England's children's homes are multiplying, getting smaller on average, and are owned by a strikingly fragmented market

The number of registered children's homes rose 19.8% in a year, from 4,009 to 4,804. Registered places rose only 11.3%, from 15,742 to 17,523.

Because homes grew faster than beds, the average home got smaller, from 3.93 places to 3.65. This is the clearest signal in the dataset: the sector is expanding by opening many small houses rather than by scaling existing ones. Every region grew, but the pace varied by more than three to one.

The North West alone accounts for 1,259 homes, 26.2% of every registered children's home in England, and more than the South East, South West and North East combined.

Lancashire is the single largest local authority area with 404 homes, up 71 in a year. At constituency level the concentration is sharper still: Fylde contains 71 registered children's homes and 155 places. Homes are spread across 522 of England's 543 parliamentary constituencies, so only 21 have none at all.

Private providers run 4,090 of the 4,804 registered homes. Private provision grew 21.9% year on year, against 9.7% for local authority homes and 7.3% for the voluntary sector.

The three sectors are not growing at comparable rates, and the private sector is expanding from much the largest base. That combination means the year's 795 additional homes came overwhelmingly from private provision. The dataset records registrations, not why organisations chose to register, so it establishes the pattern without explaining it.

4,804 homes are run by 1,673 distinct organisations. More than half of them, 874, own exactly one home.

The ten largest owners together account for just 12.4% of homes. The largest single owner, Cambian Childcare Limited, runs 181 homes: 3.8% of the sector. That is a long tail by any measure, and it cuts against the assumption that children's residential care is dominated by a handful of large groups.

Nearly 59% of registered children's homes have three beds or fewer. Only 277 homes across all of England have seven beds or more.

Of the 4,362 homes carrying an inspection judgement, 85.4% were rated Good or Outstanding. 74 homes, 1.7%, were rated Inadequate.

A further 442 homes had not yet been inspected at the snapshot date, which is consistent with the volume of new registrations during the year. The overall grade mix barely moved: Outstanding slipped from 12.6% to 12.0% of graded homes and Requires improvement from 13.5% to 13.0%, while Inadequate rose from 1.2% to 1.7%, or from 44 homes to 74.