One big benefit of the country opening up is in-person conferences. It does feel good.
Last week, I attended my first conference, in person, since March of 2020. And boy did it feel great! Shaking hands again, hugging people I haven’t seen in person in 15 months, or more, was like a celebration for everyone there. All because we were vaccinated. Thank you, Senior Living 100.
I was invited to moderate a panel on, what else, the M&A market. Two weeks earlier, I was a panelist at their sister conference, The LTC 100, but I was virtual, as was one other panelist in my session, and it just was not the same.
My two takeaways were that people are pretty optimistic about the comeback for senior care, with the main difference being timing. Some think it will be late 2022 when we are back to “normal,” while the others believe more time will be needed, putting the full recovery out to 2023, 2024 as a worst case.
Not just that, but some providers said they are already back to their pre-COVID census levels. Now, these ones did not suffer that 1,000-plus basis point decline that others did, but that is still pretty remarkable. And, I kept on hearing, the south is outperforming other areas of the country in the recovery.
See you soon!
