Valuing a supported independent living (SIL) provider

Start with what SIL actually is

The NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission (the Commission) describes supported independent living, in its summary, at the time of writing, of the draft amendments to the Provider Registration Rules, as a package of home and living support for people with higher support needs, where the participant requires support at all times of the day or for most of it and the provider manages and delivers that package. The NDIA describes SIL as funding for a support worker to help or supervise a participant 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, which may be shared with others in the home.

Revenue is therefore a small number of continuous rosters, each attached to a home and funded from the plans of the people who live there. The NDIS provider valuation framework applies, but the unit of analysis is the home.

Build the valuation home by home

HPNA asks for the roster of care for every home: the support hours across the day and night, the shared to individual ratio, and the sleepover or active night cover. From the roster, the SIL quotes and revenue by participant we reconstruct each home's earnings: funded hours, price limits, the labour needed to deliver them, and the margin left.

The NDIA reported an average annualised plan budget of $488,200 for participants in SIL at 30 June 2026, so a provider running three homes may draw most of its revenue from a dozen people. Revenue by participant and by home, plan end dates and management type are the first measures of risk. See participant and referral concentration.

Cost the roster under the SCHADS Award

Labour is the dominant cost and the price is capped from outside by the maximum prices in the NDIS pricing schedules. The Fair Work Ombudsman states that the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award (MA000100) covers employers providing disability services, including personal care and domestic and lifestyle support, in a community or residential setting, and that minimum award wages rose 4.75 per cent from the first full pay period on or after 1 July 2026. It describes a sleepover as a continuous 8 hour period attracting an allowance and a minimum of 4 hours pay before or after it. The Commission adds that the pricing arrangements allow up to 2 hours of active support within an 8 hour sleepover, and that active overnight support, where the worker stays awake, is a different support.

HPNA therefore recosts every roster at award rates for the pattern actually worked, plus super guarantee at 12 per cent of qualifying earnings, which the ATO now requires to reach the fund within 7 business days of payday. The gap to the payroll in the accounts overstates earnings and may also indicate a back pay liability. See maintainable earnings and the clinical workforce.

Separate the housing from the supports

The NDIA states that SDA is the housing itself, that SDA funding pays the SDA provider while SIL funding pays for the support workers, and that dwellings must be enrolled by a registered provider. The Commission's SIL Practice Standards require separate service and tenancy agreements where one provider delivers both, and that the participant is supported to understand their right to change SIL provider at any time during the tenancy agreement.

Where a group holds both, the SDA dwelling entity is valued on net assets, being assets less liabilities, with the dwelling taken at the market value given by a property valuer. The SIL operation is valued on its earnings after any rent paid to the SDA entity is reset to market. Tenure in every other home is tested through the head lease, its term and assignability, and what happens to the roster if the home is lost. See premises and lease terms.

Registration since 1 July 2026 and what transfers

The Commission states that from 1 July 2026 SIL providers must be registered, that a provider which had not applied by 1 October 2026 must stop delivering SIL, and that registered SIL providers need certification audits. A registration is linked to a single ABN and cannot be moved to another.

In an asset sale the buyer needs its own SIL registration. In a share sale the entity and its registration continue, but the Commission requires notification as soon as possible, updated key personnel details and, where a certification registration group is held and the sale significantly changes the organisation or its governance, a condition audit started within 3 months. Participants must not be moved across automatically.

Reprice for the 2026 reform timetable

The Department of Health, Disability and Ageing states that the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Act 2026 received Royal Assent on 20 August 2026, that budgets for critical supports are unchanged and that participants requiring continuous 24-hour care will continue to receive it. It has consulted on a commissioning approach to home and living supports for SIL participants, in a consultation that closed on 13 September 2026, and states that the outcomes will inform a decision on whether to proceed with commissioning a portion of the SIL market. At the time of writing the NDIA publishes the NDIS pricing schedule effective 24 September 2026 under the Minister's first pricing determination, so historical periods are repriced to it.

Choose the method and strike the value

An established SIL operation is normally valued by capitalising maintainable earnings, the profit it can repeat under a new owner, at a multiple reflecting concentration, tenure, labour margin and compliance history. Capitalised earnings give enterprise value; equity value deducts debt, adds surplus assets and adjusts working capital. Goodwill, the value above identifiable net assets, has sources: the rosters, homes, screened workforce and documented participant relationships of the business, or the owner personally, and the report says which. See how to value an NDIS business and how much is my NDIS business worth.