Many skilled nursing owners are exiting the business these days, but family-owned private equity firm The Portopiccolo Group has been actively buying in the last couple of years. Its latest acquisition was the third Virginia property to join its portfolio so far this year, after purchases in Roanoke (February) and Dunn Loring (August).
Portopiccolo’s latest target was a 120-bed skilled nursing facility in the rural, southern Virigina town of Emporia. Built in 1971, this facility seems to have been a part of every major SNF deal between institutional investors over the years. Before Portopiccolo’s acquisition, it was acquired by Sabra Health Care REIT in 2017 in the REIT’s takeover of Care Capital Properties. And before that, Ventas (CCP’s progenitor) had obtained the SNF in its 2011 acquisition of Nationwide Health Properties. The facility was underperforming, but hopefully more stable ownership will help it going forward. Accordius Health will take over operations from Epic Group.
To fund the acquisition, Tim Eberhardt and Jeffrey Stein of Capital Funding Group (CFG) originated a $14.5 million bridge loan that was cross-collateralized with a 96-bed skilled nursing facility in Louisville, Kentucky that had an existing term loan attached to it. The loan also reimbursed capital expenditures previously completed at the Louisville property and for future projects at the Emporia facility. Concurrent with the bridge loan closing, CFG also consolidated existing lines of credit for Portopiccolo into one global line with $3.5 million of availability. CFG was able to underwrite the loan to the projected stabilized performance of the assets, thereby maximizing the amount Portopiccolo could borrow.
