Newsletter,Senior Care
Home Care Post Bulletin – September 2026
From Courtroom to Caregiver: Why Isaac Miller Left the Law to Build a Home Care Business
Isaac Miller had built the kind of career many attorneys spend decades pursuing.
He graduated from Vanderbilt University before earning his law degree from Pepperdine, built a successful practice in complex class-action litigation, and eventually found himself leading large teams in the death care technology sector before returning to private practice.
Along the way, he managed operations for a rapidly growing marketing company, helped oversee the sale of that business and directed multinational software implementation teams numbering more than 60 employees.
Today, however, Miller’s focus has shifted dramatically.
Instead of preparing legal arguments or overseeing software implementations, he is preparing to open FirstLight Home Care of West Des Moines, Iowa, where he’ll help older adults remain safely in their homes while supporting families.
His official open date is Oct. 1.
For professionals contemplating a second career in home care, Miller’s journey offers a blueprint for the due diligence that goes into starting an agency.
Survey Highlights Crisis for Family Caregivers — and an Opportunity for Home Care Agencies
Family caregiving is placing an enormous financial, professional and emotional burden on millions of Americans — and the findings of a new 2026 survey suggest home care agencies have an increasingly important role to play in helping families navigate that burden.
The 2026 Family Caregivers in Crisis Survey, conducted by Aeroflow Urology and based on responses from 1,144 family caregivers, found that fewer than one in four Americans can afford the cost of caregiving. The findings point to a caregiving system under significant strain, with families frequently providing complex care without formal training while simultaneously dealing with lost income, rising expenses and limited support.
For home care agency owners, the findings underscore the challenges facing the families who increasingly turn to professional caregivers for assistance — and highlight the importance of making home care easier to understand, access and integrate into a family’s overall care plan.
How Valley Health’s Steven Kleinman Is Redefining Rehabilitation in Home Care
When Steven Kleinman, PT, MPT, MHA, began his career as a physical therapist, home care wasn’t part of his long-term plan.
“I thought home care was where old therapists went to be put out to pasture,” he admitted with a laugh. “I thought it would be easy. Boy, was I wrong. I’ve seen firsthand that the caliber of home care physical therapists is top notch.”
A decade after joining Valley Health System, he couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.
Today, Kleinman serves as rehabilitation manager for Valley Health Home Care, overseeing physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy services across Bergen and Passaic counties in New Jersey. What began as a consulting assignment evolved into a leadership role responsible for more than 100 rehabilitation clinicians serving patients wherever they call home.
Along the way, Kleinman has witnessed the number of physical therapists at the operation increase by about 33% — and he’s navigated dramatic changes in home health reimbursement, patient complexity and clinical expectations. Yet one thing has remained constant.
“Our job is to restore function,” he said. “That’s what most people want when they come into home care — to restore function and improve mobility within their home.”
That philosophy has become the foundation of Valley Health’s rehabilitation program.
Maximize Billable Hours: Mastering Home Care Website Conversions
By Welton Hong, founder and CEO, Senior Care Marketing Max
Home care agencies spend a tremendous amount of time and money generating leads. They advertise, build referral relationships and attend networking events.
But there is a critical piece of the marketing equation that too many agencies overlook: What happens after someone finds you?
In home care, offline marketing is still king. I generally think of the marketing mix as roughly 80% offline and 20% online. But there is an important caveat: Whether someone discovers your agency through a physician referral, a personal recommendation, a networking relationship, or an advertisement or a Google search, they will almost always visit your website.
If your website looks dated, loads slowly or fails to explain who you are and why your agency is different, prospective clients have little reason to choose you over another provider. One of the biggest mistakes I see is an agency continuing to invest in advertising and other marketing while sending those prospects to a subpar website.
The website’s job is not necessarily to make someone call you immediately. Its job is to nurture the lead and give that person enough confidence to take the next step.
FirstLight Home Care and SilverAssist Join Forces to Create a More Connected Senior Care Journey
FirstLight Home Care and SilverAssist are proud to announce their new preferred partnership designed to make navigating senior care easier for older adults and their families. The collaboration brings together FirstLight’s trusted local home care providers with SilverAssist’s network of senior care resources including Oasis Senior Advisors, ElderLife Financial and Caring.com, creating a more coordinated path for families as care needs evolve.
