Step by Step

About Step by Step Houses

Step by Step Houses is a sober living operator based in Croydon, Pennsylvania, running recovery homes for men and women across lower Bucks County. The company has housed people in recovery in the county for more than a decade, and several of its addresses hold full recovery house licenses from the Commonwealth.

A Bucks County Sober Living Operator Based in Croydon

The operator works where its principals live, in the dense band of lower Bucks County along the Delaware River. Its houses are run day to day by on-site house leaders who are active in 12 step programs, with general managers above them. That arrangement puts someone in every household who has done what the residents are doing, and it keeps decisions about fees, admissions and discharge in the hands of people a resident can reach.

Six Recovery Homes in Bensalem, Croydon and Levittown

The Step by Step Houses portfolio in Pennsylvania covers three lower Bucks County communities:

• Belmont Recovery House, on Bristol Road in Bensalem, for women.
• Cedar Recovery House, on Cedar Avenue in Croydon, for men.
• Harris Sober Living House, in Croydon, for men.
• Serpentine Sober Living House, on Serpentine Lane in Levittown, for men.
• A men's recovery house on Candle Road in Levittown.
• A men's recovery house on Frosty Hollow Road in Levittown.

The whole group falls inside a few miles of the Route 13 corridor, so moving between houses leaves a resident's job, bus route, rail station and outpatient provider unchanged.

Men's and Women's Sober Houses Under One Operator

Every household is single gender. Women apply to the Bensalem house; men have several options in Croydon and Levittown. The operator also splits its houses by structure. Its sober living houses require at least six months of recovery time and active 12 step participation, while its recovery houses take residents earlier in the process. An applicant who is honest about where they are gets matched to the right one of the two.

State Licensing Across These Sober Homes

The Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs licenses recovery houses under Act 59 of 2017, and Step by Step Houses holds full licenses on addresses in Bensalem, Croydon and Levittown. Licensure is voluntary in this state, which means a company can operate entirely without it. An operator carrying licenses across most of its portfolio has accepted inspection, written standards on fees and discharge, and an oversight route that ends outside the company. Certification through the Pennsylvania Alliance of Recovery Residences is a separate credential covering individual residences.

One Application, Several Recovery Homes

Applications go to Step by Step Houses, and that is the practical argument for a multi-house operator. An applicant is weighed against every open bed in the group, and a placement that turns out wrong becomes a transfer conversation with people who already know the resident. The house model stays constant across addresses: random testing, a blackout period for new arrivals, a Sunday evening house meeting, four resident-cooked house meals a week, and laundry, cable, wi-fi and phone included in the fee.

Recovery Housing and Treatment Support for Lower Bucks County

The company works alongside clinical care instead of replacing it. Cognitive behavioral therapy, medication-assisted treatment and outpatient aftercare all sit in what it supports, so a resident on prescribed medication for opioid use disorder keeps both the medication and the housing. Lower Bucks County holds most of the county's treatment capacity, its rail service into Philadelphia and Trenton, and its entry-level employment, with county business handled at the courthouse in Doylestown. An operator with six addresses inside that band can place someone close to all of it.