• Grace Management Adds Five Ventas Communities

    Grace Management expanded its relationship with Ventas, adding five seniors housing communities owned by the REIT to its operating portfolio. The communities were previously managed under a triple-net lease structure. They include Brookdale Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, Illinois, Brookdale Northbrook in Northbrook, Illinois, Brookdale Springs Mesa... Read More »
  • Seller Boosts Census Ahead of Sale to JV

    Senwell Senior Investment Advisors sold Rose Hill Retirement Community, a 66-unit, 87-bed assisted living community in Marion, North Carolina. Originally built as a hospital, Rose Hill has been transformed by the seller over the past two decades into a senior care community. After a previous attempt to sell the community was unsuccessful,... Read More »
  • Joint Venture Buys Orange County Community

    A high-end seniors housing community in Orange County sold with the help of CBRE National Senior Housing. Aron Will and John Sweeny represented the joint venture seller in the deal, while Will and Matthew Kuronen arranged acquisition financing from a national bank. The loan came with a four-year term, a full term of interest only and a floating... Read More »
  • Developer Secures Construction Financing

    JLL Capital Markets arranged a $47 million construction financing for The Arbella at Blue Hills, a 164-unit, active adult community to be developed in Bloomfield, Connecticut. JLL worked on behalf of the developer, The United Group of Companies, Inc. (United Group) to secure the construction loan through Liberty Bank of Middletown, Connecticut.... Read More »
  • Midwest-Based Operator Refinances AL/MC Communities

    MONTICELLOAM, LLC, along with firm affiliates, provided a $28.5 million senior bridge financing for two Midwest seniors housing communities. The financing was originated by Karina Davydov, Senior Managing Director, Originations. The sponsor, a Midwest-based operator with a portfolio of over 40 seniors housing and healthcare properties and a... Read More »
Brookdale Continues To Make Progress

Brookdale Continues To Make Progress

The one thing that has been beneficial about COVID is the enhanced reporting by the public companies. By the time they release quarterly earnings results, they have already been issuing monthly updates, mostly on occupancy, so there is rarely much of a surprise. Such was the case with Brookdale Senior Living. On the occupancy front, average occupancy in the second quarter was 90 basis points higher than in the first quarter. While we would have liked to see a better gain, census was still declining in the first quarter and didn’t really flatten out until March/April on a weighted average basis. More impressively, month-end census has increased for five consecutive months starting in March.... Read More »
Capital Senior Living Lives Another Day

Capital Senior Living Lives Another Day

It isn’t often that a company gets to report good news on two different fronts on the same day, especially in this environment. Capital Senior Living announced that June occupancy reached an average of 79.1%, up 380 basis points from its pandemic low of 75.3% this past February. We have been hearing a lot of that lately, and it is great news.  Perhaps that is what Conversant Capital LLC had its eye on these past few months as it was mulling over a major investment in Capital Senior Living. It is obviously looking at the future and counting on these occupancy increases to continue. Maybe not at the same pace, but continue nonetheless. What we do not know... Read More »
Removing Financial Barriers to Boost Occupancy

Removing Financial Barriers to Boost Occupancy

Coming out of the pandemic-induced senior living financial fiasco, top on almost every provider’s mind is how to increase their census as soon as possible, and then how to do it without sacrificing operating margins. Help is on the way.  For most seniors and their families, making the move into senior living is a big decision, both emotionally as well as financially. Both can be significant hurdles, but the financial side is now going to be easier to deal with, especially if you don’t want to be rushed into selling your home or selling assets to come up with cash for a large entrance-fee payment for CCRCs, or your first several months of rent.  Readers may remember 20 years ago... Read More »
What Do REIT Investors Know?

What Do REIT Investors Know?

Remember back in March 2020 when the financial world was falling apart, rapidly? March 18 was the bottom for most of the healthcare REIT stocks, when investors thought the pandemic might wipe out a good portion of their investment value in senior care properties. At the time, they weren’t too far off, when top-quality REITs such as Ventas plunged to market values that had not been seen in years. But it was much more of a knee-jerk panic attack based on worst-case scenarios. Hindsight is always great, isn’t it?  Within two weeks, most REITs had recovered 30% to 80% of that initial loss, and then steadily rose for the rest of the year. The odd thing was that this nine-month... Read More »
60 Seconds with Ben Swett: M&A Hits a High in 2021

60 Seconds with Ben Swett: M&A Hits a High in 2021

When it rains, it pours in senior care M&A. First, we noticed a significant uptick in deal activity this month, with over 30 transactions announced since June 1st. Not December’s level of activity, but we’ll take it. Then, Harrison Street announced the largest purchase in the industry in two years, spending $1.2 billion on 24 Oakmont communities. But yesterday, when we were still digesting the sale of former SNF giant Kindred Healthcare to LifePoint, Welltower made the biggest splash of all, buying Holiday Retirement’s owned portfolio of 86 independent living properties for $1.58 billion. Not only that, but Atria Senior Living will acquire the operating business of Holiday for an... Read More »
Drinking the Kool-Aid in Washington (State), Again

Drinking the Kool-Aid in Washington (State), Again

The people of the state of Washington are getting closer to having to make a decision about a new payroll tax to fund a “long-term” care benefit, that is anything but long term. The 58-cent tax withholding for every $100 of salary and bonus may not seem like much, but the benefit is not much either.  This reminds us (sort of) of the Class Act that was part of the Affordable Care Act of 2010, except there does not appear to be any funding deception in this new legislation coming from the West Coast. The Class Act, you may remember, was canceled after even those members of Congress who voted for it realized it was a financial sham. The premiums for those first five years were actually... Read More »