave the maximum penalty as $51,744 per violation at adoption (FTC); the eCFR showed $53,088 in November 2026 (16 CFR 1.98). The Endorsement Guides, revised July 26, 2023 (16 CFR 255), read a testimonial as typical unless the ad discloses the "generally expected performance" (16 CFR 255.2), and want real residents in "both the audio and video" of an ad that claims to show actual customers (16 CFR 255.2). The Consumer Review Fairness Act voids contract clauses that gag reviews, effective 90 days after its 2016 enactment (15 U.S.C. 45b).
What does Florida require in assisted living ads?
A license number, and since 2026 a license to say "memory care". Florida had 2,989 licensed assisted living facilities in early 2026 (Florida Senate). Each must print its license number in "all advertising" (Fla. Stat. 429.47), "at least one license number per advertisement" (Fla. Stat. 429.47), and may not imply it is a "nursing home" (Fla. Stat. 429.47). The 2026 law, chapter 2026-102 (Laws of Florida), passed 111-0 in the House and 37-0 in the Senate (Florida Senate). It reserves terms such as "memory care" and "dementia care" for licensed providers (Florida Legislature), with state rules due by June 1, 2027 (Florida Legislature); until then, s. 429.177 requires a disclosure from any facility advertising Alzheimer's care (Fla. Stat. 429.177). Residents keep a right to dignity and their "need for privacy" (Fla. Stat. 429.28).
Referral payments are tightly limited. Section 429.195 bans kickbacks and split fees (Fla. Stat. 429.195), lets facilities pay referral services only for residents who are "not Medicaid recipients" (Fla. Stat. 429.195), and allows a "monetary reward" to a resident who refers a friend (Fla. Stat. 429.195). Breaking the ban is patient brokering, with a $50,000 fine (Fla. Stat. 817.505), rising to $500,000 for 20 or more patients (Fla. Stat. 817.505).
How are senior living referral agencies regulated?
Lightly, and they have drawn federal scrutiny. On September 17, 2012 the FTC announced its first cases against online senior placement services, CarePatrol and ABCSP (FTC), with orders barring unsupported claims for 20 years (FTC); it alleged ABCSP claimed its coordinators had personally seen "virtually all" communities in an area (FTC). Washington's referral agency law requires agencies to carry "one million dollars" of insurance (RCW 18.330) and refund part of the fee if a placement ends within "thirty days" (RCW 18.330), but section 18.330.080 says nothing in the law will limit, specify or "otherwise regulate the fees" agencies charge providers (RCW 18.330.080).
In June 2024, Sen. Bob Casey, chairing the Senate Aging Committee, asked A Place for Mom for its fees and practices by July 15, 2024 (Senate Aging Committee). His letter said its network covered about 14,000 of roughly 30,600 assisted living facilities (Senate Aging Committee), 45.8% (our calculation), that the community typically pays the first month's rent and care, against a national median of $5,350 a month (Senate Aging Committee), and quoted the company's own FAQ: 38% of families paid on average $987 a month over their budget (Senate Aging Committee). It asked for fee data for 2023 by state (Senate Aging Committee). We found no published results of the inquiry.
What the popular senior living marketing numbers really say
Senior living marketing agencies, virtual tour vendors and referral sites repeat a small set of numbers. We traced each to the organization that produced it. Pages that repeat a claim are linked only as dated evidence of how it spread, never as a source for the number.
"10,000 Americans turn 65 every day"
It is a 2010 projection about baby boomers, not a current count of all Americans. A 2020 senior housing technology article still gives "Everyday, 10,000 new Americans turn 65" as a market fact (Propmodo). The origin is Pew Research Center, which wrote on December 29, 2010 that from January 1, 2011, "and every day for the next 19 years", 10,000 baby boomers would reach 65 (Pew). The Census Bureau later used the same round number for the past: since 2010, about 10,000 boomers a day had crossed 65, it wrote in December 2019 (Census), and repeated "about 10,000 a day" in another story (Census). The rate was never fixed: one aging-technology analyst collected estimates from 8,000 a day (AARP, 2014) to about 11,780 a day in 2022 (Aging and Health Technology Watch). The newest version, more than 11,200 a day from 2024 to 2027, comes from the Alliance for Lifetime Income, an annuity-industry group (PLANADVISER). Use instead: the Census Bureau's estimates of the 65+ population, which rose to 61.2 million in 2024 (Census) and 64,617,088 in 2025.
