Types of group homes in Texas
People use “group home” as a shorthand. Texas programs use more specific names. This page explains the ones families run into most often, in original language, using HHSC’s published descriptions as the guide. It is not a complete catalog of every living arrangement, and it is not advice about which option is right for someone.
Group home, as people say it
In everyday speech, a group home is a shared house or small residence where more than one person with a disability lives, with staff who help with daily life. That description can apply to several legal programs. When you call a provider or a local authority, it helps to ask which program funds the home and how many people live there.
ICF/IID community homes — listed in this directory
An intermediate care facility for people with an intellectual disability or a related condition (ICF/IID) is a 24-hour residential setting. Community ICF/IID homes can be small — most in the current HHSC directory have six beds (634 of 705 facilities) — or larger. Staff are there around the clock. A person can prefer a particular home, but the home has to have a vacancy and the provider has to accept the admission. Some homes keep their own waiting lists. Your local authority helps with enrollment.
These homes, and the State Supported Living Centers, are what you can look up on GroupHomeLookup. We take names, addresses, phone numbers, capacity, certification, and ownership from the public HHSC ICF/IID directory.
State Supported Living Centers
Texas operates 13 State Supported Living Centers (SSLCs). These are large, campus-based intermediate care facilities, not small neighborhood houses. HHSC describes them as serving people with intellectual and developmental disabilities who have significant medical or behavioral needs. They provide 24-hour residential services and on-site health care. Admission is a separate process from a typical community home. Read HHSC’s SSLC page and talk with a local authority before treating an SSLC as interchangeable with a six-bed group home.
HCS group homes — not a public statewide list
The Home and Community-based Services (HCS) program can support a person in their family’s home, in their own home, in a host home / companion care setting, or in a residence with no more than four people who also receive HCS services. That last setting is what many families mean when they say “HCS group home.” Those homes are not the same license file as the ICF/IID directory, and there is no public statewide roster of HCS providers that we can republish. Do not assume a home is missing from this site because we overlooked it — it may simply be an HCS home.
Learn more on HHSC’s HCS provider page and ask your LIDDA for the current provider options in your area.
Host home and companion care
In HCS, host home / companion care is a setting where the person lives in a home with a host or companion, rather than in a staffed four-person group home. It is still an HCS service, arranged through the waiver and the local authority — not something this directory can list home by home.
Supported living and Texas Home Living
Many people live in their own home or with family and receive help there. Texas Home Living (TxHmL) is a Medicaid waiver that supports people with IDD who live with their families or in their own homes, with limits on what the program will pay. HCS can also support people in their own home. Neither program is a complete substitute for the other, and both often involve an interest list. See HHSC’s TxHmL page.
How to use this when you search
If you need a licensed ICF/IID community home or want to understand a State Supported Living Center, search this site and verify the listing on TULIP. If you are looking for a smaller HCS group home, a host home, or supports in a person’s own place, start with the local authority and the path to services. The words people type — “group home,” “special needs group home,” “disability group home” — can point to any of these.