By Miami Senior Advisor Care Team · August 27, 2026
Why the residency agreement matters more than the tour
Families spend hours touring assisted living communities in Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach — checking the dining room, meeting the activities director, sniffing the hallways — and then sign a 20- to 40-page residency agreement in a leasing office in about eleven minutes, usually on a day that has already been emotionally exhausting. That contract, not the tour, is what governs the next several years: what you actually pay, what happens when your parent needs more help, what the community can charge you for, and under what circumstances your parent can be asked to leave.
The good news is that Florida regulates these contracts more tightly than most people realize. Section 429.24 of the Florida Statutes and Rule 59A-36.018 of the Florida Administrative Code set out specific things every assisted living facility (ALF) contract must contain, and the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) enforces them. The bad news is that everything the law does not address — community fees, second-person fees, how quickly a level-of-care tier can be reassessed upward, arbitration — is left entirely to whatever the document says. This guide walks through both halves, in the order you will actually encounter them.
None of this is legal advice, and for a large financial commitment it is worth having a Florida elder-law attorney read the agreement before you sign. But knowing what to look for turns a 40-page document into about eight questions.
What Florida law requires your contract to contain
Under Fla. Stat. § 429.24, the presence of every resident in a licensed Florida ALF must be covered by a written contract, executed at the time of admission or before it, between the licensee and the resident, the resident's designee, or the resident's legal representative. Each party gets a duplicate original, and the facility keeps a copy on file at the community. If you are handed a contract to sign and not given a complete signed copy back, that is not a paperwork oversight — it is a compliance problem, and you should ask for it in writing before move-in day ends.
The statute requires the contract to include, at minimum:
- A list of the specific services, supplies, and accommodations the facility will provide — including any limited nursing services (LNS) or extended congregate care (ECC) services the resident elects to receive. This matters enormously in South Florida, where standard, LNS, and ECC licenses are common and describe genuinely different levels of what a community is legally allowed to do. Our guide to Florida ALF license types explains the difference.
- The daily, weekly, or monthly rate for those services.
- A list of any additional services and charges not covered by that rate — or a reference to a separate fee schedule, which must then be attached to the contract itself. A fee schedule referenced but not attached is a red flag; ask for it and staple it on.
- A provision stating that at least 30 days' written notice will be given before any rate increase.
Rule 59A-36.018 layers on more, including provisions about how the facility handles self-administration, assistance with self-administration, and administration of medications — a genuinely important clause if your parent takes more than a couple of prescriptions, because the three categories carry different staffing and licensure requirements. The rule also reflects the residency assessment cycle: residents are assessed on admission (on AHCA Form 1823) and again every three years, or sooner after a significant change in condition.
One more provision worth knowing: a facility may not levy an additional charge for supplies, services, or accommodations it has already agreed by contract to provide as part of the standard daily, weekly, or monthly rate. If "assistance with bathing" is listed in the base package, it cannot reappear as a line item three months later.
The rate: base, level-of-care add-ons, and the 30-day rate-increase rule
South Florida communities generally price one of three ways: all-inclusive, tiered ("levels" 1 through 5 or similar), or a la carte points-based. The quoted number families remember from the tour is almost always the base rent for a specific unit type, before care. What you want in writing is the base rate for the exact unit, the current care tier and its cost, the criteria that move a resident from one tier to the next, and who makes that determination.
Ask directly: how often can the care level be reassessed, and what triggers a reassessment? Many agreements allow reassessment at any time following a change in condition, which is reasonable in principle and expensive in practice — a fall, a UTI, or a short hospitalization can push a resident into a higher tier that does not automatically come back down after recovery. Ask whether tiers step back down when a resident improves, and get the answer in the contract rather than from a smiling director of sales.
On increases, Florida's 30-day written notice requirement is a floor, not a ceiling of protection. It tells you when you will hear about an increase; it says nothing about size or frequency. So ask for the actual increase history: what were the annual increases for the last three years, expressed as a percentage, and were there any mid-year level-of-care repricings on top of them? A community that will not answer that question has told you something. Budget realistically — our breakdown of assisted living costs in South Florida covers what the current market actually looks like across the tri-county area.
Also check the second-person fee if a couple is moving in together, the fee for a companion or private-duty aide brought in from outside, and whether the community permits outside home health at all. Miami-Dade families frequently pair an ALF apartment with a few hours a day of private aide time; some contracts require the agency to be licensed, insured, and pre-approved, and a few restrict it outright.
Deposits, community fees, and the 45-day refund rule
Here is where the statute is unusually specific and unusually helpful. Under § 429.24, when a resident is transferred, discharged, or dies, the resident or responsible party is entitled to a prorated refund based on the daily rate for any unused portion of payment beyond the termination date, after all charges — including the cost of damage to the unit beyond normal use — have been paid. The termination date is the date the unit is vacated by the resident and cleared of all personal belongings. The facility must provide that refund within 45 days.
Florida gives that requirement real teeth: AHCA is directed to impose a fine on a facility that fails to comply, equal to three times the amount owed, with half remitted to the resident or the resident's estate and half to the Health Care Trust Fund. Families rarely know this, and it is the single most useful piece of leverage in a refund dispute.
