Sydney-based founder of Aged Care Checker, an independent directory of aged care facilities, nursing homes and retirement homes across Australia, built so families can decide with the facts in front of them.
James lives and works in Sydney, a city with more residential aged care homes than any other in Australia and, on his reading of the data, some of the widest gaps between how a home looks on paper and how it feels to the families who visit it.
That contrast is what drew him to the subject. Sydney's homes carry the country's highest accommodation prices, the busiest waiting lists and the most scrutiny, yet the information families need to choose between them is spread across government portals, quarterly spreadsheets and provider brochures written in a language most people never learn until they have to.
Away from the site he is, by his own description, a reader of spreadsheets and a walker of suburbs: the best way to understand an aged care home, he says, is to sit in its lounge room on a weekday afternoon.
James kept seeing the same problem: families trying to find a good aged care home for someone they love, and struggling to get straight answers. The information exists. Every home in Australia has an official Star Rating, reports its staffing minutes each quarter, publishes its quality measures and lists its room prices. But almost none of it is written for the people who actually have to make the call, and much of it is hard to find.
"People were making one of the biggest decisions of their lives on a gut feeling and a guided tour."
In 2026 he decided to build the resource he thought should already exist: an independent directory where every aged care facility, nursing home and retirement home in Australia can be looked up, with its official ratings, staffing data, fees and family reviews presented in plain language, and the source and date of every figure shown.
He researches and writes the site's data reports himself, including Aged Care Statistics Australia, working directly from Department of Health, Disability and Ageing releases, the Productivity Commission's Report on Government Services, AIHW data and Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission reports.
Independent, with no provider ownership or affiliation. Every statistic tied to a named official source and a date. Written for people, not policy experts. Mistakes fixed and noted in the open.
A national statistics report, city guides to the best-rated homes in Sydney, Canberra and Perth, and plain-language guides to choosing and paying for care.