• CIBC Completes Several Financings

    CIBC Bank USA announced a handful of senior care financings across multiple states. First, the company closed a $17.5 million cash-out refinancing for a regional operator’s portfolio of three skilled nursing facilities with 235 total beds in northeast and southeast Massachusetts, and southern New Hampshire. The facilities have an effective age of... Read More »
  • Blueprint Adding HUD Lending Platform

    Fresh off another record-setting year for investment sales activity, Blueprint announced a major expansion of its capital markets services to now include FHA/HUD lending and servicing capabilities. The firm is acquiring the existing FHA/HUD lending platform of MidCap Financial Services, and hiring Tony Marino, formerly of Cambridge Realty Capital... Read More »
  • More New Capital Enters Seniors Housing

    A fully-integrated real estate firm that is well known in the student housing world announced its foray into the seniors housing industry. Landmark Properties focuses on the development, construction, acquisition, investment management, and operation of high-quality residential communities, but the company’s intent is to invest in ground-up... Read More »
  • Berkadia’s Recent Financing Activity

    In the past 30 days, Berkadia’s Jay Healy and Andrew Lanzaro have closed $111.5 million across four financings for four separate sponsors, encompassing eleven properties in six states. The activity included three bridge financings totaling $69.6 million from Berkadia’s proprietary balance sheet and a $41.9 million HUD refinance. The first... Read More »
  • Inspirit Senior Living Appoints New President

    Torey Riso is heading back to the operating world, joining Inspirit Senior Living as President as of March 16. He joins Dave McHarg, who is the CEO of Inspirit and Founding Partner of the company. Since its founding in 2015, Inspirit has grown to 37 properties under management, with Inspirit holding an equity interest in around half of those. ... Read More »
Celebrating 30 Years

Celebrating 30 Years

The American Seniors Housing Association has been supporting the senior living industry for 30 years now, with David Schless at the helm throughout. I fondly remember going to my first annual meeting of the American Seniors Housing Association, back when it was part of the National Multifamily Housing Council. Let’s just say it was quite smaller than it is today, and I have to say, a bit more intimate. If you attended one of those early meetings, you may remember my question to Murry Gunty of Lazard Freres, when in the 1990s he was in the middle of patching together a company that seemed very disorganized, as I outlined his various, unconnected acquisitions. I asked, “So Murry, what’s the... Read More »
Celebrating 30 Years

Can Skilled Nursing Be Reformed?

The American Health Care Association and Leading Age have proposed a reform agenda for skilled nursing. As usual, the problem is Medicaid. The American Health Care Association and Leading Age have proposed a policy “agenda” to address some of the problems that exist in skilled nursing facilities today, which were obviously highlighted by the impact of the pandemic.  As part of the reforms, they want enhanced infection control practices, 24-hour RNs, 30-day minimum supply of PPE, better recruiting and retention of staff, improved oversight systems, and a shift to all private rooms. There is little here to disagree with, except that they expect Medicaid to pick up most of the $15... Read More »
Celebrating 30 Years

Financial Relief For Seniors Housing

Federal financial relief may be coming to assisted living and memory care providers, but will it be enough? The folks at ASHA, Argentum and NCAL have been working overtime to obtain some federal financial relief for their private pay members to deal with the burdens associated with COVID-19.  It’s supposed to be coming soon, but will it be enough? For now, the formula will be based on how it worked for Medicaid providers, which is 2% of 2019 revenues. For an 80-unit assisted living/memory care community with an average $5,000 monthly rate, that might come in at close to $80,000. If you have 50 communities, that is $4 million. Now we’re talking. For a more modest community with 50 units in... Read More »
Celebrating 30 Years

ASHA and Stifel Nicolaus Meetings

What we heard about industry trends 3,000 miles from home. After spending three days at the American Seniors Housing Association meeting and the Stifel Nicolaus “2020 Seniors Housing & Healthcare Real Estate Conference, other than jet lag, there were a few takeaways. First off, on a few panels stand-alone memory care communities came up, and not in a good way. Because they tend to be small, a few resident deaths can have an outsized impact, the former over-development has still left a bad taste, and stand-alone anything is viewed by many as too risky. Speakers believed cap rates were at least 100 basis points higher than for assisted living.  One thing we did hear is that... Read More »

Being Large In Seniors Housing

Size isn’t all its cracked up to be, and it does matter whether you own or operate the real estate. We always hear that size matters, but it can also work against you. While no one has claimed to be able to define the optimal size of a seniors housing company, I have yet to hear anyway say that they would be comfortable running a company with more than 500 properties. Most would say that 250 would be tops, with many of them even much smaller. I am talking about owning and operating, with the emphasis on operating. For REITs, I don’t know if there is a real number where their efficiencies get maxed out. They are not hiring the staff and serving the food. And they are not trying to... Read More »