The Best Senior Living Communities in Crystal River, FL

"I went to look at Highland Place. The people are friendly. Even the people that live there now are very friendly. It's a convenient place for my mother and her friends if they want to visit. It's close to her house. If a family wants, they can stay in her house and visit her. She loved the food. She's been there for lunch a couple of times, and the food has been fabulous. The cleanliness is fabulous. Every room I saw this nice and spotless. They have a TV and movies."

"I toured Canterfield of Ocala. I wanted my mom to go there because it was beautiful. It's very nice and half the price. I liked the rooms and how they were designed. I liked the services that they provided. The assistant manager was so helpful. It was an open room waiting to be filled with furniture, but it was perfect the way it was designed. I would recommend it as one of the top choices."

"I liked it a lot. What I didn't like was that they had mentally challenged people living among the other people. They didn't have them separated. They had the memory care, and they might have another section, but they still had people with memory care walking around with the others. The one day that I was there, I saw this gentleman walking around, and he couldn't find his room. He wanted to go up to the second floor, and there is no second floor. It's all one floor. It could've been that they only have that one man that's like that, but it scared me. The staff was wonderful. They didn't want us to go into the dining room, but they arranged to have us eat in a guest room. The gentlemen ate with us, so we could ask him questions. That way we weren't exposed, and we weren't exposing other people. They were all wonderful. I couldn't complain about any of their directors or anything. The girl that brought the food couldn't have been any more helpful. They outdid themselves. They were excellent. The food was excellent. It was real clean. The grounds were beautiful. I went into one of the general bathrooms that guests can use in the hall, and they were clean. They had a very nice library, and they had large print books. They show movies, and they have areas where you can sit and just chat with other people or read, so you don't have to stay in your room all the time."

"I like Brookdale Canopy Oaks. The location is awesome because I could walk there if I needed to. It's a small facility, and I like that. It had a good atmosphere when I walked in the door. It was very friendly. They gave me a good tour. The staff seemed genuinely interested in the residents there. The place appeared to be very clean. They have this little spot where residents can garden and stuff like that. They seemed to have zeroed in on individual needs, which is good. The atmosphere was very welcoming. The receptionist was very welcoming, too. However, I didn't care for the layout of the bathroom. And the room seemed small, too."

"I toured Vitality Living Spring Hill. I liked the dining area. You can order anything you want to eat. The dining room was beautiful. The chef was nice, Stephanie. She's very caring, and they're very caring there. Wendy and Frankie were very nice to me. I feel like I'm going to like it a lot. They have a pool and a lot of activities, which I need. I've been to the Memorial Day celebration. It was very, very nice. I met a lot of people, and the food was good. It was a nice day."

"I toured Casalia Gardens. It's a very nice place. The rooms were very nice. The rooms were private. The room was large. There's some furniture, and a bed was already there. I like this because it's a home. I think the capacity was 6 or 7 residents maximum, and they were all female, no men allowed. It was very clean. The staff was very nice. Everything was very professional."

"We went to Elevated Estates Brooksville. I didn't like anything about that place. It was a 150-year-old building. They were under construction. We walked in, and there was nobody in the lobby. There were people outside smoking and loitering. I couldn't tell who was a resident or a street person. We had an appointment, but we had to stand there and wait until somebody came by. It was a resident who was able to assist us, so that was a turn-off right there. We did meet somebody, but they couldn't show us anything because the whole place was under renovation. And they didn't really have a whole lot of grounds outside for people to walk around. It was more like in the city type, and what I saw was very dumpy. Anybody could walk in there, and there was no security. The staff only showed us some colored printouts of what the intended rooms would look like."

"I toured Salishan Gracious Retirement Living. I liked everything about it. It was good, but they're expensive. I went for lunch and dinner. The only thing is that breakfast was too early for me. You have to be there at 8:00 or 8:30, and that was the only problem, but everything was fine."

"We chose Elevated Estates Forest Oaks for my mother because it meets all of her needs. She will be moving into their assisted living facility. I toured the place, and it was very nice, and everybody seemed to be happy. We were able to have lunch there, too, and the food was very good. She's also already picked out her room. They had a couple of different rooms, and she's happy with what's available. It's more like a studio, just one room, and it's possible that she could have a roommate. As of right now, no one else is in the room, so it would just be her. They have nurses on staff, and they have different types of doctors who come in at least once a month, if not more. For activities, they have bingo, and people come in and do different types of entertainment. It could be magicians or people singing. They print up a schedule for each month, as to what activity it's going to be for every particular day. They have a couple of libraries, too. If you don't want to participate in the activities, they don't force you."

"We toured Brentwood at Fore Ranch. We visited the assisted living facility. They discussed memory care, too, but we went for the assisted care. They were exceptional. The staff was very helpful. She gave me the information that I requested. We had a complete tour, and we were able to meet some of the staff and also some of the residents. We were welcome to have lunch sometime if we wanted to. She was exceptional. She was very good. The facilities were excellent. The room seemed a little bigger than some of the other areas. All of my mom's furniture would fit in nicely."

"I toured The Residence at Timber Pines. What I like best is that the people are very, very nice, and they talk and do a lot of activities there. They're very outgoing. The food is good. They showed me the apartments and the rooms. They were very nice. They have a pool there, which I liked. They have a game room. It's so big, that place. They have so much stuff there."

"I have seen Hawthorne Estates of Ocala for my mom. My mother-in-law who has passed away also stayed there, and everything was fine. Everything they did was exactly the way I wanted it. I have also never had a problem with the staff. I've never tasted the food, but I have never heard any complaints about it either."

"Hawthorne Inn of Ocala was an average facility, but the interaction I saw between the residents was excellent. They were interactive. It's good. We were in the dining area because it was around lunchtime, and Dad got to see the interaction of people there and was concerned about the language barrier. Most of them were only English speaking, and he's a Spanish-speaking 99%, He wanted to make sure that the location had some bilingual people or people who spoke his language so he could interact with them properly. We visited the three types of room sizes. They were adequate. The room size, for our standards for one person, was kind of in the middle range. It wasn't that big. The hallways were clean. Everything's OK. We went through a library area where the residents got to pick books and read. They had somewhat of a selection. It wasn't a huge selection. Then we stepped outside. In our opinion, the outside was not an appropriate interaction for outdoor activities because there was none, other than a small porch with a couple of seatings. You just kind of sit there and maybe bask in the sun, and that's about it. My dad is more of the outdoorsy type that he would like interactions with a garden or growing tomatoes, or there are animals in the facilities, or just basically gazing and seeing what's going on in there to kind of keep his mind occupied. I personally liked the wood floors. That made it a nice, very homey, and warm feeling. The staff was friendly. All the spaces that I visited were clean. I got a peek at their activity room or craft room where they were doing some painting or something like that, and it was small because this looks like a smaller facility than the other one we visited. I saw their menu and they had a variation of items."

"I visited my mom there about 4 times a week and felt like a member of their family. Professional, personal care was provided. At her passing, staff cried with us. It doesn't get any more engaged than that. I hope that readers of this review know that I highly recommend this facility. I would go there if I needed that kind of facility. My mom lived there for 5 years. "