• 2nd Quarter Investor Call: The Great Debates of Senior Care

    On Thursday, July 17, Managing Editor of The SeniorCare Investor Ben Swett hosted SCI’s latest webinar, dubbed The Great Debates of Senior Care, with panelists ​​Dan Revie of Ziegler, Scott Hougham of Sage, and Michael Feinstein of Focus Healthcare Partners. Issues such as the chances of having a unit shortfall, whether cap rates are too low, the... Read More »
  • Ventas Acquires in Washington State

    Ventas expanded its portfolio through a recent acquisition of a seniors housing community in Washington State. Built in 2003, MorningStar at Silver Lake is in Everett, Washington, with 113 independent living and 35 assisted living units. The in-place operator will continue to manage the community going forward. MorningStar Senior Living has been... Read More »
  • Chicago Pacific Founders Acquires Class-A Communities

    Berkadia handled the sale and financing of two Class-A independent living, assisted living, and memory care communities: Grand Living at Citrus Hills and Grand Living at Bridgewater. The pair of seniors housing communities have a combined total of 337 units, and are located in Hernando, Florida, and Coralville, Iowa, respectively. Managing... Read More »
  • Blueprint Closes Lease-to-Purchase Transaction

    A large New York-based seniors housing owner engaged Blueprint to explore the sale of an 80-unit assisted living/memory care community in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Kory Buzin and Steve Thomes handled the transaction. Ownership acquired the asset several years prior while in distress and brought on Viva Senior Living as manager to execute a... Read More »
  • BHI Provides Bridge Loan

    BHI, the U.S. branch of Bank Hapoalim B.M., provided $49 million in bridge-to-HUD financing for a portfolio of three seniors housing communities in the suburbs of Detroit. The portfolio consists of Hampton Manor of Dundee, Hampton Manor of Trenton and Hampton Manor of Hamburg. Together, the communities total 221 units, with 171 assisted living... Read More »
Capital Senior Living Disappoints, And Pays A Price

Capital Senior Living Disappoints, And Pays A Price

We have now become nervous with each earnings period because there just seem to be too many surprises. Unfortunately, these surprises have usually been negative. Three months after being positive about the direction of the company, Capital Senior Living spooked investors not only with their poor results in the second quarter, but their dismal prospects for the rest of the year. When you underperform expectations, and cut full-year forecasts by 20%, you should expect the worst. And the worst was a 23% plunge in the share price on August 1, followed by a 5% decline the following morning. Volume was 6x the average, but not heavy in absolute terms. The news also took Brookdale Senior Living... Read More »
Should Cap Rates Go Lower?

Should Cap Rates Go Lower?

Two major REIT CEOs can see seniors cap rates moving below multifamily for the first time. The Big Two REITs have reported their second earnings, and while occupancy and labor costs certainly remain an issue for their operating partners, there was one funny comment that came out of the calls. Well, funny if you get your kicks from these sorts of things the way I do. Apparently, Welltower CEO Tom DeRosa and Ventas CEO Debbie Cafaro see eye to eye on at least one thing. As one analyst joked, they both apparently agree that seniors housing cap rates should be lower than multifamily, and I think they were even talking about assisted living. The reason? Because demand will do nothing but grow,... Read More »
Sale of Quality Care Properties Approved

Sale of Quality Care Properties Approved

By a margin of 26-1, shareholders approved the sale of Quality Care Properties to Welltower for $20.75 per share in cash, with Welltower teaming up with ProMedica Health System, which will own the HCR ManorCare operating business, lease the facilities from Welltower, and also own the home health and hospice business. Shareholders also approved the compensation packages for QCP’s executives but at a much smaller margin of 1.14-1.0. Although we have not seen a closing date, we expect all the transactions to close in the next few weeks. We are sure Welltower would like to have it all wrapped up in time for the August 3 second quarter earnings calls. It will be interesting to see how the HCR... Read More »
Should Cap Rates Go Lower?

Occupancy And Active Adult Communities

Seniors housing occupancy hits a low because of new supply, while active adult communities begin to take off. As you know, occupancy in seniors housing now stands at a low point since the Great Recession, especially on the assisted living side. Eighteen months ago, “the market” was looking for a turn around by the second half of 2018. Not happening. Now it is the second half of 2019, with some looking at 2020. Maybe happening. New supply has obviously had its impact, and people keep on developing. But some developers are moving into what is variously called the 55+ market or “active adult” communities. They are easier to zone, cheaper to build and don’t require much staff, all important... Read More »
Should Cap Rates Go Lower?

The Warning Signs Were There

With assisted living occupancy now at an eight-year low, the reasons seemed very obvious a few years ago. I am a hoarder. I like to keep reports, articles, magazines and anything else of interest pertaining to seniors housing and care. So, last night I was cleaning up some papers stacked in my office and came across one of Jerry Doctrow’s first blogs since retiring from Stifel Nicolaus in 2015. Dated January 6, 2016, it was called, “Why Near-Term Trends Could Spell Trouble for Senior Housing.” As I re-read it, all I thought was, why didn’t more people see the problem back then? NIC MAP had just come out with its most recent quarterly data on occupancy and construction, and while not... Read More »
Should Cap Rates Go Lower?

Skilled Nursing Staffing Woes

Another front page New York Times story highlighting problems with skilled nursing facilities. I am sure many of you saw the recent New York Times article about understaffing in the nation’s nursing facilities, particularly on the weekends. The new methodology used, based on actual payrolls obtained by Medicare, indicates that staffing is 12% lower than using the previous methodology, which was based on self-reporting. The article used one small nursing facility in New York as an example of weekend staff shortages. Anecdotally, my next-door neighbor’s mother was in a local assisted living community operated by a prominent national chain, and she always complained about the “Sunday dump... Read More »