• Sabra Trims Forecast, Tempering a Solid Quarter

    Sabra Health Care REIT, Inc. announced several acquisitions in its third quarter results. The REIT acquired six managed seniors housing properties for $217.5 million with an estimated initial cash yield of 7.8%, three of which were acquired through a consolidated joint venture in which Sabra has a 95% equity interest. The company also purchased... Read More »
  • CareTrust’s Flurry of Acquisitions

    CareTrust REIT, Inc. closed a series of transactions totaling approximately $437 million in late October. In two separate deals, the REIT acquired 12 skilled nursing facilities and one skilled nursing campus located across the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic. The combined portfolio includes approximately 1,760 licensed skilled nursing beds and... Read More »
  • Ensign Adds to Its Utah and Alabama Footprint

    The Ensign Group, Inc. kicked off November with a couple of new deals. The publicly traded company acquired the real estate and operations of the following seven Stonehedge skilled nursing facilities in Utah: Stonehenge of American Fork (90 beds in American Fork) Stonehenge of Cedar City (50 beds in Cedar City) Stonehenge of Ogden (52 beds in... Read More »
  • Joint Venture Makes Its First Acquisition

    A joint venture between Capitol Seniors Housing and a global alternative asset manager with over $55 billion in assets under management worldwide acquired The Woods at Merrimack, a 140-unit seniors housing community in Methuen, Massachusetts. This is the first deal between CSH and the asset manager but marks the beginning of a long-term... Read More »
  • Michigan-Based Owner/Operator Buys Lansing Campus

    A public REIT engaged Blueprint in the confidential divestiture of a 53-unit assisted living and memory care campus in Lansing, Michigan. The campus features two standalone buildings separately catering to assisted living residents and those requiring memory care. The well-maintained campus was originally built in 1997 and consisted of 19... Read More »
The 55+ Active Adult Market: The New Frontier of Seniors Housing

The 55+ Active Adult Market: The New Frontier of Seniors Housing

Judging by the number of questions we got during our May 16th webinar called “The 55+ Active Adult Market: The New Frontier of Seniors Housing,” it is safe to say that there is plenty of interest in this growing market. Our listeners tuned in to find out what prices active adult communities have been trading at, their cap rates, and what exactly operationally goes into this no-care and low-services senior living option. You can still listen here. Our Editor, Steve Monroe, and several experts that included Ryan Maconachy of Newmark Knight Frank, Ryan Frederick of SmartLiving 360 and Michael Hartman of Capitol Seniors Housing made up our panel, bringing in different perspectives on how to... Read More »
Pricing Age in Skilled Nursing Facilities

Pricing Age in Skilled Nursing Facilities

There are plenty of issues that come along with the aging of the skilled nursing facility inventory. Older facilities require more capex to keep operations up to snuff, have trouble attracting the coveted Medicare and private insurance patients, and often have far fewer private units but more three- or four-bed wards. In addition, it has to be more difficult attracting and retaining staff at an older facility, especially when a newer facility often comes with more bells and whistles in addition to newer technology that makes those employees’ jobs easier. Where would you rather work? So, in the M&A market, how did those older facilities fare compare with the newer ones? Well, there was... Read More »
Another Valuation Metric for the 2018 Seniors Housing M&A Market

Another Valuation Metric for the 2018 Seniors Housing M&A Market

In a year when both the assisted living and independent living average cap rates rose, how did the sectors’ average Gross Income Multiples (GIM) change year over year? Well, they accordingly fell off their 2017 levels, mirroring their changes in cap rate, according to The Seniors Housing Acquisition & Investment Report. The average independent living GIM fell to its lowest point in five years at 5.0x, while the assisted living GIM dropped 70 basis points to 3.2x, also a five-year low. The difference between the sectors can be explained by the higher risk of owning assisted living communities. The IL market, on the other hand, has seen far less new construction and more stable occupancy... Read More »
How Did Buyers Value Cash Flow in Seniors Housing M&A in 2018?

How Did Buyers Value Cash Flow in Seniors Housing M&A in 2018?

For the seventh year in a row, there was a perfect correlation between the age of seniors housing communities sold and their average net operating income per unit, according to the Seniors Housing Acquisition & Investment Report. This makes sense, given that the newer communities should better reflect the current demand (by unit size, amenities, etc.) and require less capex to maintain their competitiveness. Newer communities also have an easier time attracting good staff and charging higher rents. Those newest communities (built after 2013) had an average of $19,700 per unit of NOI, relatively consistent with recent levels. The next subset of properties built between five and 10 years... Read More »
What About the CCRC M&A Market?

What About the CCRC M&A Market?

The CCRC (or LPC) acquisition market, which we highlighted in the First Edition of The Seniors Housing Acquisition & Investment Report, is the thinnest of all the major sectors of seniors housing and care. The number of potential buyers is smaller, the lender and investor pool is smaller, and the number communities for sale each year is smaller. Because the market is not very active, we have grouped our statistics in two-year intervals (with the exception of the three-year period before the Great Recession) to minimize the impact of outlier sales at both extremes. Anecdotally, we have heard that the CCRC market is possibly faring the strongest of the seniors housing sectors. There has... Read More »
How Occupancy Impacted 2018 Assisted Living Values

How Occupancy Impacted 2018 Assisted Living Values

As we’ve mentioned several times, 2018 was a tough year for assisted living occupancy, as new development took its toll on a number of markets. Low occupancy often leads to lower operating margins and less cash flow, especially when operators feel the need to heavily discount their rates in order to fill beds, so it’s a serious issue for the industry. In our Seniors Housing Acquisition & Investment Report, “stabilized” means having an occupancy equal to or higher than 85%. And while there are some operators not pleased with their “stabilized” communities occupied in the 80s, it could be worse, and there was clearly a premium paid for existing census in 2018. Stabilized communities sold... Read More »