Watermark Retirement Communities Archives

Senior living providers nationwide are feeling increased pressure from new competition, including where staffing is concerned. Providers, after all, want their communities to stand out as great places to work—especially ones that are better than newer communities across town.

As it turns out, the best candidates will not be won over by salaries or vacation time, however, but with an engaging and fulfilling workplace culture, according to senior living human resource executives.

“We’re purposely avoiding the nickel and dime war,” Mike Burkhart, director of human resources at Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark Retirement Communities, told Senior Housing News. “When it comes to salaries and benefits, another community will always be able to up you by a nickel. Instead, we’re focusing on creating our cultural definition of who we are within the market.”

Providing team members with support, recognition, training and growth opportunities are all a part of creating a strong culture. Equally important is giving employees the space to think on their own and contribute ideas that foster an environment of innovation, Mary (Roxy) Mast, director of sales training at Newton, Massachusetts-based Five Star Senior Living (Nasdaq: FVE), told SHN.

Creating this kind of culture within a senior living community attracts strong candidates, while also keeping staff satisfied and happy to stay. This can be encouraging news for senior housing operators worried about recruitment and retention in the face of growth and competition in the industry.

Attracting the Right Candidates

At Watermark Retirement Communities—which operates more than 40 senior living communities across the country—the response to a recent staffing crunch was to reevaluate its hiring process.

“We’ve certainly noticed increased competition when it comes to attracting the best candidates,” Burkhart said. “Internally and with consultants, we’ve been working on creating a new and enhanced recruiting approach. We’re focusing on culture, sharing our message in interviews and bringing on people who want to partner with us in our mission.”

Promoting culture is not just about attracting a large number of candidates; it’s about attracting the right candidates. That message needs to be at the forefront of all employee interviews so that hiring managers can make sure that the prospective hire will be a good match for the culture, Burkhart said. This is important to ensuring that the brand message is perpetuated; the culture only gets stronger if a provider hires people who adhere to it.

Plus, ensuring that new hires fit well with the company’s culture is a proactive retention measure, according to Burkhart. When the culture matches the candidate’s own values and goals, they are more likely to stay with the company.

The personal values that drive most job seekers do not have much to do with salaries and benefits, according to Mast. At Five Star Senior Living, which operates more than 260 independent living communities, memory care communities, skilled nursing facilities and continuing care retirement communities (CCRCs) across the country, these quantitative benefits are robust, but only valued to the extent that they reflect culture.

“Benefits help, but it’s not what keeps people around,” Mast said.

Many senior living communities put out marketing materials and cover their websites’ career pages with details on their positive workplace environments. This in itself is not enough, Burkhart said.

Over the past several months, Watermark has been consciously building relationships with universities, home care agencies, health care leaders and government personnel to tell them about Watermark’s culture and let them know that they are hiring. Job seekers do not often look at ads and decide to apply for a position, but they do trust recommendations from people they know or seek out, Burkhart said.

Securing High Tenures

Once strong candidates have been brought on to a senior housing community’s team, the next step is ensuring that they are happy and plan to stay. Often people are looking for a pathway to growth and if they don’t see it, they leave, said Mast.

Five Star’s “Rising Stars” executive-director-in-training program provides this path by giving internal candidates the opportunity to participate in a six-to-twelve month preceptorship with an executive director. After this time, they are placed in an open position. The program is also open to new, external candidates, so it can be used as a recruiting tool.

Recognition programs are another way to keep staff feeling appreciated and valued, which can go a long way in keeping them at the company. Five Star calls its recognition program “Way To Go,” and it gives residents and their family members the opportunity to fill out a form acknowledging a staff member who went above and beyond.

Continuing education and training programs are also a typical and useful method to help employees grow and feel fulfilled. However, not all of these programs should be geared towards preparing team members to work up to the executive level, according to Burkhart.

“Not everyone wants to be a manager or supervisor, but everyone wants to feel needed and included,” he said.

