Build and open a residential aged care home — New South Wales

The same three-tier shape as childcare, with one difference that dominates everything else: the process is not what is stopping these being built. The economics are.

aged-careA new residential aged care home of about 120 places, developed by an existing registered provider skeleton compare across jurisdictions

This is a structural skeleton, not a measured process. The steps, the authorities and the sequence are researched from this jurisdiction's published requirements and are broadly right. The durations are a uniform template applied across all jurisdictions, so the differences between them on the comparison page are mostly an artefact of that template rather than evidence about Australia. Do not quote the day counts. Replacing them with sourced figures for even one jurisdiction would make this page genuinely useful.

1581 days elapsed
longest dependent chain

12 discrete steps
across 3 bodies

5% waiting on availability
scheduling or queue, not assessment

240 days saved by concurrency
vs. 1821 if run end-to-end

Where the time goes

Critical-path days only. Steps that run alongside others are real work but do not lengthen the process, so counting them here would overstate the prize.

applicant	1155d	Waiting on the applicant to supply or fix something.
assessment	330d	Someone is genuinely evaluating the merits.
scheduling	75d	Waiting for a person or committee to become available.
statutory	21d	A legislated period that must elapse regardless of readiness.

75 of 1581 elapsed days are spent waiting for a person or a meeting rather than for a judgement to be formed. Removing that time changes no assessment standard and lowers no bar -- it is the cost of scheduling alone.

The process, step by step

Applies when: A provider seeks to build and operate a new residential aged care home.

#	Step	Who	Why it waits	Clock	Typical	Basis
1	Site selection and financial feasibility application Identify a site, model the accommodation payment and subsidy revenue against construction and operating cost.	—	applicant	—	270 estimate	—
2	Design and consultant documentation application Architectural documentation meeting the aged care design and accommodation requirements, plus traffic, acoustic and access reports. after Site selection and financial feasibility 1071d slack	—	applicant	—	240 estimate	—
3	Lodge the development application application after Design and consultant documentation 1066d slack	Consent authority (NSW council)	applicant	—	5 estimate	Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW)
4	Neighbour notification and submissions notification after Lodge the development application 1045d slack	Consent authority (NSW council)	statutory	14	21 estimate	—
5	Council assessment assessment after Neighbour notification and submissions 895d slack	Consent authority (NSW council)	assessment	—	150 estimate	—
6	Determination decision after Council assessment 850d slack	Consent authority (NSW council)	scheduling	—	45 estimate	—
7	Construction certificate certification after Determination 790d slack	Registered certifier (NSW)	assessment	—	60 estimate	—
8	Construction and fit-out application after Construction certificate 150d slack	—	applicant	—	640 estimate	—
9	Occupation certificate certification after Construction and fit-out 120d slack	Registered certifier (NSW)	assessment	—	30 estimate	—
10	Provider registration, or variation to add the service registration Registration in the applicable category under the Aged Care Act 2024, or a variation for an existing registered provider. after Occupation certificate 30d slack	Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission	assessment	—	90 estimate	Aged Care Act 2024 (Cth)
11	Recruit to the care minute and registered nurse requirements application Staff to the sector-wide target of 215 care minutes per resident per day including 44 registered nurse minutes, and the 24/7 registered nurse requirement. after Determination 610d slack	—	third party	—	240 reported	—
12	Open and admit residents registration after Provider registration, or variation to add the service, Recruit to the care minute and registered nurse requirements	—	scheduling	—	30 estimate	—

on the critical path scheduling/queue = delay not caused by the assessment itself

Machine-flagged questions

These are produced automatically from the dependency graph. They are questions for a practitioner, not findings. Each one needs a person who has run this process to say whether the constraint is real.

The same body asked more than once

nsw-private-certifier (certification) appears at Construction certificate, Occupation certificate. Could these be a single sign-off?

Proposed changes

Universal registration: one aged care approval instead of two merge ~90d
The Aged Care Act 2024 merged provider approval and accreditation into a single registration in risk-based categories. It is the clearest counter-example to the assumption that merging approvals means weakening them — the same Act sharply increased the regulator's enforcement powers.

Sources

Aged Care Act 2024 (Cth), commenced 1 November 2025, universal registration
Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, $3 billion package for an additional 5,000 beds a year, with capital subsidies from 1 January 2027 and accommodation supplement increases from 20 March 2027
Sector financial reporting: FY25 operating EBITDA of $5,647 per bed per annum against an estimated $20,000 to $22,000 required to be investable; more than 60 per cent of homes operating at a deficit with occupancy above 95 per cent

Something wrong here?

This page is wrong in some way -- every page like it is. If you have run this process, the most useful thing you can do is tell us which step took longer than we say and why. Edit data/processes/nsw-aged-care-home.toml and open a pull request, or send us the correction.