Nursing home, assisted living costs vary widely by region, new report finds

Geography plays an important role in the cost of nursing home and other long-term care services, according to a recently released report.

Nationally, the average nursing home cost was $210 per day for a private room in the markets surveyed. But costs vary greatly depending on where you live. If you reside in a facility in Homer, AK, you could be paying up to $538 per day in nursing home costs, according to the report. But a nursing home in Lafayette, LA, costs a fraction of that-$118 per day. Meanwhile Hawaii is the most expensive on average for care in an assisted living facility at $4,406 a month-more than twice what assisted living residents in North Dakota pay. Many of the nation’s Northeastern states have assisted living costs that top $4,000 per month.

The survey, which was conducted by the Long Term Care Group on behalf of Northwestern Mutual, sampled more than 7,000 long-term care facilities nationwide. For more information on the report, or the companies that commissioned it, visit www.nmfn.com.