CCRCs Still Leading In Occupancy
Ziegler just came out with its quarterly analysis of occupancy trends for CCRC (LPCs) in conjunction with the NIC MAP data, and while census is still slipping, the sub-sector has fared better than the other components of the senior living spectrum. The data set used includes 1,134 CCRCs in both primary and secondary markets, as defined by NIC MAP. It is not clear how the other 800 or so CCRCs have performed. All CCRCs posted an average occupancy rate of 84.3% in the first quarter 2021, a drop of 720 basis points from the first quarter of 2020. While somewhat shocking, that performance is better than assisted living and skilled nursing. And, starting from an average... Read More »
Senior Care M&A Tanks In Q1
After a strong fourth quarter, senior care M&A activity cooled off this winter. We thought that after 59 seniors housing and care M&A transactions were announced in December 2020, a monthly record, we had returned to some kind of “normal” in terms of dealmaking. Well that just didn’t happen in the first quarter of 2021, when despite widespread vaccination of the senior care population investor activity cooled to just 77 publicly announced deals. That is just a preliminary total but is well off Q4’s total of 127 deals. M&A in the skilled nursing sector especially slowed down, accounting for just 32% of the deals announced during the quarter. But it makes sense. If various... Read More »
Bifurcation Between Stabilized and Non-Stabilized SNFs Grew in 2020
In some ways, the pandemic only rubbed salt in the wound in terms of occupancy across skilled nursing facilities nationwide. Average census across the skilled nursing industry was already languishing between the mid- to low- 80% range before the pandemic temporarily shut the doors to many facilities, paused elective surgeries and sent more post-acute patients home to recover. These problems adversely affected the older, mostly-Medicaid facilities and were only made worse in 2020. That means digging out from the pandemic will be a tougher assignment, and buyers paid accordingly in 2020, averaging $55,300 per bed for non-stabilized facilities reporting occupancy lower... Read More »
Senior Care Leading Indicators
There has not been a lot of good news, but given some leading indicators, the next development boom may be a bit further out than we had expected four months ago. Our focus for the past 12 months has been on the coronavirus pandemic and what it has done to seniors housing and care occupancy rates. We are also on record as stating that getting back to pre-pandemic census levels may take up to four years, partly because we expect development to ramp up again when developers eye the post-2025 demographics. But something else has been happening that may keep some builders away. First, the 10-year treasury rate has more than doubled in the past seven months. Yes, 1.36% is still attractive, but... Read More »