People with learning disabilities and autistic people should be able to live in the place they call home, with the people and things they love, as part of their communities.
Making this possible depends on support that is consistent, respectful and built around the person’s life. It relies on stable teams, trusted relationships and strong practice leadership. Above all, it requires funding that reflects the real cost of delivering safe, high-quality supported living.
The Sustainable Supported Living Costing Tool has been developed by the More Than a Provider collaborative in partnership with PPL to support an honest conversation about those costs. It is based on real financial and operational data from not-for-profit providers delivering supported living across England. Its purpose is not to maximise profit but to secure sustainability, ensuring social care providers can continue to support people well into the future.
The 2026-27 update reflects the pressures experienced across the sector over the past year: rising pay expectations, recruitment and retention challenges, increasing complexity of need, and sustained inflation across essential running costs. The update provides a clear, evidence-based foundation for fair pricing and stable local markets.
What it really takes to deliver supported living
Supported living is sometimes reduced to a price per hour. In reality, it is built on people, relationships and the infrastructure that keeps those relationships steady.
Stable colleagues and continuity of support
Continuity is what keeps people safe, settled and in control of their own lives. Skilled colleagues who are paid fairly and supported well are more likely to stay, build relationships and understand what makes each person’s life work. The model reflects the full cost of employing staff responsibly, including realistic pay benchmarks, on-costs and the essential contribution of senior support workers who coach and guide teams.
Practice leadership and safeguarding
Quality support depends on visible leadership. Managers coordinate support, oversee risk, guide colleagues and maintain consistent standards. This work is crucial to keeping services safe, person-centred and responsive to people’s changing needs.
The practical costs of community-based support
Community-based support brings practical costs that cannot be avoided: travel between locations, insurance, digital tools, communication systems, equipment and local administration. These costs are fundamental to making supported living work at scale and to keeping people connected to their wider communities.
Organisational infrastructure
Behind frontline teams sit the functions that keep people safe and services accountable: recruitment, payroll, training, governance, IT and quality assurance. These are the foundations that ensure staff are safely recruited, supported and supervised, and that providers meet regulatory expectations.
Resilience and continuity
A modest 2.5% surplus assumption supports organisational stability. It allows providers to manage unexpected costs, invest in improvement and avoid the fragility that puts continuity of people’s support at risk.
What has changed for 2026-27?
The operating environment has shifted significantly. The updated model reflects higher wage benchmarks across the wider economy, sustained inflation affecting insurance, fuel, utilities and digital systems, expanding expectations around safeguarding, workforce wellbeing and compliance, and increasing complexity of people’s support needs in community settings. These pressures mean many existing fee levels no longer cover the real cost of safe, high-quality provision.
Fee parameters for supported living 2026-27
Daytime support
Support during waking hours enabling daily routines, independence and community participation
£24.00 – £26.08 per hour
Waking night support
Overnight support with staff awake to provide reassurance or assistance
£25.69 – £29.27 per hour
Blended 24-hour support
Packages combining daytime and waking night provision
£24.48 – £27.46 per hour
Specialist or complex support
Provision for people with higher levels of need requiring enhanced skills and coordination
£27.90 – £31.82 per hour
Sleep-in support (10-hour shift)
Staff sleep on site but remain available if needed
£99.39 / £115.15 / £130.90 per shift
Actual costs will vary locally depending on workforce conditions, geography and the needs of the people supported.
Supporting fair and constructive local dialogue
The Sustainable Supported Living Costing Tool provides clear transparency about how rates are constructed. It allows local areas to model their own assumptions, such as local pay rates or specific service features, while keeping a consistent structure across regions.
This shared evidence base helps commissioners and providers move away from short-term affordability and towards long-term sustainability. More Than a Provider partners support thousands of people and work across most local authorities in England and Wales. Our collective experience shows that sustainable funding is essential for maintaining high-quality community support and for avoiding more costly crisis or institutional responses.
Why this matters for people’s lives
Funding decisions shape the stability and quality of the support people receive.
When funding reflects real costs:
- Services can recruit and hold on to skilled colleagues
- People are supported by familiar staff who know them well
- Relationships deepen over time
- Support can be flexible, responsive and built around the person
- People feel secure in their own homes
When funding falls short:
- Staff turnover rises
- Continuity breaks down
- Support becomes more task-focused and risk averse
- People experience uncertainty and instability
Sustainable funding is what makes stable teams, trusted relationships and good lives possible. When commissioners and providers work from a shared, honest picture of real costs, people receive the secure, consistent support they need to thrive in their own homes.
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