"Listings with virtual tours get 87% more views" and "virtual tours increase move-ins"
The 87% is a real-estate claim with no surviving original, and we found no measured move-in lift from senior living virtual tours. The earliest form we could retrieve is a virtual-tour vendor's page crediting "Realtor.com 2007": listings "receive 87% more views if they include a virtual tour" (Fusion Virtual Tours), in a block of 2006-2008 home buyer statistics; our real estate video statistics page found no Realtor.com original either. A 2014 Senior Housing News article quoted providers saying video tours lifted contact-to-move-in conversion "at a rate as high as 80%", with no data or comparison (Senior Housing News). A senior living operator wrote in October 2025 that "only 2% of prospective residents" used virtual tours in 2024, crediting U.S. News (Kisco Senior Living); the 2% is not in the text of the U.S. News report it links. Use instead: survey owners' own shares, 10.8% who took a virtual tour in A Closer Look's 2024 survey and 50% who found in-person tours most helpful in U.S. News's, and the one published test, where a photo beat a video on Brookdale's site (3.92% against 0.85%).
"Video on a landing page lifts conversions 80%"
It is a vendor's best case from 2010. EyeView Digital, which sold landing-page video, wrote that video could raise conversions by over 80% in some cases (EyeView); the one fully described test in the same paper, on a trading site, found almost 32 percent (EyeView). Our video advertising statistics page traces the same paper. Use instead: no general number; test it on your own page, as Brookdale did.
"70% of people turning 65 will need long-term care"
It comes from a 2005 model that counted any help, including family care, and HHS's current estimate is lower. The federal LongTermCare.gov page says someone turning 65 has "almost a 70% chance" of needing some long-term care (ACL), on a page last updated in 2020, and a personal finance site still repeated "nearly 70%" in October 2026 (Money Talks News). Behind it is Kemper, Komisar and Alecxih's 2005 microsimulation in Inquiry, which projected about three years of need on average (Inquiry); the same table gives 13% of people using assisted living, for under a year on average (ACL). LongTermCare.gov also gives 3.7 years of need for women and 2.2 for men (ACL). HHS's own planning office now puts the share at 56% for a disability serious enough to need long-term services (ASPE, 2022) and says "Fifty-six percent" is lower because broader definitions give higher numbers (ASPE). A 2019 ASPE study using a severe-needs definition still found 70% (ASPE), with 24% receiving more than two years of paid care (ASPE). Use instead: ASPE's 56%, with its definition.
"The average assisted living stay is 22 months"
It is a 2010 median for residents still living there, not the average length of a finished stay. Caring.com writes that the average stay "is just under two years, at 22 months" (Caring.com), and on the same page calls it a median; it also says "around 60%" of residents move on to a nursing home, with no source (Caring.com). An operator's guide gives about 30 months (Senior Services of America), and an HHS compilation records an older industry figure of 29 months (ASPR TRACIE). The origin is NCHS's 2010 National Survey of Residential Care Facilities: the median stay so far among current residents was 671 days, or about 22 months (NCHS), a measure that undercounts short stays. NCAL's current facts page gives no length of stay. Use instead: the NCHS figure with its scope and year, or no figure.
"89% of adult children help make the decision" and "nursing home turnover is 94%"
The first has no identifiable survey; the second is real but narrower than it is used. Senior Housing News's 2012 "By the Numbers" piece says 89% of adult children assisted their parents in the decision, citing several sources without saying which produced the number (Senior Housing News). The nearest measured version is Caring.com's 2015 survey of 2,098 online searchers, in which about 58% of adult children said a medical diagnosis prompted the search (Senior Housing News on Caring.com). Use Pew's 24% of adults with a parent 65+ who see themselves as a caregiver instead. The "94% staff turnover" headline (Skilled Nursing News, 2021) comes from Gandhi, Yu and Grabowski's study of 2017-2018 CMS payroll data for 15,645 nursing homes, which found median nursing staff turnover of about 94 percent (Health Affairs). It describes nursing homes before COVID-19, not assisted living or home care.
We started from the questions people search for about senior living video statistics and looked for the organization that actually produced each answer. Every figure on this page sits in an evidence ledger with its source, the exact table or paragraph it came from, the measurement period, the population measured, and the date we checked it. This edition holds 366 figures from 53 publishers.
