• 60 Seconds with Swett: The Problem with CMS Interpretive Guidelines

    Just a day after we highlighted the potential downsides of overregulation of assisted living from the federal level, a case of regulatory overreach involving a nursing home just headed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth District in hopes of overturning a $1.8 million civil monetary penalty. Without getting into the minutiae too much, the... Read More »
  • Kayne Anderson Fund Tops Target

    The familiar refrain continues, with more capital continuing to flow into the seniors housing industry, property prices should keep rising. Kayne Anderson Real Estate, the real estate private equity arm of Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors, L.P., has closed the largest opportunistic equity fund in its history, at more than 70% above its initial... Read More »
  • Well-Performing Full-Continuum Community Sells

    Blueprint announced its role in the sale of Morningstar at Golden Ridge, a seniors housing community in Peoria, Arizona (Phoenix MSA). Built in 2019, the community has 38 independent living, 65 assisted living and 35 memory care units. It is nearly fully occupied. The community is one of the newest and most well-appointed assets within a... Read More »
  • Kaplan Development Divests to Cedarwood Group

    Cedarwood Group closed its acquisition of Saranac Village at Will Rogers, a 75-unit independent living community in Saranac Lake, New York. The seller was Kaplan Development Group, which took over Will Rogers after the first year of it being open as a senior living community. The community was originally built in 1928 as a Tudor-style... Read More »
  • Omega Welcomes New CEO and CFO

    Omega Healthcare Investors, Inc.’s President, Matthew Gourmand will become the REIT’s Chief Executive Officer in conjunction with the planned retirement of Taylor Pickett, effective October 1, 2026. Pickett will also step down from the Board of Directors upon his retirement, and the Board of Directors intends to appoint Gourmand to the Board,... Read More »
CapSenior: Ready For a New Beginning

CapSenior: Ready For a New Beginning

It has been a tumultuous year for Capital Senior Living, more so than for many other large providers. Not only did management have to deal with the pandemic, like everyone else, but they also had to deal with questions about solvency, liquidity and a shareholder battle over the future of the company and its capital structure. Well, that is now all behind them (except the pandemic), as will be the company name effective November 15 when they become Sonida Senior Living with a new ticker “SNDA.” We suppose they decided that a new name was appropriate for a new financial beginning.  One week before announcing third quarter earnings results, the company closed its hotly... Read More »
Diversicare Merger Moves Ahead Following Troubling Third Quarter

Diversicare Merger Moves Ahead Following Troubling Third Quarter

It seemed to be a difficult third quarter for Diversicare Healthcare Services, at least operationally, when it reported drops in its NOI, EBITDA, patient revenue and its Medicare, private pay and hospice average daily census when compared with the third quarter of 2020.  But the planned merger with DAC Acquisition LLC, a privately held Delaware limited liability company managed by Ephram Lahasky and owning/leasing 100 skilled nursing and similar facilities in over 20 states, is still on track to close later this quarter. The price is for $10.10 per share in cash, or a premium of approximately 256% to the closing price of $2.84 for Diversicare’s common stock on August 19, 2021,... Read More »

Getting to the Truth with COVID and Senior Care

We all know that COVID-19 was not kind to the senior care industry. But we also have to be vigilant in communicating that it wasn’t as bad as the media portrayed it to be, at least with regard to mortality rates. Even the most respected media outlets, whether in print or on television, made it sound like all senior care facilities were death traps. This was all far from the truth. The reality is that slightly more than 50% of all facilities nationwide, from skilled nursing to assisted living to independent living, never experienced a COVID death. This is according to a study by NORC at the University of Chicago sponsored by NIC. Now, if they had been able to remove from the... Read More »
Brookdale Soars on Q3 Earnings

Brookdale Soars on Q3 Earnings

As the largest seniors housing company, all eyes are always on Brookdale Senior Living and how it is performing. Investors seemed to like what they heard and saw after the company released its third quarter earnings report last Friday, sending the shares up by 14% to close at their highest level since August 2.  Part of the good news was that the company will start issuing earnings and cash flow guidance moving forward, something that Brookdale and most other companies suspended with the onset of the pandemic. In addition, they reported their eighth straight month of census increases dating back to the bottom in February. In February, the weighted average occupancy was 69.4%... Read More »

Ventas Reports an Up and Down Quarter

Several publicly traded REITs announced their third quarter earnings results at the end of last week, and the results were a mixed bag. Welltower released some very positive occupancy news, as well as four major portfolio acquisitions, signaling its confidence in the seniors housing industry. On the flip side, WELL’s total portfolio same store NOI declined 5.3% year over year, and 7.1% from the previous quarter, while its operating margins and lease coverages continued to deteriorate. For more details on the REIT’s third quarter results, read about them here.  Ventas followed soon afterwards with its own earnings release, and there was also both good news and bad. The company reported its... Read More »
The Ensign Group Shines, Again

The Ensign Group Shines, Again

We have still not figured out how The Ensign Group continues to outperform the rest of the skilled nursing industry when so many companies and providers are still hurting, with many of them still not able to make lease payments in full. For the past year, we have wondered if the only way to perform as well as they have is to cook the books, so to speak. That idea was discarded, and while we know they operate their model with each facility run by a mini-CEO with full local decision-making responsibilities and run it successfully, we continue to scratch our heads and wonder why others can’t do what they do. It just must be the culture, but obviously, one that needs to be mimicked by others,... Read More »