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Samantha Mallon

Downsizing

Moving to Pine Run Village in Doylestown: The Seller’s Guide to the Two Refund Plans

Pine Run Village is Central Bucks’ cottage-scale Life Plan Community: 282 cottage-style homes on 43 acres in Doylestown Township, operated by Presbyterian Senior Living, where every floor plan is priced under two refund plans that differ by roughly fifty percent. This independent seller’s guide lays out the published 2026 rate sheet, explains the 50 Month versus 50% refund decision and the life-lease structure, and covers how Doylestown-orbit homeowners sequence the house sale against the residency investment fee.

By Samantha Mallon, SRES®, licensed in PA & NJ · Reviewed August 5, 2026 · 11 min read

Pine Run Village is the village-scale answer to the mega-campus question: 282 cottage-style homes on 43 acres in Doylestown Township, run by Presbyterian Senior Living, where the entrance decision is not just which cottage but which of two refund plans, a choice that moves the up-front number by roughly half. This guide is written from the seller’s side of that move, because the residency investment fee and the Central Bucks house are, for most families, the same money. It is independent research; Samantha is a real estate agent, not affiliated with Pine Run or Presbyterian Senior Living, built from the community’s published rate sheets and the disclosure statement it files with the Pennsylvania Insurance Department.

What Pine Run Village is, in verified numbers

Pine Run Village at a glance (sources: PA Insurance Department disclosure statement; Presbyterian Senior Living)
FactDetail
TypeLife Plan Community (CCRC) for people 55 and older, operated by Presbyterian Senior Living
Campus43 acres in Doylestown Township, Bucks County, adjacent to Pine Run Lake; historic farmhouses, community center with indoor pool, craft barn, woodshop, greenhouse, walking trails
Independent living282 cottage-style homes, from compact one-bedrooms to full farmhouse floor plans
Care on campusLicensed 90-bed skilled nursing facility and 38-room secured memory care unit on the Ferry Road campus; 96-room personal care center at Pine Run Lakeview, about three miles away
Entrance structureA onetime Residency Investment Fee buying a life-lease of the cottage, offered under two plans (50 Month declining refund, or 50% refundable), plus a monthly maintenance fee
RegulationFiles an annual disclosure statement with the Pennsylvania Insurance Department

The all-cottage character is the distinguishing fact. Where most regional CCRCs are apartment buildings with some cottages attached, Pine Run is a village of front doors, which is precisely its appeal to owners leaving single-family houses in the Doylestown orbit. The community’s site carries current details, and the disclosure statement is the document to read with an adviser before any deposit.

One cottage, two prices: the refund plan decision

Every Pine Run floor plan is published at two prices, and the gap between them is the real decision. From the community’s 2026 rate sheet, a sampling:

Published residency investment fees, selected floor plans (source: Presbyterian Senior Living 2026 rate sheet; figures change, confirm current pricing)
Cottage50 Month plan50% refund planMonthly fee
New Hope (smallest)$93,300$139,900$1,431
Chalfont$206,700$310,200$2,574
Buckingham Standard$297,400$446,100$3,540
Solebury Deluxe$482,600$724,000$5,690
Bucks County Farmhouse (largest)$886,300$1,329,700$8,514
Second person+$23,600+$35,400+$1,096
  • The 50 Month plan is the lower entry: if you withdraw within the first 50 months, a prorated share returns; past that point, the fee is fully earned by the community. It suits families optimizing for the lowest cost of a long residency.
  • The 50% refund plan costs roughly half again more up front, and half of it returns to you or your estate whenever you leave. It suits families for whom the estate matters, and it changes the inheritance math enough that the attorney drafting the wills should know which plan was signed.
  • Both are life-leases, not deeds. You buy the right to reside, not the real estate. That is the structural difference between Pine Run and an ownership community like Hershey’s Mill, where you hold a deed and sell on the open market when you leave.

The care continuum behind the cottages

Pine Run’s entrance plans buy the residence; they do not prepay care the way a Type A life care contract does. The continuum is real and on campus, skilled nursing and memory care at Ferry Road, personal care at the Lakeview campus three miles away, but each level has its own fee schedule, billed when used. Three planning consequences:

  • Long-term care insurance stays relevant. At a life care community the contract largely replaces it; here it complements the move, and the decision to keep or drop a policy belongs in the same conversation as the plan choice.
  • The disclosure statement is the fee map. Pennsylvania requires it, updated annually, through the Insurance Department; the care-level fee schedules inside it are what a careful family reads twice.
  • Part of the fees may still be deductible. Under IRS Publication 502, the portion of fees allocable to medical care is deductible as a medical expense; the community publishes the allocation. Our CCRC funding guide covers how that deduction interacts with the house-sale year.

Sequencing the house sale against the move

  1. 01House number first. Presbyterian Senior Living’s own materials note the residency fee is often covered by the sale of a house. Get the valuation and run the net proceeds calculator before choosing between a Chalfont and a Buckingham, because the after-cost number decides which rows of the rate sheet are real.
  2. 02Pick the refund plan with the adviser, then reserve. The plan choice moves six figures; it deserves an hour with the accountant and the estate attorney before the deposit, not after.
  3. 03List on the coordinated calendar. Doylestown Township’s resale requirements, and those of the surrounding Central Bucks townships, have lead times; the fee index lists every municipality’s. Target the closing at or just before move-in so the proceeds wire straight to the fee.
  4. 04Decide the bridge deliberately. Sell first and move once, or move first and briefly carry both; our sell-first-or-buy-first guide walks the tradeoffs either way.