On November 1, 2026, each sourced figure on this page was re-fetched with the fetch cache cleared and matched against the recorded wording: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (through the BLS data API), the Occupational Outlook Handbook (through Internet Archive copies, because bls.gov refuses automated requests) and Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages open data; Census County Business Patterns, the 2022 Economic Census, Nonemployer Statistics and the Annual Integrated Economic Survey (through the Census data API), and Census population releases; NCHS long-term care reports (through Internet Archive copies), MedPAC, ACL and ASPE; the 10-K filings of Brookdale, Sonida/Capital Senior Living, Welltower, Ventas, Pennant, Ensign, PACS, Addus, Aveanna, Amedisys, Enhabit, AlerisLife and Healthcare Trust, and SEC EDGAR full-text search; the eCFR, CMS guidance, HUD, the FTC, the Florida and Washington statutes and the Senate Aging Committee; AARP, the National Alliance for Caregiving, Pew Research Center, J.D. Power, ASHA/ProMatura, NIC, Aline, CareScout, A Closer Look, Caring.com and A Place for Mom releases; peer-reviewed studies through PubMed; and the pages behind each popular claim. The homepage figures are our own measurement: 400 senior living and care provider websites sampled at random from OpenStreetMap and opened in a headless browser on November 1, 2026. We left out Census projection tables the checker cannot read, an NCHS 2025 report with no readable copy, CES monthly series we could not re-check, and paid or form-gated reports.
We only cite the producer: government agencies, regulators, company filings and official posts, and the survey owner's own report. We do not cite statistics roundups, Statista-style aggregators, or salary sites without a public method. We did not bypass paywalls or sign-up forms; where a full report was gated, we used only the figures its publisher states publicly.
Figures marked "our calculation" are arithmetic on the cited numbers, and anyone can reproduce them:
87 / 284 readable homepages with video_player = true in homepages.csv; rule: video player: a <video> element or player iframe/placeholder (YouTube, Vimeo, Wistia, Vidyard, Brightcove, Loom, Facebook video ...) at least 150x80 px, or a labelled click-to-play control or hidden player embed
36 / 284 readable homepages with video_self_hosted = true in homepages.csv; rule: video player that is a native <video> element (file served by the site or its site builder/CDN, incl. background videos)
52 / 284 readable homepages with video_embedded = true in homepages.csv; rule: video player from a third-party host (YouTube, Vimeo, Wistia, Facebook, TikTok ...)
38 / 284 readable homepages with youtube_embed = true in homepages.csv; rule: a YouTube player (iframe, lite-youtube facade or hidden YouTube embed) on the homepage
57 / 284 readable homepages with youtube_channel_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: link to a YouTube channel or handle (not a single video; template placeholders excluded)
92 / 284 readable homepages with instagram_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: link to an Instagram profile (template placeholders such as instagram.com/wix excluded)
35 / 284 readable homepages with virtual_tour = true in homepages.csv; rule: virtual tour: an iframe or link to a tour vendor (Matterport, Kuula, CloudPano, Panoee, TourMkr, iGuide, 3DVista ...), a link/button labelled virtual tour / 360 tour / video tour / 3D tour, or a link path like /virtual-tour, /360-tour, /video-tour
138 / 284 readable homepages with tour_cta = true in homepages.csv; rule: tour or visit call to action: a link/button labelled schedule|book|request|plan|arrange|reserve (+ up to two words) tour|visit (e.g. Schedule a Tour, Plan Your Visit, Book a Tour), take/come for a tour, Tour us today, or a path like /schedule-a-tour, /book-a-tour, /request-a-visit; labels with call, visiting hours or visitation excluded
228 / 284 readable homepages with careers_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: careers or jobs link: a link/button labelled careers, jobs, join our team, employment, work with us, now hiring, or a path /careers, /jobs, /employment, or a link into an applicant-tracking system (Workday, Paycom, UKG, iCIMS, Indeed ...)
66 / 284 readable homepages with pricing_or_floor_plans_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: pricing or floor-plans link: a short link label pricing, price(s), cost(s), rates, fees, cost of care or floor plan(s), or a path /pricing, /costs, /floor-plans (hospital price-transparency links excluded)
39 / 284 readable homepages with pricing_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: pricing link: a short link label pricing, price(s), cost(s), rates, fees or cost of care, or a path /pricing, /costs, /rates (hospital price-transparency links excluded)
54 / 284 readable homepages with floor_plans_link = true in homepages.csv; rule: floor-plans link: a short link label floor plan(s)/floorplans, or a path /floor-plans
This edition contains no Mark Studios customer data.
Limitations
Nobody counts senior living video directly. Statistics agencies count communities, workers, revenue and advertising spend, not what providers publish. Our homepage read covers providers mapped in OpenStreetMap with a website, a volunteer-built list that is not a random sample of all U.S. providers and leans toward nursing homes.
