• Interview with Bryan Lockard of JLL Value and Risk Advisory

    Ben Swett, Managing Editor of The SeniorCare Investor, sat down with Bryan Lockard of JLL Value and Risk Advisory to discuss JLL’s 2024 Seniors Housing and Care Investor Survey and Trends, which you can download here. Read More »
  • Wow…Sonida Senior Living

    The last company in our sector, Sonida Senior Living, finally reported fourth quarter and full-year 2023 earnings, and while pretty good, that was not even the story. The story started four weeks ago. In February, the company announced a series of capital transactions which reduced their debt, raised some equity, and provided liquidity to take... Read More »
  • Marcus & Millichap Arranges SNF Leases

    After purchasing four senior care campuses in a large portfolio deal, a seniors housing owner/operator turned to Marcus & Millichap to find new tenants for the skilled nursing portions of each newly acquired campus. Each building was losing close to $1 million annually and had struggled with occupancy and expenses.  While the portfolio... Read More »
  • LSS Absorbs Diakon

    Two large not-for-profits announced that they were combining to create the 12th largest not-for-profit senior living organization in the country. Lutheran Senior Services, based in St. Louis, Missouri, signed an agreement to bring Diakon Senior Living operations and four CCRCs under its umbrella. Both organizations were described by Adam Marles,... Read More »
  • SNF Under Receivership Is Acquired in Kansas

    Marcus & Millichap was brought on by a limited liability company in the sale of a skilled nursing facility in Topeka, Kansas, that was under receivership. The facility, Providence Living Center, comprises 78 beds across 24,000 square feet and focuses on senior residents with mental health needs. Rod Llanos and Colby Haugness handled the... Read More »
The Pennant Group Swinging For The Pennant

The Pennant Group Swinging For The Pennant

We don’t know what is in the water out west (well, yes, we do) that makes The Pennant Group and its former parent, The Ensign Group, so successful. As readers know, Ensign returned the federal CARES Act funds they had received and posted another good quarter. Taking in COVID patients at its nursing facilities, and the higher rates that come with that, certainly helped.   But the spin-off Pennant Group also had a solid quarter, when its seniors housing friends did not fare as well. But Pennant’s home health and hospice business performed quite well, as did most of that sector, benefitting from the desire to be treated at home when institutional care seemed a... Read More »
The Ensign Group Strikes Again

The Ensign Group Strikes Again

Ensign the Energizer Bunny, our pet name for several years now for one of two publicly traded companies that continue to make a GAAP profit, quarter after quarter, did it again. And they did it during what could have been a disruptive third quarter when they spun out their senior living operations and home health and hospice business into The Pennant Group. Obviously, it was not disruptive. To sum up some of the key numbers, there was a 33% year-over-year quarterly increase in income from operations, plus a 36% increase in net income to $27.8 million. This is after rent, depreciation and interest, or in other words, the real thing. And, net income per share increased by 25% year over year.... Read More »
The Pennant Group Debut

The Pennant Group Debut

The Pennant Group is The Ensign Group’s latest spin off. If history repeats itself, the new company will succeed. It has been three weeks since The Pennant Group was spun out of The Ensign Group as a separate publicly traded company. This is not Ensign’s first rodeo when it comes to successful spin outs. Five years ago, it spun out the majority of its real estate assets (and mostly skilled nursing) into CareTrust REIT, which has been among the leaders in shareholder return among healthcare-oriented REITs.  As Ensign grew its senior living and home health and hospice business, management decided that shareholders would benefit from higher valuation multiples if these assets were spun... Read More »
The Ensign Group Expands in South Texas with Senior Care Campus

The Ensign Group Expands in South Texas with Senior Care Campus

The Ensign Group may have just spun off its senior living assets into a new entity named The Pennant Group, but the firm can’t fully shake the seniors housing business, acquiring a senior care campus with 38 assisted living and 92 independent living units, along with 60 skilled nursing beds. Located in the town of Harlingen, the campus complements five other Ensign operations in south Texas, including another 82-bed skilled nursing facility in Harlingen that the company acquired from The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society in 2009. Ensign acquired both the operations and real estate in this transaction, bringing its portfolio to 198 skilled nursing operations, 27 of which also... Read More »
The Ensign Group to Split Up

The Ensign Group to Split Up

Talk about a surprise move. The Ensign Group announced that it will be spinning out its home health and hospice business and substantially all of its senior living operations, plus its mobile diagnostic and clinical lab operations, into a separate publicly traded company called The Pennant Group. Ensign will become a stand-alone skilled nursing company but will also continue to own the real estate of 28 of the senior living communities and lease them to Pennant. The remaining 23 senior living properties are leased from third parties. While it makes sense for Ensign to want to focus just on skilled nursing because the business is getting increasingly complex, we are not sure why they want... Read More »