• Brookdale Shares Hit Seven-Year High

    Brookdale Senior Living has posted occupancy increases for several consecutive months. The operator has lagged behind the industry for a decade now, so it is about time.  Weighted average occupancy has increased each month since January, beginning at 79.2% and reaching 82.5% in September. The third quarter’s average of 81.8% is up 290 basis... Read More »
  • Newmark’s Nearly $2 Billion Third Quarter

    Newmark is in the middle of a banner year for both investment sales and debt financings, and both its deal volume and activity appears to be accelerating as the year progresses. In the year to date, the team has closed nearly $3.6 billion in investment sales, and $1.9 billion in the third quarter alone. Excluding the Amica Senior Lifestyles... Read More »
  • Clarion Partners Makes Its First Seniors Housing Purchase

    Clarion Partners made its first seniors housing acquisition, buying Sancerre at Atlee Station in Mechanicsville, Virginia (Richmond MSA). Built in 2023, the community features 103 units of independent living, assisted living and memory care. It experienced a rapid lease-up, reaching 90% occupancy by October 2024. Census is now in the mid-90s, and... Read More »
  • LTC Properties Continues to Reduce Skilled Nursing Exposure to Support SHOP Growth

    LTC Properties sold two skilled nursing facilities in Florida totaling 240 beds for $42 million, or $175,000 per bed, with expectations of a gain on the sale of approximately $26 million. These two facilities are part of a divestment effort that includes five additional SNFs. An undisclosed operator (one of LTC Properties’ top 10 operating... Read More »
  • Kentucky SNF Sells with Blueprint’s Help

    Blueprint finished the third quarter with 48 deal closings valued at $840 million. Included in that impressive activity were four closings in Kentucky totaling more than $200 million in dollar volume. Big bucks in the Bluegrass State. In one of those closings, Blueprint represented a local family with its sale of a high performing skilled nursing... Read More »
60 Seconds with Swett: Gloom Prevails at the NIC Conference

60 Seconds with Swett: Gloom Prevails at the NIC Conference

As always, it was great to see so many of our industry friends, and plenty of new faces, at the NIC Conference in Chicago last week. And typical of most conferences, many asked us what we thought the mood of the conference was. We wondered if it would be at all better than the grim 2022 Fall conference when the capital markets had fundamentally shifted for the worse. Unfortunately, we cannot say it was better than that. With the 10-year Treasury rate touching 5% at the start of the conference and consistent signals from the Fed that interest rates would be “higher, for longer,” any hope for an improving capital markets environment unleashing a flood of financings and M&A (at higher... Read More »
60 Seconds with Swett: Gloom Prevails at the NIC Conference

60 Seconds with Swett: Skilled Nursing M&A in 2023 and Beyond

Skilled nursing investors, operators and dealmakers have been on quite the rollercoaster the last several years, with COVID initially threatening the life of the industry quickly shifting to an exuberant M&A market that saw buyers clamor for facilities of all qualities, and paying up for them too. Now, higher capital costs have tempered some of that excitement, and the industry faces a new threat: the minimum staffing mandate. It is safe to say, the party is over, but M&A volume has not fallen off a cliff either. Neither have values. So, how are dealmakers evaluating this new market we are in, and how will investment strategies, the lending environment or valuations change? Join us... Read More »
60 Seconds with Monroe: Finding A Solution For LTC Funding

60 Seconds with Monroe: Finding A Solution For LTC Funding

My friend Stephen Moses, president of the Center for Long-Term Care Reform, has been a consistent and persistent advocate for reforming the Medicaid system and getting Americans out of the Medicaid-dependency mindset. He just published, with the Paragon Health Institute, the follow-on to his paper “Long-Term Care: The Problem.” Available now is “Long-Term Care: The Solution.” While I was hoping for something completely new and creative, I can’t disagree with his recommendations, which include 1) stop the ability to purchase Medicaid-exempt assets, 2) eliminate the home equity exemption, 3) ban Medicaid Asset Protection Trusts, 4) disallow Medicaid compliant annuities, and 5) increase the... Read More »
60 Seconds with Swett: Gloom Prevails at the NIC Conference

60 Seconds with Swett: 2023 Deal Volume at 2019 Levels

Dealmakers have a lot to be frustrated with in the M&A market right now, with valuations low, deal processes taking longer than ever, scarcity in the debt markets and other headwinds making their impact. But despite it all, deal volume was actually historically healthy in the third quarter of 2023.  There were 115 publicly announced transactions in the quarter. That is down from the 120 deals made public in Q2:23 and the 140 from last year’s third quarter. But the average deals per quarter for 2023 at 115 is equal to the average deals per quarter in 2019, a time of cheap and abundant capital and before anyone knew what COVID-19 was. Plus, on an annualized basis, Q3’s total would... Read More »
60 Seconds with Swett: Gloom Prevails at the NIC Conference

60 Seconds with Swett: SNFs Get a Bad Grade

It was unfortunate, but unsurprising, to see that in a recent Gallup poll, a plurality of those surveyed gave SNFs either a D or an F grade on overall quality of care. We say unsurprising not because we agree with that for the majority of facilities, although there are certainly those guilty of providing subpar care, but because of the general negative perception the public has on SNFs. Cases of bad care will always spread in the media and by word-of-mouth faster than the many instances of good care, and only 9% of respondents gave SNFs either B (good) or A (excellent) grades in the survey.  That is not good, but let’s face it, the skilled nursing business is also a thankless... Read More »
60 Seconds with Monroe: Finding A Solution For LTC Funding

60 Seconds with Monroe: Is Joe Biden That Tone Deaf?

We already reported on the new proposed staffing requirements for nursing homes, coming at a time when most everyone in senior living is still struggling with finding enough staff, and paying for them. Coincident with the release of the proposed rules, USA Today published an opinion piece by President Biden. Now, if anyone thinks he actually wrote it, I have a bridge to sell you. My guess is that he did not even read it. This was a staff piece. Perhaps from Joe’s basement? I will say one thing, he has been consistent in his criticism of private equity in the nursing home business, but he still gets his facts and names wrong. Not many “private equity” firms have been buying up nursing homes... Read More »