“Families often have to coordinate several types of support as their loved ones age, from help at home to decisions about a future living transition,” said Glee McAnanly, CEO of FirstLight Home Care. “Working with SilverAssist brings trusted resources closer together so people can move forward with more information, guidance and confidence. At FirstLight, that’s what our mission is all about—helping people live their best day, every day.”
Home Helpers Home Care Builds Momentum with 18 Franchise Agreements in First Half of 2026
Home Helpers Home Care, a trusted brand and industry leader in the in-home care franchise space, signed 18 franchise agreements through the second quarter of 2026, demonstrating steady growth as demand rises for trusted care delivered at home. The brand also opened 13 new locations and completed two franchise expansions during the first half of 2026.
Home Helpers Home Care signed seven agreements, opened nine new locations and completed two expansions in Q1 2026, followed by 11 new agreements and four new openings in Q2 2026. This growth reflects the in-home care franchise brand’s continued investment in training, care technology, marketing resources and ongoing operational support designed to help franchisees build sustainable local businesses.
“The results of the first half of 2026 show the strength of the Home Helpers franchise community and the value of growing with purpose,” said Home Helpers Home Care CEO and President Emma Dickison. “Every new agreement and opening represents a local entrepreneur preparing to serve families with compassionate, reliable care. We remain focused on giving franchisees the tools and support they need to lead in their communities.”
Home Helpers Home Care is actively recruiting qualified franchise candidates in high-demand markets, including Minneapolis-St. Paul; Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona; Houston and Austin, Texas; Atlanta; Pittsburgh; San Diego and the San Francisco Bay Area in California; and several Florida markets, including Orlando and the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach region.
The company also marked several leadership and franchisee milestones in Q2. Nick Evans was appointed Chief Financial Officer, succeeding Bill Burlingham, who retired after 11 years of service. Franchisee Rick Cseak received Multi-Unit Franchisee Magazine’s 2026 Most Valuable Performer Veteran Entrepreneurship Award, honoring his 18 years with Home Helpers Home Care and leadership as a third-generation military veteran.
Visiting Angels Sets $1 Million+ Fundraising Goal for 2026 Walk to End Alzheimer’s
More than 7 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease. For Visiting Angels, America’s Choice in Home Care, the Alzheimer’s Association’s Walk to End Alzheimer’s is one of the most important initiatives the in-home care brand supports each year.
Over the past 15 years, Visiting Angels has raised more than $5.3 million through the company’s Walk to End Alzheimer’s fundraising initiatives. Thousands of employees and their families at hundreds of locations nationwide have contributed to these efforts through community walks.
“This is one of the most important things we do all year,” said Scott Parrish, president of Visiting Angels. “Our caregivers regularly work with people affected by Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia, so this is a cause that is very dear to our hearts. When you see people and their family members living with the effects of Alzheimer’s every day, it inspires our team to want to help. The Walk to End Alzheimer’s is a way we can make a difference in our communities and nationally.”
Over the past six years, Visiting Angels has consistently ranked in the Top 10 among companies raising money through the Walk to End Alzheimer’s, including as the top-fundraising brand in the healthcare sector.
WellSky and WelcomeHome Software Team Up to Convert More Inquiries into Scheduled Care
WellSky, a leading health and community care technology and services company, has announced a new integration with WelcomeHome Software, a customer relationship management solution built for personal care agencies. The partnership connects WelcomeHome’s sales and marketing CRM with the WellSky Personal Care solution giving agencies clearer visibility across prospect engagement, client intake, scheduling, and operations while reducing manual work and duplicate data entry.
Personal care agencies today depend on multiple software platforms to manage the full lifecycle of their business from marketing and referral tracking to client intake, scheduling, and operations. Disconnected systems create inefficiencies, limit data visibility, and increase costs. The integration between WelcomeHome and the WellSky Personal Care solution addresses these challenges by connecting CRM, intake, and operational workflows in one coordinated ecosystem, helping agencies move information across teams more easily, reducing manual reconciliation, and improving visibility into growth opportunities.