Two practical consequences. First, that 45-day clock starts running from the vacate-and-clear date, so clearing the apartment promptly is in your financial interest, not just the community's. Second, the statute governs the prorated unused payment — it does not make every up-front charge refundable. Community fees, move-in fees, and administrative fees are typically presented as one-time and nonrefundable, and whether you get any of that back is a matter of what the contract says. Read that paragraph closely and ask what happens if the placement fails in the first 30 or 60 days, which is exactly when placements are most likely to fail. Some South Florida communities will agree to a partial refund or a credit within a short trial window; almost none volunteer it.
Discharge, transfer, and continued-residency language
Every ALF contract contains language describing when the community can no longer meet a resident's needs. This is the clause that decides whether your parent stays put or has to move again in eighteen months, and it deserves more attention than it usually gets.
Florida's continued-residency criteria under Rule 59A-36.006 set the outer boundary of what a facility with a given license may keep. Within that, contracts vary: some list specific conditions that trigger a required move (two-person transfer assistance, a stage-three or higher pressure injury, wandering behaviors, tube feeding), others use vaguer "unable to meet the resident's needs" language. Vaguer is worse for you. Ask the administrator to walk through the three most common reasons residents have been discharged from that specific community in the past year, and match the answer against the contract text.
Also confirm the notice period. Florida generally requires 45 days' written notice for a relocation or termination of residency, with narrower exceptions — our post on the 45-day discharge notice explains how that works and what to do if you receive one. If your parent has dementia, the most common trigger is behavioral rather than medical, so ask specifically what behaviors the community will and will not accommodate before you sign, and consider whether a memory care setting is the better first move rather than the inevitable second one.
Payment-source clauses: Medicaid, VA benefits, and long-term care insurance
If there is any realistic chance your family will eventually need help paying, the payment clauses matter as much as the rate. Three things to look for:
Medicaid. Florida's Statewide Medicaid Managed Care Long-Term Care program (SMMC LTC) can pay for assisted living services, but only at communities that participate and hold a contract with the relevant managed care plan — and many communities either do not participate or accept Medicaid only after a defined number of years of private pay. Ask two separate questions: does this community accept SMMC LTC at all, and if so, is there a private-pay duration requirement before a resident can convert? Get the answer in writing. Families are blindsided by this constantly. Our guide to SMMC LTC eligibility covers the program side; the community side is contractual.
VA benefits. Aid & Attendance is paid to the veteran or surviving spouse, not to the facility, so it rarely appears in the contract — but the community's willingness to provide the itemized statements of care charges the VA asks for does matter. See our Aid & Attendance guide for Florida veterans.
Long-term care insurance. Most policies require the community to meet a specific definition (licensure type, number of residents, on-site staffing) and require ongoing documentation of ADL assistance. Confirm the community will complete carrier forms and provide the care-plan documentation your policy requires — some charge a fee for it. Our guide to filing a long-term care insurance claim in Florida covers what carriers typically ask for.
Finally, look hard at any clause asking a family member to sign as a "responsible party," "guarantor," or "financial agent." Signing in a representative capacity using a power of attorney is normal. Personally guaranteeing the debt out of your own assets is a different thing entirely, and the signature line often does not distinguish. If you hold power of attorney, sign as "[Your Name], as attorney-in-fact for [Parent's Name]," and ask the community to strike any language making you personally liable. Our Florida power of attorney guide explains the authority you need to have first.
A pre-signing checklist for South Florida families
Before anyone signs anything, work through this list. It takes about twenty minutes and routinely saves families thousands of dollars.
- Is the fee schedule physically attached to the contract, and does it match the number you were quoted?
- Is the current care level written in, along with the criteria and the cost of moving up a tier — and does it step back down?
- What were the rate increases in each of the last three years?
- What exactly is nonrefundable, and what happens if the placement fails in the first 60 days?
- What are the discharge triggers, and what is the notice period?
- Does the community accept SMMC LTC Medicaid, and is there a private-pay requirement first?
- Are there arbitration or jury-waiver provisions, and are they optional? In many contracts they are presented as optional but are pre-checked or bundled — read the signature pages, not just the body.
- Have you pulled the license and inspection history from AHCA for this specific address? Here is how to do that in a few minutes.
- Did you get a complete, signed copy of everything, including addenda?
Take the contract home. A community that pressures you to sign the same day to "hold the apartment" is telling you how it will behave later. Reputable communities in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton, and across the tri-county area will hold a unit for a short period with a refundable deposit while you review, and will put that in writing.
If you believe a facility has violated its contract or Florida law, you can file a complaint with AHCA through the state complaint process, and the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program advocates for residents at no cost. More state-level resources are collected on our Florida resources page.
And if you would rather not do this alone: our advisors read these agreements with South Florida families every week, know which communities in Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach negotiate on community fees and which do not, and cost you nothing. Talk to an advisor — hablamos español. If you are still choosing between settings, start with our Miami assisted living overview and the tour checklist.