The short answer
- Claim Attendance Allowance first: £77 or £115 a week, not means testedMost people over State Pension age who need help with personal care qualify, and it is paid whatever the savings. It goes unclaimed by a great many families who are entitled to it.
- Ask the council for an assessment, whatever the savingsThe needs assessment is free and you are entitled to it. The council contributes below £23,250 in savings, and the house is not counted while your relative lives in it.
- Where the need is mainly a health need, the NHS can pay all of itNHS Continuing Healthcare is not means tested and can fund live-in care at home in full. Ask for the checklist if a nurse, GP or hospital has ever suggested it.
- A typical week in Lancashire is £1,089; after Attendance Allowance, about £974Live-in care is priced by the day, so days the family covers come straight off the bill, and one carer for a couple costs a fifth more, not double.
Benefit and threshold figures are for 2026/27. Local cost figures come from the advertised rates of 43 live-in carers based within about an hour of Lancashire, read from their profiles in September 2026. Every carer sets their own rate.
The four routes
How families in Lancashire pay for live-in care
There are four, and they stack. Most families end up using two or three of them together, so go through all four before deciding what you can afford.
The four routes, side by side
| Who qualifies | Means tested? | What it pays | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Attendance Allowance | Over State Pension age, needing help with personal care or supervision for six months or more | No | £77 or £115 a week, in cash |
| Lancashire's council | Eligible care needs and savings under £23,250 | Yes | A contribution, sometimes the whole cost, as a direct payment you spend on your carer |
| NHS Continuing Healthcare | A primary health need: complex, intense or unpredictable | No | The whole package, including live-in care |
| Your own money | Everyone else, and most people for part of it | n/a | Typically £1,089 a week in Lancashire, less the above |
Attendance Allowance
- Who qualifies
- Over State Pension age, needing help with personal care or supervision for six months or more
- Means tested?
- No
- What it pays
- £77 or £115 a week, in cash
Lancashire's council
- Who qualifies
- Eligible care needs and savings under £23,250
- Means tested?
- Yes
- What it pays
- A contribution, sometimes the whole cost, as a direct payment you spend on your carer
NHS Continuing Healthcare
- Who qualifies
- A primary health need: complex, intense or unpredictable
- Means tested?
- No
- What it pays
- The whole package, including live-in care
Your own money
- Who qualifies
- Everyone else, and most people for part of it
- Means tested?
- n/a
- What it pays
- Typically £1,089 a week in Lancashire, less the above
Attendance Allowance is counted as income in a council financial assessment, but the council must then allow for the disability costs it covers, so claiming it never leaves a family worse off.
What you are funding
What live-in care costs in Lancashire, and what is left after benefits
Live-in carers based within about an hour of Lancashire advertise £1,036 to £1,173 a week on PrimeCarers, with our fee included. The sums below use the typical week, £1,089.
A typical week, before and after Attendance Allowance
| One person | A couple, one carer | |
|---|---|---|
| Live-in care, a week | £1,089 | £1,350 |
| Attendance Allowance, higher rate | −£115 | −£230 (one claim each) |
| Left to find, a week | £974 | £1,120 |
| Left to find, a year | £50,648 | £58,240 |
| For comparison: a care home, England average | £1,160 a week | £2,320 a week, two fees |
Live-in care, a week
- One person
- £1,089
- A couple, one carer
- £1,350
Attendance Allowance, higher rate
- One person
- −£115
- A couple, one carer
- −£230 (one claim each)
Left to find, a week
- One person
- £974
- A couple, one carer
- £1,120
Left to find, a year
- One person
- £50,648
- A couple, one carer
- £58,240
For comparison: a care home, England average
- One person
- £1,160 a week
- A couple, one carer
- £2,320 a week, two fees
At the lower rate of Attendance Allowance the weekly figure for one person is £1,012. At home you keep paying the household bills and the carer's food (£5 to £10 a day), so add those before comparing with a care home. Council or NHS funding comes off these figures too.
Live-in care is priced by the day, so every day the family covers comes straight off the bill: one day a week is roughly a seventh less. The cost of live-in care in Lancashire has an estimator and goes through what changes the figure.
Route one
Attendance Allowance: claim it first, whatever the savings
£76.70 or £114.60 a week in 2026/27, tax free, not means tested, and paid on top of the State Pension. Anyone over State Pension age who has needed help with personal care or keeping safe for six months qualifies, and anyone arranging live-in care almost certainly does.
- 1
Get the form
TodayRing the Attendance Allowance helpline or download the form from gov.uk. Ringing starts the claim from that date, so ring first and fill in later. - 2
Describe the worst days, not the best
An eveningThe form asks about help needed with washing, dressing, eating, medication, getting about and staying safe, by day and by night. Write about the days when everything is hard, and say how long each thing takes. Night-time needs are what lift a claim to the higher rate. - 3
Get help filling it in
FreeAge UK and Citizens Advice fill these forms in every week and know what the assessors look for. Both have branches in Lancashire. - 4
Claim Pension Credit if it now applies
After the awardAttendance Allowance opens the door to extra amounts in Pension Credit and Housing Benefit, so a household that was just over the line may now qualify. Ask when the award letter arrives.
Route two
Council funding in Lancashire
In England the council contributes once savings fall below £23,250, and ignores savings under £14,250 altogether. Between the two, every £250 counts as £1 a week of income. The house is not counted while your relative lives in it. Income is counted, but the council must leave a single pensioner with at least £241.45 a week to live on before it charges anything.
