Paying for care in England is decided by a small number of published figures and a handful of rules about the home, and almost everything a family needs to know follows from them. This page sets them out with their sources: the two capital limits, the tariff between them, the personal allowance, the 12-week disregard, the deferred payment agreement, and the one route where the NHS pays everything.
The assessment comes before the money
A council must assess anyone who appears to need care and support, whatever it thinks about their eligibility and whatever their financial situation (Care and Support Statutory Guidance, chapter 6, checked 11 September 2026). That needs assessment comes first and is separate from any assessment of what you can pay.
Someone whose capital is above the upper limit can still ask the council to arrange their care. The guidance says the council must meet eligible needs on request outside a care home, and may choose to for a care home place. Either way the person pays the full cost until their capital falls below the limit (chapter 8, checked 11 September 2026). You apply for the assessment through your council’s adult social services.
The two capital limits
The local authority circular for 2026 to 2027 says the capital limits remain at their current level: an upper limit of £23,250 and a lower limit of £14,250 (Social care charging for local authorities: 2026 to 2027, checked 11 September 2026). Three bands follow from them.
| Your capital | What you pay |
|---|---|
| Above £23,250 | The full cost of your care, until your capital falls below £23,250 |
| £14,250 to £23,250 | What you can afford from income, plus £1 a week for every £250 of capital between the limits |
| Below £14,250 | Only what you can afford from income |
Source: the same circular, and Annex B of the statutory guidance, checked 11 September 2026. Our band estimator applies these rules to your own figures, and says which band and whether the home counts, without ever stating a fee. The £1 per £250 is called tariff income, it is charged on any part of a £250 and rounded up, and at the top of the band it comes to £36 a week. For a care home place the limits are fixed. For care anywhere else, the guidance lets a council set higher limits if it wishes, never lower.
Capital means savings, investments and property other than the home, plus the home itself where it is not disregarded. Some assets must be ignored: the surrender value of life insurance policies and annuities, and personal possessions, unless they were bought to reduce capital and avoid charges (Annex B, checked 11 September 2026).
What you are left with
If the council supports your care home place, it must leave you a personal expenses allowance from your own income, set each year by circular. For 2026 to 2027 it rises from £30.65 to £31.80 a week (Social care charging for local authorities: 2026 to 2027, checked 11 September 2026).
The guidance says this money is for the person to spend as they wish and that pressure from a council or provider to do otherwise is not permitted.
Outside a care home the equivalent is the minimum income guarantee. For 2026 to 2027 it is £241.45 a week for a single person of Pension Credit age, and £184.30 each for a couple where one or both have reached that age (same circular). A council charging for care at home leaves you at least that much, and our home care costs page covers the full set of rules, including why your home’s value never comes into it.
Your home: when it counts and when it does not
The home is the asset that decides most assessments, and the rules on it are specific. A council must disregard the value of your main or only home while it is occupied by your spouse, partner or civil partner, unless you are estranged.
By a relative who is aged 60 or over, or incapacitated, or your child aged under 18; or by a lone parent who is your estranged or divorced partner (Annex B, paragraph 34, checked 11 September 2026).
The list of relatives is long and includes parents, children, in-laws, step-relations, siblings, grandparents, grandchildren, uncles, aunts, nephews and nieces, and their spouses or partners. Whoever qualifies must have lived there as their main home since before you entered the care home. Councils can also disregard the home at their discretion, and the guidance’s own example is someone who gave up their own home to care for you.
Where nobody in those categories lives there, the home still cannot be counted at once. The council must disregard it for 12 weeks when you first enter a care home as a permanent resident. The same 12 weeks apply when another disregard ends unexpectedly because the qualifying relative has died or gone into care (Annex B, paragraph 45, checked 11 September 2026). The guidance says the aim is to stop people being forced to sell at a time of crisis.
The deferred payment agreement
After the 12 weeks, the home does not have to be sold either. A deferred payment agreement is a loan from the council, secured against the home, that pays the care fees now and is repaid when the home is sold or from the estate (chapter 9, checked 11 September 2026).
The guidance says councils must offer one to anyone who meets the criteria.
The criteria: your needs are to be met in a care home; you have £23,250 or less in assets excluding the home; the home is not already disregarded, for instance because a spouse lives there; you are ordinarily resident in the council’s area; and you can provide adequate security, which usually means a legal charge on the home. Councils should aim to have the agreement in place by the end of the 12-week disregard.
