Welltower to acquire Holiday Retirement’s Seniors Housing Portfolio for $1.58B
Welltower (WELL) announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire a portfolio of 86 seniors housing properties, including 80 nearly identical independent living and six combination independent living/assisted living properties, currently owned by Holiday Retirement.
Additionally, as announced on June 21, upon the closing date of this transaction, which is expected to be in the third quarter, Atria Senior Living will assume operations of the properties and retain Holiday’s in-place senior management and staff.
Through this landmark transaction, the 86-property portfolio will be acquired by Welltower for $1.58B, or $152,000 per unit, representing a discount to estimated replacement cost in excess of 30%.
The transaction is expected to be approximately 10c per diluted share accretive to Welltower’s normalized funds from operations during the first twelve months post-closing.
The portfolio is expected to deliver substantial net operating income growth in future quarters and in coming years as occupancy growth accelerates from near-trough levels of 76.3% as of June 20.
Portfolio occupancy has already increased over 2.7% since bottoming in March.
Additionally, the anticipated recovery in occupancy and Atria’s operational and technological expertise is expected to maximize community level performance and to generate meaningful expansion in operating margins going forward.
Welltower and Atria have agreed to a highly incentivized and strongly aligned enhanced RIDEA 3.0 management contract based on both top and bottom-line financial metrics. The contract will also include substantial promote opportunities to Atria upon achievement of certain long-term financial metrics.
The achievement of such hurdles would imply significant growth in underlying property level performance, resulting in a nominal yield in excess of 9% to Welltower and a net economic yield in excess of 8% to Welltower after capital expenditures and payment of the promote.
Atria expects to integrate Holiday’s corporate staff and retain its experienced and reputed management team, thereby de-risking the overall transaction.
Atria has significant experience with Holiday properties, having successfully assumed operations in recent years of two portfolios previously managed by Holiday: a 29-property portfolio across Canada in 2014 and, in April 2021, a 21-property portfolio owned by New Senior Investment Group Inc.
The portfolio is expected to benefit from Atria’s operating model and technology platform, which includes its proprietary Glennis software for staffing optimization, digital marketing, and CRM.
Atria’s digital marketing capabilities and front of house technology suite are also expected to reduce dependency on referral sources and increase organic lead generation.
Holiday’s management team expects that this significant investment in its platform and technology infrastructure will significantly enhance their ability to serve residents going forward.
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