That is why Watermark University, an educational program for residents, is also open to staff. It gives them one more way to be involved in the community and even opens up opportunities for them to embrace their own talents, Burkhart said.

All of these positive initiatives are great ways to engage team members, but most senior housing executives will acknowledge that issues and concerns will still arise with staff despite their best efforts. The key to handling these issues—before a two-week notice is handed in—is listening and responding to employee feedback.

Watermark has been further developing its exit interview process to get better at resolving future issues, but in an effort to avoid those altogether, individual communities offer what they call “speakeasy meetings.” These take place when someone in a management position visits a community in another region. The manager meets with a group of associates, usually all from one department, such as food service, and asks how things can be improved. No names are taken, so staff lose any reservations they may have about voicing concerns. Burkhart calls these “conversations for opportunity” in which the manager is trained to respond openly and effectively.

All of these programs and initiatives to improve the employee experience build a supportive culture in which people work well together. To keep the positive momentum going, it all comes to hiring candidates that will uphold the community’s vision.

“All senior housing industry leaders develop effective, motivating employee programming, from mentorship programs to partnering programs,” Burkhart said. “The challenge is truly finding someone who believe in what you’re doing.”

Written by Elizabeth Jakaitis

Industry Update — 7/10/17

The post Why Staffing Battles Should Not Escalate to ‘Nickel and Dime Wars’ appeared first on Senior Housing News.

(Thrive Dining photo courtesy of Watermark Retirement Communities)

The way some memory care programs feed their residents is rapidly changing.

At many senior living communities, the standard mealtime practice for seniors with dementia is for caregivers to feed them things like chicken nuggets, fish sticks, french fries and purees. Those foods are easily identifiable and don’t require utensils to handle or eat, which makes them ideal for people with memory loss, the conventional wisdom goes. But chicken nuggets and french fries lack variety, nutritional value and flavor, and unintended weight loss and vitamin deficiencies are common industry problems.

But some big memory care providers like Watermark Retirement Communities, MorningStar Senior Living and Silverado are trying to change that. Those companies are spending a good deal of time and money on finding new ways to keep their residents with dementia and other cognitive impairments full and happy without serving them overly processed meals.

From finger foods to family-style dining, here are a few hot new dining trends that are popping up in memory care programs across the country.

Bite-sized balance

One of the largest pushes to overhaul memory care dining is happening at Watermark Retirement Communities. For months, the Tucson, Arizona-based company has worked to roll out Thrive Dining across its 39 communities. Thrive Dining is a food program based on Grind Dining, is a culinary program that made waves when it was debuted by two former food service professionals in 2014.

Turkey cutlet with Spanish rice / photo courtesy of Watermark Retirement Communities

The idea is simple: turn regular Watermark meals into one- and two-bite hors d’oeuvres that can be eaten by hand and on the go.

“The Thrive Dining meal is a complete, balanced meal in a finger-food form,” Rob Bobbitt, Watermark’s national director of dining services, told Senior Housing News.

A typical Thrive menu might include things like breakfast casserole with syrup and fresh fruit, chef salad bites with dipping sauce, or beef wellington turnovers with truffle mashed potatoes and vegetables julienne. Anything—even foods that would normally be tricky for memory care residents such as spaghetti and meatballs or beef brisket—can be turned into a Thrive menu item.

Watermark’s chefs start by grinding or chopping up regular dinner menu items in carefully measured proportions. They then spoon the ground-up food into rice paper wrappers, crepe shells or mini pastry cups and plate them with colorful vegetables or other edible garnishes.

Though the end result may resemble an appetizer platter, it still contains the flavor and nutritional value of a normal Watermark meal.

“The beauty of this program is we’re taking our fresh food that we’re providing daily [in other parts of the community] and giving access to our memory care residents,” Bobbitt says.

