My nan moved into a retirement village in 2009, with a section for nursing home patients too, so if it came to it (and it has), she could move into the nursing bit.

She bought her unit, paid a deposit and the contract was that the remainder could be paid when her house was sold. She was able to move into the retirement village before the house sold, but she then had a certain amount of time to pay in full. Once the unit was no longer required, it was to be sold at current market value. I believe the retirement village then took a small percentage of that and she (or her family) got the remainder. Her unit is currently up for sale as she has recently gone into the nursing home area, and when it sells, the money will go into her care. Anything left once she passes will be put into her estate.

There were different options available for her - she chose to have all her meals cooked, her unit cleaned and her washing done for her for a weekly fee that came from her pension. The big meals are breakfast and lunch where they go to a common room and are waited on, with dinner in their unit. If she doesn't appear for either breakfast or lunch, and hasn't notified staff that she will be absent, a staff member will go and check on her wellbeing. She could have lived as she wanted, cooking and cleaning herself, but she no longer wanted that worry (and we were glad to know that she was eating properly). Once she made the decision that she wanted to move into one, it was around 12 months before a unit became available (but only because she was being difficult about the situation - she made the decision that she wanted to move, and then didn't actually want to commit to it.) Since she did it, she says she's far happier than she's been in a very long time. They do day trips, have movie sessions, an in-house hairdresser comes, there's group activities like lawn bowls. A shuttle bus takes them to and from the local shops multiple times a day if they want to go. There's even a swimming pool that family are allowed to share too. The only complaint she had was that she chose apartment-style living, which meant that often residents burnt their toast and set off all the smoke alarms

I think the easiest thing for mum was picking somewhere and meeting the people that were running it. My grandmother gave the directive that she wanted to do it and left mum to work it all out. Mum really liked the woman who oversaw everything and that made it all a lot easier for her. Good luck!