• 60 Seconds with Swett: Getting Realistic with New Development

    The positive mood at the NIC Fall Conference was contagious, as dealmakers were looking forward to a potential record-breaking fourth quarter. We at LevinPro are also gearing up to cover a new elevated level of M&A activity and pricing in the coming months, with our updated valuation tool better accounting for today’s market and the estimated... Read More »
  • NHC Responds to NHI

    National Healthcare Corporation, the tenant of 32 of National Health Investor’s skilled nursing/senior care facilities and three independent living communities, is disputing NHI’s determination of default after the landlord formally notified the operator that it was in default and must cure the default within 30 days to avoid an Event of... Read More »
  • REIT Acquires High-Quality Continuum of Care Community

    Blueprint facilitated the sale of a Class-A seniors housing community in Jasper, Georgia. Built in 2022, The Lodge at Stephens Lake includes 83 units of independent living cottages, assisted living and memory care. It is adjacent to a large active adult development and benefits from significant planned residential and commercial growth. At the... Read More »
  • Legend Senior Living Adds Allentown-Area Asset

    A Class-A, well performing property outside of Allentown, Pennsylvania, traded to a joint venture between Legend Senior Living and a new capital partner. Alex Florea and Kevin Lukehart of Blueprint handled the transaction. Legend previously operated The Vero at Bethlehem, which opened in July 2023 and stabilized within 18 months. At the time of... Read More »
  • CFG’s Senior Care Financing Activity

    Capital Funding Group financed more than $86 million across six transactions from early to mid-August. The transactions supported two memory care communities, four skilled nursing facilities, and one psychiatric hospital in Missouri, California, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia on behalf of nationally recognized borrowers, one of which is a... Read More »
May’s M&A Meltdown

May’s M&A Meltdown

The M&A statistics are in for May, and it was a doozy. Only 19 seniors housing and skilled nursing deals were publicly announced during the month, nearly half of which coming from the first quarter earnings reports of several public companies. Without those, we would have barely made it to double digits. You have to go back to July 2017 for such a low monthly total, when 16 sales were disclosed. Back then, however, the month was followed by a strong August (27 deals) and September (35). We’re not as hopeful for such a comeback this time.  Another facet of May’s M&A activity was that nearly all of the deals were either closed in the first quarter or were all-but-completed... Read More »
Skilled Nursing Values Were Strong Before COVID-19

Skilled Nursing Values Were Strong Before COVID-19

Leading up to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, skilled nursing facilities were going through their own challenges of falling census and shortening lengths of stay, low Medicaid reimbursement, aging physical plants, a labor squeeze and the possibility of a CMS correction after the implementation of PDPM. What some wouldn’t give to go back to those kinds of problems. However, values were near an all-time high, averaging $93,000 per bed in 2019 according to the 25th Edition of The Senior Care Acquisition Report, and falling slightly to an average of $92,800 per unit in the four quarters ended March 2020.   That high average was the result of investors acquiring... Read More »
Where Will Independent Living Values Go?

Where Will Independent Living Values Go?

Here’s the good news and the bad news regarding the independent living market today. The good news is that the fundamentals of the sector were stronger than ever as recent as this March, with values nearing a peak, occupancy consistently above 90% nationally, rents staying strong, and the labor problems largely avoiding IL communities. The bad news is that move-ins may be delayed for months, a recession may make selling and moving out of one’s home (and into an IL community) less feasible, and the socialization benefit of these communities may change significantly for some time.   Anecdotally, we do hear of move-ins continuing at a steady pace, depending on the locality and... Read More »
Where Were Assisted Living Values At Their Pre-Pandemic Peak?

Where Were Assisted Living Values At Their Pre-Pandemic Peak?

Seniors housing values were at (or very close to) a peak by the beginning of March. Then, COVID-19 shut down the country, and those communities were forced to shut their doors, halt move-ins, and deal with the pandemic and their residents as best they could. Keeping those seniors safe and healthy is, of course, the first priority. But the drop in occupancy and cash flow is also a serious matter (how else can these communities stay open to care for seniors if they are not profitable, after all?) and may lead to a correction in values.   Just how large of a correction, we cannot be sure, but we do know where values were right before the pandemic hit. According... Read More »
Where Will Independent Living Values Go?

Q1 M&A Activity Falls Below 100 Deals

For the first time since the first quarter of 2018, quarterly seniors housing and care deals dropped below 100 in Q1:2020, to 93 deals. Averaging 31 deals per month is not too shabby, but compared with the red-hot M&A market of 2019, when 450 deals were publicly announced and likely over 600 were actually completed, it is a significant decline. Not surprisingly, the COVID-19 pandemic had a large part to play in the slowdown, but not as much as you may think in the first quarter. After all, large swaths of the U.S. economy were not shut down until mid-March, and deals that closed after that were all-but-completed by the time businesses shut their doors. They just needed a little nudge... Read More »
Senior Care M&A Spending Hits Highest Level Since 2014

Senior Care M&A Spending Hits Highest Level Since 2014

Total dollar volume did not break any records in 2019, but it was still the third-highest annual total ever recorded, and the highest since 2014 according to our just-published Senior Care Acquisition Report, 25th Edition. And that was without a single deal in the top-16 prices seen in the sector (2006 and 2014 had two and four, respectively). In fact, there were only two transactions valued above $1 billion: Ventas’ $1.8 billion purchase of Le Group Maurice’s Canadian seniors housing portfolio and KKR’s $1.75 billion acquisition of the Benchmark Senior Living portfolio from Welltower.   However, the 2019 M&A market was larger and busier than people think, and that is... Read More »