Looking for a group home alternative in California?
You have more options than you've been told. A parent's honest guide to life-sharing, SLS, and ILS — what each one is, who it fits, and how to ask your Regional Center for it.
- Vendored SLS provider with California Regional Centers
- 100+ matches across California
- 95%+ match success rate
Why families come looking for something else
Group homes aren't bad. They're just not a fit for most of the adults with IDD we work with. These are the reasons parents tell us they started searching.
Rotating staff, never the same face
Group home caregivers work shifts. Your loved one may bond with someone Monday and never see them again Friday. Industry turnover sits between 40% and 60% in California.
Roommates by bed availability, not compatibility
Residents rarely choose who they live with. Matches happen based on which bed is open — not personality, interests, or daily rhythm.
The facility's schedule, not your son or daughter's
Meals at 5:30. Lights out at 9. Bath night on Tuesdays. Group homes run on operational rhythms, not on what your adult child actually wants their day to look like.
Independence stalls
Structure makes group homes safe, but it can also limit growth. Many parents notice their loved one stops building skills the day they move in.
Community fades
Most group homes are clustered with other residents who share a diagnosis, not a friendship. Real community integration is hard to build from the inside of a facility.
And the answer to "is it the best option?" stays unsettled
Parents we talk to almost always say the same thing: a group home was presented as the next step, but no one walked them through what else exists in California.
The three main alternatives in California
All three are funded through the Regional Center system. They serve different needs, and many families end up combining them.
Life-sharing
Your adult child shares a real apartment or house with one compatible supportive roommate who lives there full-time. Not a caregiver on shift — a peer who chose to be there.
- Who it fits
- Adults with IDD who want independence, friendship, and their own home — and don’t need awake overnight medical staff.
- How it’s funded
- Regional Center, billed as Supported Living Services (SLS). Typically no out-of-pocket cost to the family for support.
- The tradeoff
- Not licensed for 24/7 awake medical care. Requires a thoughtful matching process — bad matches are worse than no match.
SLS in an independent apartment
Your adult child lives alone (or with a non-paid roommate) in their own apartment, and Regional Center funds SLS support staff who come in for scheduled hours.
- Who it fits
- Adults with IDD who are close to fully independent and only need help with specific tasks — meds, transportation, budgeting.
- How it’s funded
- Regional Center SLS hours, authorized through the IPP. Staff is hourly, not live-in.
- The tradeoff
- Staff turnover and isolation. Many adults with IDD do fine with the support hours but struggle with the loneliness of living alone.
ILS (Independent Living Services)
Skill-building, not housing. An ILS provider sends staff to your adult child’s current home (yours or theirs) to teach budgeting, cooking, transportation, and daily routines.
- Who it fits
- Adults with IDD preparing for eventual independent living — often combined with later SLS or life-sharing.
- How it’s funded
- Regional Center, billed as ILS. Hourly, not 24/7.
- The tradeoff
- Not a housing solution. ILS alone doesn’t get your adult child out of the family home — it builds the skills for the next step.
Worth knowing: these aren’t either-or choices. Many families start with ILS in the family home, layer on SLS hours, then move into life-sharing once their adult child is ready. The Regional Center system is designed to support that progression.
What makes life-sharing different
Life-sharing isn't a smaller group home. It's a one-to-one relationship in a regular home, screened and supported by a real team. The supportive roommate lives there — they share meals, run errands, watch the same shows, build a real friendship. That stability is what makes the rest of the support work.
If you want the side-by-side comparison — staffing, environment, oversight, growth, cost — we built a separate page for that.
- One supportive roommate, not a rotating staff team
- FBI background checks and a five-step screening process
- Monthly check-ins and 24/7 program support
- 95%+ match success across 100+ California matches
After 22 years, Gina got to be just a mom
Abby is 22. She has been a Regional Center of Orange County client since before she was two. She’s into anime, thrifting, gothic style, piercings, and she has five rubber snakes she considers pets. Until this spring, she lived with her parents.
Her mom Gina had been Abby’s caretaker, best friend, and mom for 22 years — three full-time roles, one person, no off switch. The group home option had come up. So had the question of what happens when Gina can’t keep doing all three.
Then Homies matched Abby with Katie. Eight years of community caregiving, recently back in California, looking for purpose. They met on a video call and Abby went first.
“I read on your profile that you really like anime. What’s your favorite right now?”
By the end of the call, they were debating Diet Coke versus Diet Pepsi. Three more meetings followed. Now Abby has her own apartment, Katie has a real friendship, and Gina, for the first time in 22 years, gets to be just a mom.
