Where should I look to find live-in help?

Try a reputable agency in your area. They take care of background checks, taxes, insurance, etc. depending on salaries in your area, small salary might not be enough. House sharing always sounds good. But is not proving that successful. A recent experience in Cincinnati only lasted three weeks, The Golden Girls was a sit com, not reality. I have a full time, experienced housekeeper. She cleans, does laundry, runs errands. She is provided a small apartment with all utilities, cable, WiFi, etc. She does no cooking because I like to cook. She has two days off weekly, holidays and two weeks vacation, plus $500.00 salary weekly. Her arrangements are comparable for where we live.

You’ll have to offer more than a small salary just FYI. A live in caregiver needs a normal salary, they too have expenses to pay for. To do otherwise is essentially.....slavery. Which is illegal. If you don’t go through an agency, you’ll have to take care of payroll taxes and have workers compensation insurance.

Does she need aid with the activities of daily living, like bathing, dressing or moving about? Then seek out home health care done by certified nurses aides. You can call local home health agencies. Does she need help with cooking and house cleaning? You can always posts ads on Facebook and look for a housekeeper. Be certain to do background checks.

Google senior home sharing. This is more and more common as facility assisted living is very expensive. Remember the Golden Girls?

https://www.mytrusense.com/2018/07/17/want-to-keep-living-at-home-a-senior-homeshare-may-be-the-answer/

https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/senior-homesharing-30159.html

Silverspring, hiring a person privately makes you an employer. Also, once someone lives in your house, that is their residence. If you needed to fire them, and they weren't willing to move out you'd literally need to go through an eviction process. That means filing legal documents requiring a fee (approx $300) and posting a notice for 30 days on the door. Then if they still won't leave you can at that point call the police to forcibly remove them. Please don't choose this option...it may seem "less expensive" in the beginning but can be incredibly "expensive" if it goes badly. Not to mention the very high risk of elder abuse (both physical and financial). FYI my family went through financial elder abuse, so am speaking from experience. Those predators are literally everywhere.

Please look into agencies like Visiting Angels. We are using them now (in FL) to care for 2 very elderly LOs and both the service and their caregivers have been awesome. Worth the money and peace of mind and the only true way to protect yourself.

Silver, I went thru a regular employment agency. It was a temp to hire position after she worked 60 days. Then our attorney provided a standard contract.

Real, You can eat for free and put your dishes in the dishwasher.:)

I would talk to friends and relatives about anyone they know that might be looking for a position like this. If you are involved in a church, speak with the Pastor and ask for help finding and vetting a person.

You will need to have a very detailed description of exactly what you are requiring them to do. It needs to be as real and accurate as possible. Nobody wants to agree to something and find out it wasn't the reality. You will want to check with your homeowners policy and ensure that a live in helper is covered, you will need to find out if you can add a workmans comp rider or how that works. You will need to put the time off, pay and expectations in writing. You can not ask anyone to be available 24/7 the labor laws require certain amounts of time off, you don't want to do anything that could open you up to any type of legal action.

Depending on what type of help you need, you may be better served in a facility. There are small ones to giant industrial sized ones and everything in between, so you would have to do some research to find a place that you could be comfortable in.

Have you had an official needs assessment? I would recommend that you get one, it will help you with your duties list or your search for a facility.

I hope you find what meets your needs best, whatever that is.

In just stumbled across this article from AARP.

https://states.aarp.org/co-living