How to Find a Private Caregiver in Virginia: A Step-by-Step Guide

We tested Care.com in Charlottesville. There were 275 caregivers listed in our area. By the time we removed the fake profiles, the hard nos, and the listings that hadn't been updated in years, we were looking at single digits. That process took days.

This is the experience most Virginia families have, usually after they've already burned a week they couldn't afford.

Finding a private caregiver in Virginia isn't hard. It's tedious. There's a difference, and knowing it going in changes how you approach the whole thing.

Here's what works.

Key takeaways

• Finding a private caregiver in Virginia isn't hard. It's tedious. A list of 275 candidates will narrow to a handful of real options. That's normal — not failure.
• A caregiver is not a commodity. Hard skills (experience with dementia or Parkinson's disease), personality fit, a clean background, and schedule availability all have to line up.
• Virginia has real caregiver infrastructure most families never find: the Jefferson Area Board for Aging (JABA), Virginia Navigator, and disease-specific support groups are your best local starting points.
• Always plan for more than one caregiver. Build the backup pool before you need it.
• When you hire privately, you're the employer. Background checks, payroll taxes, and documentation are on you — unless you use Alula Connect, which handles the vetting and structures direct hire so you own the relationship.

What are you really looking for in a private caregiver?

The first mistake is treating caregiver search like a product search. You list your requirements, candidates apply, you pick the best one.

A caregiver is not a commodity. They're not interchangeable.

You're looking for someone with the hard skills to handle your parent's specific condition (dementia, Parkinson's disease, stroke recovery, whatever the diagnosis is). You're also looking for the soft skills and personality to work with your specific family. You need a background that checks out and references you've actually called. And you need availability that lines up with when you need coverage.

Four requirements. Applied to any real population, they don't produce many matches. The search that starts with 275 listings ends with five people worth calling. That's not failure. That's how it works.

Think of it as a serious game of Tetris. Most pieces don't fit. The ones that do are worth protecting.

In 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projected 22 percent growth in home health aide employment through 2032, one of the largest numeric increases of any occupation. More caregivers are entering the field every year. The ones with specific dementia or Parkinson's disease experience who fit your schedule and your family's personality: that pool is smaller than the headline number suggests.

Where do Virginia families actually find private caregivers?

Start with the large platforms, but know their limits.

Care.com is the biggest pool. In populated parts of Virginia you'll see hundreds of listings. Most families start here, and it's worth running. The qualification work, though, is entirely on you. There's no verification layer. You're filtering raw listings against your criteria, one at a time.

Indeed and ZipRecruiter work if you post your own job listing. You'll reach candidates with professional caregiving experience who aren't actively maintaining a Care.com profile. Worth running in parallel with your Care.com search.

Local Facebook groups and community groups can be productive. Search for groups specific to Charlottesville, Richmond, Northern Virginia, or your area. A caregiver who is already local and embedded in the community tends to be a more serious candidate than someone whose national profile was posted years ago.

Support groups are one of the most underused sources. Disease-specific groups (Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, ALS) are rooms full of families who have already navigated what you're navigating. They know caregivers by name. Ask.

Churches and community networks work the same way. If your congregation has a pastoral care network or senior ministry, someone in it knows someone.

Area Agencies on Aging round out the local resource picture. In Charlottesville that's the Jefferson Area Board for Aging (JABA). They don't typically make placements, but they know the local landscape and can point you toward referrals. Virginia also has a statewide resource hub, Virginia Navigator. According to the Virginia Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services (DARS), the state's Caregiver Support Program provides counseling, referrals, and Lifespan Respite Vouchers to qualifying families — financial assistance toward temporary relief care.

None of these sources screen candidates for you. That's still your job.

Do you need to do a background check on a private caregiver in Virginia?

Yes. The question is what kind.

Virginia doesn't legally require families to run background checks on private caregivers they hire directly. But skipping them is taking on risk that costs almost nothing to avoid.

The standard check covers criminal history (multi-state, SSN-based), Virginia State Police records, and driving history if your caregiver will be transporting your parent. Drug screening is optional but reasonable for higher-acuity care situations.

For private employers, GoodHire, Checkr, and Sterling all handle this. The process takes an hour to set up and costs $30 to $75 depending on scope.

One exception: if your caregiver's compensation will run through a Virginia Medicaid waiver program (like CCC+ or EDCD), there are additional requirements including fingerprint-based FBI checks. The program will specify what's needed when you enroll.

For a full picture of wages and payroll obligations, see our Virginia Caregiver Pay guide.

How do you screen and interview a private caregiver?

You don't need to find a perfect caregiver. You need to find the right one. The screening process is how you tell the difference.

Start with a phone screen to protect everyone's time. Ten minutes is enough to hear how someone communicates, how they describe their experience, and whether they've actually worked with someone who has your parent's specific diagnosis. If they can't give you concrete examples from prior care situations, that's information.

For in-person interviews, have your parent present if possible. Watch how the candidate interacts with them, not just with you. Warmth with the family and discomfort with the person they're caring for is a pattern that won't show up on paper.

Questions that surface real experience:

• "Tell me about the last person living with dementia you cared for. What was the hardest part of that job?"
• "What do you do when someone refuses to eat or take their medication?"
• "What's your plan if you can't make a shift?"
• "Do you have a backup caregiver you work with?"

Call the references. Not email. Call. An actual conversation surfaces things a written reference won't.

Run a paid trial shift before committing. Four to eight hours where you're present, watching how they work and how your parent responds. It's the closest thing to a real interview. Pay for it.

Why plan for more than one caregiver?

Most families start with one caregiver. That's a reasonable starting point.

As care needs increase, it's not enough.

One caregiver means no backup when they're sick, no coverage when they need a day off, and a single point of failure in a situation that can't have single points of failure. Two caregivers (even if one covers fewer hours) give you a working backup pool.

Build it before you need it. The time to find a second caregiver is not the morning your first one calls out.

How do families actually manage a private caregiver at home?

Families who successfully manage private caregivers have one thing in common. They're organized.

That's not a personality compliment. It's a functional requirement.

When you hire privately, you're coordinating schedules, managing medications and supplies, communicating with other family members, tracking hours, running payroll, and keeping documentation current. If you don't have a system for this, the caregiver can't do good work. And good caregivers don't stay in chaotic situations.

You're basically running a small business with one very important client.

Families can do this. They do it successfully every day, and when it works, private care produces better consistency and quality than most agency arrangements. But it requires treating the operational side like what it is.

Alula is built for this. The platform handles duties, schedules, and payroll, so the management side stays organized without becoming a second job. If you want help with the matching piece, Alula Connect places vetted CarePros in the Charlottesville and Central Virginia area in 48 hours. Background-checked, direct hire, no agency markup.

Finding a private caregiver in Virginia takes longer than it should. There’s no shortcut that eliminates the qualification work.

But families do this every day, and they get it right. The process isn’t mysterious. Start with multiple sources, screen rigorously, build a small backup pool, and treat the management side like the small business it actually is.

Families can 100% find and manage private caregivers themselves and get the consistency and quality they’re looking for. It’s tedious. It’s worth it.

If you're in Virginia and want to skip the search entirely, Alula Connect places families with vetted, experienced CarePros in 48 hours.