And the program isn’t limited to people with Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia. Seniors with Parkinson’s disease, who have had strokes or suffer from injuries also can benefit from Thrive Dining, Bobbitt says.

Watermark aims to have the program in all of its communities by the end of the year.

Photo courtesy of MorningStar

Denver-based MorningStar, which runs 20 communities in Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Nevada and Oregon, also serves regular menu items in easy-to-eat finger food form. Like Watermark, MorningStar’s chefs take regular ingredients and encapsulate them in puff pastries, egg roll wrappers and turnovers.

Another preparation technique MorningStar utilizes involves soft, pureed food mixed and molded to resemble its pre-blended form. For instance, a chef might serve something that looks like blueberry french toast, but is actually a french toast puree that’s been shaped and molded with binding agents.

“It’s all about making it less confusing for the resident,” Michael DeGiovanni, vice president of culinary operations at MorningStar tells SHN.

Mealtime can help memory

One thing many seniors with cognitive impairments don’t get to partake in often are family-style meals, where warm food and conversation are shared among loved ones. That’s why MorningStar is working to debut a new family-style, memory care-focused dining program.

Photo courtesy of MorningStar Senior Living

Roughly once every other week, participating MorningStar communities invite memory care residents and their families to a sit-down breakfast, lunch or dinner with a tablecloth, platters of food and multiple entree, side dish and drink options.

The general idea is to get residents back into a familiar environment that might help them rekindle old memories, DeGiovanni explains.

“Folks who have brain diseases… may not remember something that happened this morning, but something that happened 20 years ago might be fresh on their mind,” he says. “If they have family members around them and they start talking about how they used to have Sunday dinner, those memories start coming back.”

Watermark also takes extra steps to make sure its memory care residents are active during mealtime. The operator starts all of its meals with warm towels scented with lemon, lime or herbal aromas. Though the warm, slightly damp towels help clean residents’ fingers, they also get them thinking about food.

“[The towels] help engage the resident’s sense of touch and smell,” Bobbitt says. “That really helps set the stage for a better dining experience for our residents.”

Then, caregivers offer residents a scoop of citrus sorbet that’s meant to reinforce the idea that it’s time to eat.

“There’s science behind this that eating a citrus-based sorbet will help activiate the appetite and the salivary glands,” he adds. “That’s your body’s cue to eating.”

Nutrition and normalization

Photo courtesy of Silverado

Irvine, California-based Silverado, which runs 36 memory care communities in seven states, recently revised its menu to more closely resemble something called the “MIND Diet.”

The diet, which includes nutritious foods like green leafy vegetables, berries, beans, whole grains, fish, poultry and olive oil, may help reduce the risk of dementia and increase overall health and wellness. Though it’s still unclear if the diet can benefit people who already have Alzheimer’s or other kinds of dementia, it was associated with slower cognitive decline in a 2015 study published in the academic journal “Alzheimer’s and Dementia.”

The goal of the menu is to prolong residents’ cognitive abilities, Nick Giampietro, Silverado’s vice president of culinary services, tells SHN.

Furthermore, Silverado’s chefs take extra care to prepare those beneficial foods in a healthful way.

“A lot of our items are baked in the oven,” Giampietro says. “Our meats are raw and then we prepare them… they’re not frozen, prepared or full of sodium.”

Unlike MorningStar and Watermark, though, Silverado doesn’t serve its food in bite-sized or portable portions. And Silverado’s staffers set tables with nice ceramic plates, glassware, flatware, linen cloths and flowers.

“We really feel it’s about that normalization process of giving them the tools and utensils that they grew up with and they used in their life,” Giampietro says. “Even though a resident has a memory-impairing disease, we want to treat them the same as anybody else.”

Interested in the latest dining trends in senior living? Senior Housing News is partnering with top operators and chefs to create the future of dining. Find out more at our upcoming Dished event.

Written by Tim Regan

The post Dished: Hot New Trends in Memory Care Dining appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Ask any two people in the senior living industry where they’d like to grow old and you’re likely to hear two wildly different answers.

