Almost four in 10 care home residents are self funding their stay, an increase of almost 10%, according to data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The data covering 1 March 2022 to 28 February 2023 revealed a 3.1% increase in the number of care home residents up to 372,035.
Of these, 37% or 137,480 were self-funders, which was up 9.2% from 125,954 last year, although the ONS said the figure were not a statistically significant change.
The South East continued as the region with the highest proportion of self-funders in care homes (47.5%), which was significantly higher than the North East, which had the lowest proportion of self-funders (26.4%).
Care homes providing care for older people remained the care homes with the highest proportion of self-funders (48.9%), which was statistically significantly higher than all other care home types; care homes for younger adults remained the lowest (2.0%).
Smaller care homes, with one to 19 beds, remained the care homes with the lowest proportion of self-funders (12.0%), which the ONS said was statistically significantly lower than all other care home sizes.