Many sources sell into the market. NIC MAP, Aline, A Closer Look, CareScout (Genworth), J.D. Power, Caring.com and A Place for Mom all sell to operators or are paid by them; ASHA is the operators' trade association. Their samples are named beside each figure.
Company figures are not industry figures. Each operator defines occupancy and marketing expense its own way, and only publicly traded companies file.
Advertising spend leaves things out. Census counts purchased advertising only, not sales staff, referral-agency fees or time spent making video.
Virtual tour evidence is thin. Two small surveys and one A/B test are all the measured evidence we found; no operator publishes a virtual tour conversion rate.
How to cite this page
For a single figure, cite the original publisher named next to it, and link here if the verification trail is useful to your readers. Each figure has its own anchor, so you can link straight to it, for example https://www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics#DRV-003. To cite the page as a whole:
Mark Studios. "Senior Living Video Statistics." Last verified Nov 1, 2026. https://www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics
APA
Mark Studios. (2026, November 1). Senior living video statistics. https://www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics
MLA
“Senior Living Video Statistics.” Mark Studios, 1 Nov. 2026, www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics.
Chicago
Mark Studios. “Senior Living Video Statistics.” Last modified November 1, 2026. https://www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics.
BibTeX
@misc{markstudios_senior_living_video_statistics_2026,
author = {{Mark Studios}},
title = {{Senior Living Video Statistics}},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
url = {https://www.markstudios.com/research/senior-living-video-statistics},
note = {Last verified 2026-11-01}
}
Our calculations and the evidence table are free to reuse with attribution and a link to this page. Each underlying figure remains the claim of its original publisher, and some publishers ask for a link when their figures are reused.
Office of the Federal Register (eCFR), regulation issued by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, 42 CFR 483.10 Resident rights (2026-11-01). Accessed 2026-11-01.
Office of the Federal Register (eCFR), regulation issued by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 45 CFR 164.501 Definitions (2026-11-01). Accessed 2026-11-01.
Office of the Federal Register (eCFR), regulation issued by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 24 CFR 100.303 62 or over housing (2026-11-01). Accessed 2026-11-01.
Office of the Federal Register (eCFR), regulation issued by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 24 CFR 100.305 80 percent occupancy (2026-11-01). Accessed 2026-11-01.
Office of the Federal Register (eCFR), regulation issued by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 24 CFR 100.307 Verification of occupancy (2026-11-01). Accessed 2026-11-01.
We re-verify every figure quarterly and when a major source publishes a new edition. The next scheduled review is February 2027. Corrections go to contact@markstudios.com.
Nov 1, 2026: First published with 366 figures from 53 publishers, each checked against its original source.
Frequently asked questions
How many senior living communities use video on their website?
About three in ten. In our read of 284 U.S. senior living and care provider homepages on November 1, 2026, 30.6% showed a video player and 12.3% offered a virtual tour; 37.7% had one or the other.
Do families use senior living virtual tours?
A minority do. In A Closer Look's 2024 survey of 733 senior living shoppers, 10.8% had taken a virtual tour, against 68.4% who toured in person, and in U.S. News's 2024 survey 50% said in-person tours were the most helpful research.
How much do senior living communities spend on marketing?
U.S. CCRCs and assisted living facilities spent $702.2 million on purchased advertising and promotion in 2024, 0.8% of their revenue (our calculation from the Census Bureau's Annual Integrated Economic Survey). That excludes sales staff and referral fees.
How many assisted living communities are there in the U.S.?
About 32,200 assisted living and similar residential care communities with 1,313,600 licensed beds in 2022, by the CDC's NCHS count. BLS counted 22,534 private assisted living establishments in 2025.
What is senior living occupancy in 2026?
Senior housing occupancy in NIC MAP's 31 primary markets averaged 90.4% in the third quarter of 2026, and assisted living 89.1%.
How much does assisted living cost?
CareScout's 2025 Cost of Care Survey put the U.S. national median at $6,200 a month for an assisted living community. CareScout is owned by Genworth, which sells long-term care insurance.
Do 10,000 Americans turn 65 every day?
It is Pew Research Center's 2010 projection that 10,000 baby boomers a day would turn 65 from 2011, not a current count of all Americans. The Census Bureau estimated 64,617,088 Americans 65 and older on July 1, 2025.
Can a senior living community post photos or video of residents?
For certified nursing homes, CMS says photographs or recordings without the resident's or representative's written consent violate the resident's privacy, and demeaning ones are abuse regardless of consent.