After all, there’s a lot of interesting—and downright luxurious—choices available to seniors these days, from providers that offer dinner with wine pairings and state-of-the-art movie screening rooms to communities that have fully equipped fitness studios, indoor or heated pools and services like on-site pet grooming.

To find out what might come next, we asked executives from Solera Senior Living, Watermark Retirement Communities, Juniper Communities and Maplewood Senior Living to imagine their own personal dream communities.

Here’s what they told us:

“My dream community would include an award winning resort-style spa, a wine cellar and a sommelier on staff, a cafe serving specialty teas and coffees, multiple restaurant venues (including an Italian restaurant with homemade pastas and a sushi bar) run by local acclaimed chefs, a pastry chef on staff for homemade breads and desserts, a golf simulator, an comfortable sports bar, a game room for the grandkids, a staff that is well trained in customer service and it would be located with views of the mountains and within close proximity to cultural and entertainment hubs.” — Adam Kaplan, Founder and CEO of Solera Senior Living

“After 30 years in the profession, Watermark actually had the unique opportunity to bring our ‘dream’ community to life – The Hacienda at the River. With pioneering innovations including ‘In the Presence of Horses’ equine therapy, collaborations with Healing Kitchens, the University of Arizona College of Integrative Nursing and other partners, we are seeing what once was only a dream, come to life. Going forward, we see an ever expanding use of technology in how we train, connect, learn and grow as communities and as a management company.” — David Barnes, President and CEO of Watermark Retirement Communities

“I’m thinking about compounds. Not chemical compounds, however. I really was lousy at the periodic tables. The compound I am thinking about will have 1,500-foot small houses. Most of the living space will be on a single floor. I imagine it might include a small loft either to be used as a workspace or for younger guests. What’s interesting about the compound is that all of the small houses will be connected via either a common back porch or a common front porch. Visiting but still maintaining privacy is key. What makes these compounds interesting, however, is that the people who live in them only live in their homes for somewhere between three and four months. Then they move to another compound in another part of the country.

The compounds I would choose must have a view of water and be somewhat near a town so that I can so have coffee, read the paper or just hang out at a local place with other people, preferably some who don’t live in our compound. Each of the compounds will have common space where a kitchen can serve meals and where we all can be together. Preferably, there will also be a bar. For me, I prefer a wine bar! Some of my fondest memories are from sitting around a cafeteria in graduate school drinking anything from tea to wine and talking about every subject imaginable into the wee hours of the night. I see no reason this can’t happen in one of our compounds. In fact, I’d be surprised if it didn’t.

The compound could function something like cohousing but with an easier financial and governance structure. My hope Is that there will be at least 20 smaller homes in each of the compounds. Each of the homes will be universally designed so they look like a home you would choose to live in now but actually have tech and accessible features. Design is really important to me and attention to detail is key.

But maybe it is more about chemistry. You see what I’m concerned about is the relationships I can build, maintain and share.” — Lynne Katzmann, President and CEO of Juniper Communities

“My ultimate aging environment is where people are able to live with the upmost dignity, enjoying their lifestyle by living the life they wish—and deserve—to live. An environment where there are no obstacles. Where one can enjoy nature, art, natural light. Aging is not an illness. It should not be seen as such. Age should be respected and embraced, no matter one’s limitations. A fine dining experience – using the very freshest ingredients possible—should be able to be enjoyed, no matter what ‘age,’ or physical and cognitive limitation. Operations should never be an obstacle. The best experience for the resident is not necessarily the easiest—or most efficient—to deliver. However, it should be the very best.” — Greg Smith, President and CEO of Maplewood Senior Living

Written by Tim Regan

The post Senior Living CEOs Describe Their Dream Communities appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Capital One Provides Loans Totaling $551 Million to Kayne Anderson

Bethesda, Maryland-based Capital One has provided two loans—a $251 million bridge loan and a $300 million Freddie Mac seniors housing revolving credit facility—to Kayne Anderson Real Estate Advisors (KAREA) for its purchase of Orlando-based Sentio Healthcare Properties, a public, non-traded real estate investment trust (REIT).