The Central Bucks house this move usually involves

The house behind a Pine Run move is usually a Doylestown-orbit house: Doylestown Borough or Township, Buckingham, New Britain, Plumstead, Warrington, a colonial or rancher owned decades, in the Central Bucks school district that keeps buyer demand deep. Three field notes for exactly that sale:

  • Demand is your friend; timing is the work. These houses draw strong buyer pools in most seasons, which makes coordinating the closing date to a move-in week genuinely achievable when the listing is prepared in passes rather than projects. The room-by-room checklist keeps the clear-out on schedule.
  • The tax windows usually cooperate. The $250,000/$500,000 exclusion covers most of these sales; where a spouse has died, the two-year window in our surviving spouse guide can set the timing by itself.
  • Local specifics are covered town by town. Start with the Doylestown guide for the borough and township requirements, and the Bucks County downsizing guide for the wider picture.

Samantha, SRES®, sells the houses on both ends of this exact move across Central Bucks. If Pine Run, or the cottage-village model generally, is on your shortlist, start with the free valuation that turns the house into a number you can hold against both columns of the rate sheet, or ask her how your township’s timeline fits the community’s. Two prices per cottage, one calendar for the whole move; get the order right and the rest is logistics.

Questions sellers ask about the Pine Run move

How much does it cost to move into Pine Run Village?

The published 2026 rate sheet runs from $93,300 for the smallest cottage (the New Hope) under the 50 Month plan to $1,329,700 for the largest farmhouse under the 50% refund plan, with monthly fees from $1,431 to roughly $8,514 and a second-person charge of $23,600 or $35,400 up front plus $1,096 per month. Most cottages land between the high $100,000s and the mid $400,000s, in other words, squarely in the range a Central Bucks house sale produces. Every unit is priced under two plans, so the real question is not just which cottage but which refund structure, and that decision changes the number by roughly fifty percent.

What is the difference between the 50 Month plan and the 50% refund plan?

Both buy the same cottage and the same life-lease; they differ in what comes back. Under the 50 Month plan, the residency investment fee is lower, and if you leave within the first 50 months you receive a prorated refund that declines to zero over that period; stay past 50 months and nothing returns. Under the 50% refund plan you pay roughly fifty percent more up front, and half of the fee returns to you or your estate whenever you leave, however long you stay. The arithmetic favors the 50 Month plan if you expect a long residency and want the lower entry, and the 50% plan if preserving an estate for children matters or if you may relocate. Run both against the house proceeds before touring; the community quotes both numbers for every floor plan.

Is Pine Run a CCRC? What happens if I need care later?

Yes. Pine Run Village is a Life Plan Community (the current industry term for a CCRC) that files an annual disclosure statement with the Pennsylvania Insurance Department. The Ferry Road campus is licensed for a 90-bed skilled nursing facility and a 38-room secured memory care unit, and the affiliated Pine Run Lakeview campus about three miles away is licensed for 96 personal care rooms. Care is not prepaid the way a Type A life care contract prepays it; the entrance plans here are about the residence, and care is arranged and billed as needed through the continuum. That makes the disclosure statement and the current fee schedules for the care levels essential reading before signing, and it makes long-term care insurance a live question rather than a settled one.

Why do people choose Pine Run over the bigger campuses?

The housing itself. Pine Run is 282 cottage-style homes on 43 acres beside Pine Run Lake, with historic farmhouses, a craft barn, a woodshop, a greenhouse, walking trails, and a community center with an indoor pool. Nearly everyone lives in a cottage with their own entrance rather than an apartment off a corridor, which for a couple leaving a single-family house in Doylestown, Buckingham, or New Britain is a much smaller psychological step than a high-rise apartment. The tradeoff is scale: fewer restaurants and venues than a two-thousand-resident campus. Families comparing it to Ann’s Choice twenty minutes south are usually deciding between village texture and campus breadth.

Do I have to sell the house before moving in?

The residency investment fee is due at move-in, and Presbyterian Senior Living’s own materials say plainly that it is often covered by the sale of a house. No rule forces the sale first, but the cash flow usually does. The workable sequences are the same as at every entrance-fee community: sell first and move once, reserve and sell on one coordinated calendar, or bridge briefly with other assets. What decides among them is the house number, which is why the valuation belongs before the deposit, not after. Doylestown Township has its own resale requirements, and the surrounding Central Bucks townships each have their own; build that paperwork into the calendar from day one.

About the author

Samantha Mallon, SRES®

Samantha is a real estate agent with Compass, licensed in Pennsylvania (RS365940) and New Jersey (2440598), holding the SRES® (Seniors Real Estate Specialist®) designation. Before real estate she earned a finance degree at Rutgers and a master’s in analytics at Georgia Tech, and worked in management consulting at Deloitte, a background she now applies to pricing, preparation, and honest guidance for sellers navigating downsizing, longtime homes, and family transitions across Greater Philadelphia and South Jersey.

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