Ralfor

Choosing software for a small care home: 12 questions to ask

Most care software is built for large communities. If you run a home with 4 to 25 beds, these questions help you find out quickly whether a product fits, including ours.

Updated 11 October 2026

General information, not legal advice. Rules differ by state and licence type and change over time. Check your own licensing guidance before you change how your home works: in Virginia the VDSS Division of Licensing Programs and the 22VAC40-73 standards; in North Carolina the DHSR Adult Care Licensure Section, your county DSS adult home specialist and the 10A NCAC 13F and 13G rules.

Fit

  1. Is it built for my state and licence type? Ask which rules it tracks and whether it shows where each due date comes from.
  2. Can one person run it? In a small home the owner is often the administrator, the scheduler and the bookkeeper.
  3. Does it cover the whole home, or just one part? Count how many separate tools you'd still need: MAR, schedule, incidents, billing, family updates.
  4. Will my staff use it? Ask about phones and tablets, voice notes, languages, and how long a new aide takes to learn the med pass.

Safety and trust

  1. Will you sign a business associate agreement? Ask before you enter any real resident information.
  2. Who can see what? Look for roles, resident-level access and an audit trail of who viewed or changed a record.
  3. What does the AI do on its own? Ask what it can change without a person approving it, and whether the product still works with the AI switched off.
  4. What happens when the internet drops?

Money and leaving

  1. What is the full monthly cost for my bed count, including setup, training and add-ons?
  2. How long is the contract, and what does it cost to leave?
  3. Can I export all my records in a usable form, at any time?
  4. Can I see it on a realistic sample home before I share any real data?

Our own answers

Ralfor is built around the Virginia assisted living standards and North Carolina adult care and family care home rules, runs every core workflow without the AI, lets you export everything, and shows you a sample home first. Ask us the other questions on a call; we'd rather you hear the honest answer before you decide.

See it on a sample home. A 20-minute call where we walk through a day at a small home in Ralfor: med pass, an incident, a call-out, a family update. Sample residents only; you never need to share real resident information to see it.

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