When you start researching home safety, two acronyms show up over and over: ADA and CAPS. They sound similar, they sometimes overlap, and they are frequently confused. If you are trying to hire someone for a private home, here is what actually matters.
ADA: the accessibility law
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is federal civil rights law. It sets accessibility standards for public spaces, workplaces, and commercial buildings. It governs door widths, ramp slopes, restroom clearances, and much more in places open to the public.
ADA does not apply to private single-family homes. But its standards are a useful reference point for what "accessible" actually looks like in physical terms. A contractor or consultant who is "ADA-informed" knows those benchmarks and can apply them in your parent's home when they help.
CAPS: the aging-in-place credential
CAPS stands for Certified Aging-in-Place Specialist. It is a professional designation from the National Association of Home Builders. Someone with the CAPS certification has been trained specifically on how older adults' bodies, homes, and daily routines change with age, and how to modify a home to support all three.
CAPS is not a legal standard. It is a competency signal. A CAPS-certified specialist has been formally trained in the room-by-room realities of helping a person stay home safely as they age.
Which one should you ask about?
For a private home, ask about CAPS certification. Someone with CAPS can bring ADA-informed practices into the home when they make sense, without pretending the home must meet a commercial-building standard. That combination — CAPS-certified, ADA-informed — is what a trained aging-in-place professional actually offers.