Who to ask in Lancashire
Ask for a direct payment
The needs assessment is free and you are entitled to it
Ask for a carer’s assessment at the same time
- Day 1
Ask for the assessment
Phone or online form. Write down the date, the name of who you spoke to, and ask when the assessment will be. If your relative is in hospital, the discharge team can arrange it faster.
- Weeks 1 to 4
The needs assessment
At home, by phone or online. Ask for a home visit if your relative is unlikely to describe a bad day over the phone, and be there for it. The test is a national one: an illness or impairment, two or more everyday outcomes out of reach, and a significant effect on wellbeing.
- Then
The care plan and the budget
The council sets a personal budget for the care it has agreed is needed. Ask for it as a direct payment, and say the care will be a live-in carer you have chosen.
- About 4 weeks
The financial assessment
Savings, income and benefits, with the house ignored. The contribution is what is left after the Minimum Income Guarantee of £241.45 a week for a single pensioner, and after disability-related spending is allowed for.
- If it goes wrong
Ask for reasons in writing, then complain
A refusal must come with written reasons. Every council has a statutory complaints procedure, and the Ombudsman can look at delay, wrong decisions and unfair charges after that.
Local authority funding explained goes through the assessment, the sums and the appeals in full, with a worked example.
Route three
NHS Continuing Healthcare in Lancashire
Where somebody's main need is a health need, the NHS can fund the whole package of care, including a live-in carer at home, and it is not means tested. Fewer families ask than should.
Who it is for
How it starts
How long it takes
If it is refused
NHS Continuing Healthcare explained covers the criteria, the assessment and how to prepare for it, and free live-in care with dementia answers the question most families ask.
Route four
Paying for live-in care yourself in Lancashire
Most families pay for at least part of it, and how the money is arranged matters as much as how much there is.
Savings and pensions first
A deferred payment or equity release
A care annuity
Family contributions, written down
Days off the bill
Take specialist advice
Before you decide how to pay
0 of 11 ticked
Claim and ask
Know the numbers
Get advice on
Paying for care yourself goes through each option, and the different types of care funding is the map of everything on this page.
Questions
Questions families in Lancashire ask about paying for live-in care
Sometimes in full, more often in part. In England the council contributes once savings fall below £23,250, and ignores savings under £14,250 altogether. Between the two, every £250 counts as £1 a week of income. The house is not counted while your relative lives in it. Income is counted, but the council must leave a single pensioner with at least £241.45 a week to live on before it charges anything. The council decides what care is needed, not what form it takes, so where live-in care costs about the same as the visits it would otherwise fund, or a care home place, many will meet it. Ask for the council’s share as a direct payment and spend it on the self-employed live-in carer you choose, rather than whoever an agency sends. Local authority funding explained goes through the assessment and the sums.
Yes. A direct payment is the council's contribution paid to you (or a managed account) so that you can arrange the care yourself, and it can be spent on a self-employed carer of your choosing. The carer must not be a close relative living in the same house, and the council will want to see how the money was spent, which the weekly invoices from PrimeCarers cover. Carers here set their own rates, so tell the council the rate on the profile of the carer you have chosen.
£76.70 a week at the lower rate and £114.60 at the higher rate in 2026/27, paid whatever your savings and income, and tax free. It is not means tested and does not reduce the State Pension. It can increase Pension Credit and Housing Benefit, because it opens the door to extra amounts in those, so claim it first. If the council later assesses a contribution it will count Attendance Allowance as income, but it must also allow for the disability costs it is meant to cover.
Someone whose main need is a health need rather than help with daily living: care that is complex, intense or unpredictable, such as advanced dementia with behaviour that needs managing, a condition that changes week to week, or needs that call for a nurse's judgement. It is not means tested. It starts with a checklist that a GP, district nurse or hospital discharge team can complete; if that passes, a full assessment follows and the NHS pays the whole package, which can be live-in care at home. Someone very ill can be fast-tracked in days. NHS Continuing Healthcare explained covers the criteria and how to prepare.
Not while your relative lives in it, and live-in care means they do. The council's financial assessment for care at home ignores the value of the home; it is only when someone moves permanently into a care home that the house can be counted, and even then not while a spouse or certain relatives live there. That is one of the strongest arguments for live-in care over a care home when there is a house and modest savings.
One live-in carer looks after both partners for typically around £1,350 a week, about a fifth more than for one person. Each partner can claim Attendance Allowance in their own right if they each need help, so a couple can have up to £230 a week towards the cost. Each partner is assessed separately by the council, on their own share of the savings. Compared with two care home places at about £2,320 a week, that is usually the largest saving on this page.
Ask the same day the need becomes clear, because the wait is the delay. The guidance says the timescale should be reasonable and proportionate to the urgency, and councils commonly take a few weeks for the needs assessment and about 4 weeks for the financial one. If somebody is coming home from hospital, say so; discharge teams can arrange care and funding faster. You can start a carer privately in the meantime and ask the council to backdate its contribution to the assessment date, which some will.
Then the figure to plan around is £1,089 a week, less Attendance Allowance, so about £974 at the higher rate. Over a year that is £50,648. Live-in care is priced by the day, so every day family covers comes straight off it. Where the money is mostly in a house, a deferred payment agreement with the council or a care annuity can turn it into an income; an independent financial adviser who specialises in later-life care will show which lasts longest. Paying for care yourself goes through the options.