“There are options. If there’s any way I could help, I’d like to see the program blossom for other families.” — Gina, Abby’s momRead Abby and Katie’s full story →
Find group home alternatives by Regional Center
California has 21 Regional Centers. Homies works across Southern California — find your area below for local services, vendored partnerships, and stories from families in your community.
Eastern Los Angeles Regional Center
Los Angeles County (East LA)
Frank D. Lanterman Regional Center
Los Angeles County (Central/East)
Harbor Regional Center
Los Angeles County (Harbor/South Bay)
Inland Regional Center
Riverside County · San Bernardino County
North Los Angeles County Regional Center
Los Angeles County (North)
Regional Center of Orange County
Orange County
San Diego Regional Center
San Diego County · Imperial County
San Gabriel/Pomona Regional Center
Los Angeles County (San Gabriel Valley)
South Central Los Angeles Regional Center
Los Angeles County (South Central)
Tri-Counties Regional Center
Ventura County · Santa Barbara County · San Luis Obispo County
Westside Regional Center
Los Angeles County (Westside)
Outside Southern California? Reach out and we’ll point you to options in your Regional Center catchment.
How to start the conversation with your Regional Center
Service coordinators rarely lead with life-sharing as an option. Families almost always have to bring it up first. Here's how.
Ask about SLS at the next IPP meeting
Supported Living Services is the funding category that covers life-sharing and independent apartment living. Tell your service coordinator you want to explore SLS as an option. If you haven't had an IPP meeting recently, you can request one anytime.
Request a Resource Development referral
Most Regional Centers have a Housing or Resource Development team. Ask your SC to loop them in. They can share vendored SLS providers in your area (Homies is one of them) and explain what's available locally.
Get SLS hours written into the IPP
The IPP is the legal document that authorizes funding. Until SLS hours are in there, nothing else moves. Be specific: "My son or daughter would like to pursue life-sharing as their living arrangement, and we'd like SLS hours authorized to support that."
Tour, meet providers, and let your adult child choose
California is a "choice of provider" state. You don't have to accept the first option the RC suggests. Meet two or three vendored SLS providers, ask about their matching process, and let your adult child be part of the decision.
Common questions from parents
The questions families ask in the first ten minutes of a call with us.
In California, the main alternatives are Supported Living Services (SLS) in the person's own apartment, life-sharing with one matched supportive roommate, Independent Living Services (ILS) while living with family, and the Self-Determination Program's individual budget. For most autistic adults, life-sharing is the strongest fit because it delivers what group homes structurally can't: one consistent person instead of rotating shift staff, a sensory environment built around the individual, and a routine that bends to the person rather than the facility. All of these are funded through your Regional Center.
It's structurally different, not just smaller. A group home is a licensed facility with rotating staff and multiple residents. Life-sharing places one adult with IDD in a regular apartment or house with one compatible supportive roommate who lives there full-time. There's no facility license, no shift schedule, no rotating caregivers — just two people sharing a real home, funded as Supported Living Services through your Regional Center.
Most Regional Center-funded options — including life-sharing, SLS in an independent apartment, and ILS — typically cost families nothing out of pocket for the support services themselves. The Regional Center funds the support; your adult child pays rent and utilities from SSI, SSDI, wages, or family contribution. Group homes and life-sharing are usually similar in cost to the system, so families rarely choose based on price.
Yes, if it's written into the IPP (Individual Program Plan). Life-sharing is funded as Supported Living Services, which is a core Regional Center service category. Your service coordinator can authorize SLS hours, and Homies bills the Regional Center directly. The conversation usually goes more smoothly when the family brings it up than when the family waits for the RC to suggest it.
Life-sharing can include overnight support — the roommate sleeps in the home. For most adults with IDD, that's enough. If your loved one needs awake-staff overnight, licensed medical care, or constant behavioral intervention, a group home or other licensed facility may still be the right call. The honest test: do they need an institution, or do they need the right person?
From first call to move-in, most matches happen in 60 to 120 days. The timeline depends on Regional Center authorization, finding the right roommate, and apartment lease timing. The matching itself isn't fast on purpose — three to four meetings before anyone signs anything is the standard.
An FHA places your adult child into someone else's certified family home — they live as part of that host family. Life-sharing is the reverse: your adult child holds the lease (or co-leases) and a roommate moves in with them. It's their place, their rules, with a supportive roommate as a peer rather than a host.
Ready to see if life-sharing could work for your family?
No commitment, no sales pitch. A free call with our intake team to walk through your situation and what's available where you live.