Hän välittää perheestään.

The dictionary form is välittää. In this sentence, it means to care about or to be concerned about.

This verb can also have other meanings in other contexts, such as to pass on, to relay, or to transmit, so the case pattern helps show which meaning is intended here.

Because välittää in the sense to care about does not take a direct object. Instead, it normally takes the elative case:

välittää jostakin / jostakusta = to care about something / someone

So perhe becomes perheestä. After that, a possessive ending is added, which gives perheestään.

It is built from:

• perhe = family
• perheestä = about/from the family
• perheestään = about his/her own family

So the word contains both the idea of family and the idea of his/her.

It reflects two things at once:

• the elative ending -sta/-stä, which this verb requires
• a 3rd-person possessive ending, meaning his/her/their

So perheestään means roughly about his/her family.

A very useful thing to remember is that Finnish often puts possession on the noun itself instead of using a separate word like his or her.

Because Finnish often marks possession with a suffix on the noun.

So instead of a separate word like his family, Finnish can simply use perheensä or, in this case, perheestään.

There is also an important nuance here:
perheestään usually refers back to the subject, so it most naturally means his/her own family.

Compare:

• Hän välittää perheestään. = He/She cares about his/her own family.
• Hän välittää hänen perheestään. = He/She cares about his/her family, often meaning someone else’s family.

It can mean either. Finnish does not normally mark gender in personal pronouns.

So hän can mean:

• he
• she

You only know which one is meant from context.

Usually not in standard Finnish here.

With 1st and 2nd person, the verb ending often shows who the subject is:

• välitän = I care
• välität = you care

But välittää does not clearly identify the subject by itself in the same way, so hän is normally included:

• Hän välittää perheestään.

In conversation, Finnish may leave things out if they are obvious from context, but for a learner, keeping hän is the safest choice.

Most naturally, it means cares about.

It suggests emotional concern, affection, or importance.

If you want to say takes care of in the practical sense of looks after, Finnish more often uses expressions like:

• Hän huolehtii perheestään.
• Hän pitää huolta perheestään.

So välittää is more about caring, while huolehtia is more about taking care of.

Hän välittää perheestään is the most neutral word order.

Finnish word order is fairly flexible, and changing it often changes the emphasis rather than the basic meaning.

For example:

• Hän välittää perheestään. = neutral
• Perheestään hän välittää. = stronger emphasis on his/her family

But as a beginner, the neutral order is the best one to learn first.

Yes, they matter a lot.

In Finnish, double letters are pronounced longer than single ones:

• tt is a long consonant
• ää is a long vowel

So in välittää, both the tt and the final ää should be clearly long.

The same is true in perheestään: the ee and ää are long.

This matters because vowel and consonant length can change meaning in Finnish.

Negative:

• Hän ei välitä perheestään. = He/She does not care about his/her family.

Past:

• Hän välitti perheestään. = He/She cared about his/her family.

So the core structure stays the same, and the verb changes form.