Agencies using the WelcomeHome CRM report saving as many as six to eight hours on administrative tasks per week and converting up to 10% more inquiries into scheduled care.
SOLENVIA Caregivers Signs First Franchise Agreement, Expanding into Tampa Bay
SOLENVIA Caregivers, a senior home care franchise built on speed, reliability and dementia expertise, has signed its first franchise agreement.
Shaun and Jaminy Seagriff, a husband-and-wife team based in the Tampa Bay area, have been awarded two territories covering Pinellas and Hillsborough counties – marking SOLENVIA Caregivers’ entry into Florida following the launch of its franchise program earlier this year.
“Awarding our first franchise territories is a huge milestone for SOLENVIA Caregivers,” said Bryan Dylewski, founder of SOLENVIA Caregivers (pictured at top). “We built this brand to be the most reliable name in home care, and to provide peace of mind to families and clients in markets across the country. Shaun and Jaminy are exactly the kind of owners we want carrying that forward, and we couldn’t ask for a better team to bring SOLENVIA Caregivers into Florida.”
He added, “We built this brand to be the most reliable name in home care, and to provide peace of mind to families and clients in markets across the country. Shaun and Jaminy are exactly the kind of owners we want carrying that forward.”
SafelyYou Releases Landmark Research Revealing the True Financial Toll of Senior Care
SafelyYou, the AI leader in senior living, has released the 2026 Cost of Senior Care report. The landmark research was commissioned by SafelyYou and conducted by independent research firm Merrill Research across 175 senior living leaders. The report, building off the Cost of Falls report conducted by the company in 2022, delivers one of the most comprehensive looks at the real operational and financial costs facing assisted living and memory care operators today, and maps a clear path toward earlier visibility, reduced risk, and stronger community performance.
Shirley Nickels, COO at SafelyYou, adds, “Senior living leaders have always understood the human cost of rising acuity, falls, and workforce strain. What hasn’t been as visible is how those challenges compound financially across an entire community. This research puts numbers behind that reality—and, more importantly, helps operators see where they have the greatest opportunity to intervene earlier, reduce risk, and improve both resident and business outcomes.”
Read more and get a link to download the report on the Home Care Post.
The $2M Plateau: Why Home Care Agencies Stall
By Leslie Waddell, founder, Transforming Leaders Daily
There is a moment almost every home care owner hits and almost nobody names out loud.
Revenue is real. The census is decent. Referral sources actually call you back. From the outside, the agency looks like a success story. From the inside, the owner is scheduling on a Sunday night, approving a $40 supply order from their phone at a red light and personally re-explaining the same intake process to a coordinator for the third time this quarter.
That is the plateau. And it usually shows up somewhere between $2 million and $4 million in revenue.
I spent 14 years on the franchisor side of this industry. First leading global learning and talent development at Comfort Keepers, then as senior vice president of experience at BrightStar Care, where learning and development, talent management, change management, sales, clinical and conferences all reported to me. More or less every department that touched whether a franchisee succeeded. I helped design the systems that owners were handed. What I have learned since is that the plateau is rarely a sales problem, a marketing problem, or a caregiver-supply problem. Those are the symptoms owners can see. The actual constraint is structural: The business has outgrown the operating system it was built on, and the owner is still functioning as that operating system.
How Help at Home Is Advancing Quality, Compliance and Care at Scale: 2025 Annual Report
Help at Home, a leading national provider of relationship-based, person-centered home care, has announced the publication of its annual Quality, Compliance and Care Annual Report, detailing the organization’s continued progress in delivering high-quality, compliance-focused care. The annual report outlines Help at Home’s approach to quality and safety across its operations, highlighting how data, workforce investment and population health strategies come together to improve outcomes for clients and caregivers alike.
“Quality and compliance are not check-the-box activities at Help at Home, they are embedded in how we care for people every day,” said Chief Medical and Safety Officer Ann Wells, M.D. “This report reflects our commitment to continuous improvement, proactive risk identification and building systems that allow individuals to live safely, independently and with dignity at home.”