It is a loan with a cost. Interest is compounded, and the national maximum rate tracks the market gilt rate published by the Office for Budget Responsibility plus 0.15%, changing on 1 January and 1 July each year. Councils may also charge administration fees reflecting their actual costs. They must tell you the interest rate before the agreement is made, and must tell you in writing whenever an administration charge applies.
The scale is smaller than the attention it gets. In 2024 to 2025, 3,025 new agreements were made in England with a total value of £87.8 million, and 7,425 were outstanding at 31 March 2025 (Deferred payment agreements, England: 2024 to 2025, checked 11 September 2026).
Our deferred payment agreement page sets out the mandatory criteria, the 90% equity limit on what can be deferred, and how the agreement ends, in full.
The care cost cap: announced, delayed, cancelled
There is no cap on what you can be charged for care in England. A £86,000 lifetime cap was announced in September 2021, delayed in November 2022, and cancelled on 29 July 2024. Section 15 of the Care Act 2014, which would introduce a cap, remains uncommenced law, with no revival date set.
The government’s 2021 plan, Build Back Better, set out the £86,000 cap on personal care costs, due to start in October 2023 (Adult social care charging reform: further details, checked 1 November 2026). The Autumn Statement 2022 delayed the start to October 2025, citing “the difficult decision to delay the national rollout of social care charging reforms” (Autumn Statement 2022, checked 1 November 2026).
The reforms were then cancelled entirely. On 29 July 2024, HM Treasury said it was “not proceeding with the previous government’s unfunded adult social care charging reforms,” securing “over £1 billion next year, rising to over £4 billion by 29/30” (GOV.UK, I will take the difficult decisions to restore economic stability, checked 1 November 2026). Section 15 of the Care Act 2014, the legal basis for any cap, is marked “Prospective” on legislation.gov.uk: on the statute book, but never brought into force, checked 15 September 2026.
The question has since moved to the Casey Commission, launched in January 2025 to examine adult social care in two phases. On 29 July 2026 the Prime Minister brought forward the date for the commission to report back with a plan to deliver a National Care Service from 2028 to “next summer”, and Baroness Casey launched a public “Big Conversation on Care” (GOV.UK, 29 July 2026, checked 26 October 2026). No commencement date for a cap has been announced.
When the NHS pays everything
One route puts the whole cost on the NHS, with no financial assessment at all. NHS continuing healthcare is a package of care arranged and funded solely by the NHS for people found to have a primary health need, and the government’s leaflet says it is free, unlike council support (public information leaflet, checked 1 November 2026).
The leaflet says it does not depend on a particular disease, diagnosis or condition, but on the nature, intensity, complexity and unpredictability of a person’s needs.
Our NHS continuing healthcare page covers the checklist thresholds, the assessment and how to challenge a refusal. The process has two steps. A checklist screens whether a full assessment is needed. A positive checklist leads to a full assessment by a multidisciplinary team using a decision support tool. The leaflet says the integrated care board should normally decide within 28 days of being told a full assessment is needed. A negative checklist can be challenged by asking the board to reconsider. People with a rapidly deteriorating condition can be fast-tracked.
For nursing home residents who need registered nursing care but are not eligible for continuing healthcare, the NHS pays a standard-rate contribution direct to the home, called NHS-funded nursing care. The leaflet says councils are not permitted to fund registered nursing care except in very limited circumstances.
Two smaller things are also free by law: intermediate care and reablement for up to six weeks, and aids and minor adaptations costing £1,000 or less (chapter 8, checked 11 September 2026). For adaptations above that £1,000 threshold, our Disabled Facilities Grant page covers the mandatory grant that can pay for larger changes to a home.
Giving money away
A gift made to reduce what you pay for care is treated as if you still had the money, and there is no seven-year rule. Our deprivation of assets page sets out the test the guidance applies, which is intention at the time, and the fact that the person who received the gift can be made to pay.
Attendance Allowance in a care home
GOV.UK says you cannot usually get Attendance Allowance if you live in a care home and your care is paid for by your local authority, so the outcome of the financial assessment on this page matters to it (GOV.UK, Attendance Allowance: eligibility, checked 1 November 2026). Our Attendance Allowance and care homes page covers the rule and what self-funders keep.
What this page does not do
It does not say what a care home costs. None of the official sources this page relies on publishes an average fee, so none appears here. It does not calculate what you would pay; the council’s financial assessment does that, from your own figures.
And it describes England: Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland charge for care under their own rules.
Two narrower questions have their own pages: who is liable for a care home bill, including top-ups and fees after a death, and what happens when the council disputes who owns the house.