• Receivership Sale of Standalone Memory Care Community Closes

    Senior Living Investment Brokerage’s Southeast closings continued with the sale of Westminster Memory Care in Lexington, South Carolina. Built in 2020, the Class-A community features 48 units of memory care and high-end finishes. It is set on 6.3 acres, which provides an opportunity for expansion under new ownership. Also, at the time of the... Read More »
  • Active Adult Community Secures Freddie Mac Refinance

    An active adult community in Hurst, Texas, paid off its existing bank debt with a Freddie Mac refinance arranged by Berkadia. Heritage Village Residences was built in 2014 with 120 units, including 10 cottages. It was part of multiple acquisitions over the years, first in 2020 when Edison Equity Management Corporation bought it for $23.3 million... Read More »
  • Upstate NY Seniors Housing Community Trades

    Kory Buzin and Steve Thomes of Blueprint facilitated the sale of a seniors housing community in upstate New York that stakeholders were divesting to take advantage of positive performance trends and a strong M&A market. The Legacy at Cranberry Landing, a 95-unit independent living, assisted living and memory care community in Rochester, was... Read More »
  • Seniors Housing Investment Vehicle Acquires First Asset

    Focus Healthcare Partners acquired Bellingham at West Chester, a 274-unit seniors housing community in West Chester, Pennsylvania. The investment is Focus’ first for its newest investment vehicle, Focus Senior Housing Fund III. The property sits on an 11.8-acre site 20 miles west of downtown Philadelphia. It comprises 208 independent living, 50... Read More »
  • Management Transfer Includes Purchase Option

    A senior care campus in Waterloo, Illinois, secured a new operator thanks to Ray Giannini of Marcus & Millichap. Featuring 144 skilled nursing beds and 50 independent living units, Oak Hill – Senior Living and Rehabilitation Center was well occupied with a strong quality mix. It was owned by Monroe County, which wanted to retain the... Read More »
Occupancy On the Rebound 

Occupancy On the Rebound 

In the top 31 markets in the U.S., seniors housing occupancy has posted its third consecutive quarterly increase, according to NIC MAP data. Combining assisted and independent living, the first quarter of 2022 posted a 20-basis point increase from the previous quarter to 80.6%, and up 250 basis points from the first quarter of 2021. While smaller than we would like to see, we will take it. The pandemic low was 78.0% in the second quarter of 2021, according to the data.  Assisted living posted the largest increase in census among the three major categories, increasing by 50 basis points from the fourth quarter to 77.9%. This is up 370 basis points from the pandemic low of 74.2% in Q2... Read More »

Activists Strike Again, But Fall On Deaf Ears

You have to hand it to Jonathan Litt of Land & Buildings, he has not given up on the senior care sector. After going after a few provider companies in the pre-COVID past, he recently set his sights on Ventas. But, Big Deb did not quake in her heels. She never does. As is his way, Litt tried to get a position on the Ventas Board, and after meeting with two separate groups of directors, he apparently thought that he made a good impression and had swayed them. Wrong. Right after his March 7 letter to Ventas shareholders, Ventas announced the appointment of a new board member, but his name was not Litt. Extremely qualified, yes, but not Litt. In Litt’s letter, he indicated his “tremendous... Read More »

A Conversation on the Bridge Lending Market with Oxford Finance

The industry is emerging from the pandemic, but new issues are always arising, so how are lenders reacting and how do they distinguish pandemic problems from provider problems? Ben Swett sat down with Kevin Harbour and Tracy Maziek of Oxford Finance to discuss the state of the bridge lending market in a rising interest rate environment. Read More »

Brookdale Provides Update

Brookdale Senior Living just released its occupancy update for February, and our first take was that things need to be better than that. Then, we remembered our late 2020 analysis which showed that assisted living occupancy has never increased in the first quarter for each of the past 10 years. Therefore, we should not expect too much this quarter. In this light, Brookdale’s census outlook is not too bad. From January to February, the weighted average occupancy dropped just 10 basis points to 73.3%. Even better, the month-end occupancy increased by 20 basis points from the end of January to 74.4%. The problem is that census at the end of September was 74.2%, so we have seen little overall... Read More »
Welltower: Riding Out The Storm

Welltower: Riding Out The Storm

There were no surprises in Welltower’s fourth quarter and full-year 2021 earnings report, which we suppose is a good thing. Could the seniors housing portfolio be performing better? Yes, but so could everyone else’s portfolio. The U.S. seniors housing owned portfolio (SHOP) has seen a slowdown in census increase, with no change in December, which followed a 50-bp rise in November and 30-bp increase in October. That results in 80 basis points of census increase in three months, compared with 260 bp in the third quarter previous and 280 bps in the second quarter. While there is some seasonality in that fourth quarter number, we also may have seen the end of the “post-lockdown” boost, or the... Read More »