KAREA is part of Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors, a private equity real estate investment firm with $30 billion in assets under management, specializing in seniors housing, medical office, student housing and self-storage.

KAREA has invested in 73 private-pay senior living properties since September 2013, spanning a total of 10,000 communities and representing more than $2.6 billion in transaction value.

CBRE Capital Markets Arranges Construction Financing for Belmont Village Lincoln Park

Los Angeles-based CBRE Capital Markets has arranged a construction financing loan on behalf of the joint venture between Houston-based senior living provider Belmont Village Senior Living and Chicago-based real estate private equity firm Harrison Street Real Estate Capital LLC for Belmont Village Lincoln Park.

CBRE secured a non-recourse, four-year floating rate loan from a national bank. Vice Chairman of CBRE National Senior Housing Aron will arranged the loan.

Belmont Village Lincoln Park will be a Class-A, 149-unit assisted living and memory care community associated with the redevelopment of the Children’s Memorial Hospital in Lincoln Park. Upon completion, the property will be operated by Belmont Village.

BMO Harris Acts as Sole Lender of Construction Lending Facility for Belmont Village, Harrison Street Real Estate Capital

Chicago-based BMO Harris Healthcare Real Estate Finance group has closed a construction and mini-permanent financing for Belmont Village Senior Living for Belmont Village Lincoln Park.

KeyBank Provides $28.5 Million Mortgage Loan for Pennsylvania Senior Housing Community

KeyBank Real Estate Capital has arranged a $28.5 million Freddie Mac floating rate mortgage loan for Paoli, Pennsylvania-based Daylesford Crossing, a senior living community operated by Springfield, Pennsylvania-based Sage Senior Living.

The Class-A senior housing community is located 16 miles northwest of Philadelphia and was built in 2015. The community totals 78 units: 64 assisted living and 14 memory care.

Carolyn Nazdin of KeyBank’s Healthcare Group arranged the financing, with a seven-year term, three-year interest only period and 30-year amortization schedule.

The permanent loan refinanced an existing KeyBank construction loan arranged in 2014 by Grant Saunders of KeyBank’s Tampa, Florida office.

KeyBank is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio.

HJ Sims Provides $3.8 Million to Finance Arizona Senior Housing Community

Fairfield, Connecticut-based HJ Sims has completed a $3.8 million equity financing for The Watermark at Continental Ranch, a soon-to-be-built 99-unit assisted living and memory care community in Marana, Arizona.

HJ Sims financed the development of Watermark, which will be owned and developed by a joint venture (JV) between affiliates of Link Development, LLC and Tuscon, Arizona-based Watermark Retirement Communities, LLC, which will also operate Continental Ranch.

Watermark Retirement Communities is a privately owned company operating assisted living, memory care, life care communities and CCRCs across 20 states.

Sims structured a preferred equity investment that was classified as contributed capital on behalf of the JV owners, fulfilling regulatory requirements for the senior construction lender. The investment was structured with a capped all-in return to the preferred equity holders.

A new entity, LW Development Funding I, LLC, was formed to issue $3.8 million of taxable bonds. The bonds were successfully sold to Sims’ high net worth accredited investors. The proceeds from the bonds were used by LW Development Funding I, LLC to fund the preferred equity investment to the JV owners.

Hunt Mortgage Group Provides $3.1 Million FHA/HUD Loan Facility to Georgia Assisted Living Community

Commercial real estate firm Hunt Mortgage Group has provided a $3.1 million FHA/HUD loan facility to refinance Country Gardens in Union City, Georgia.

Country Gardens is operated by Senior Solutions Management Group, a Suwanee, Georgia-based senior care provider offering assisted living, memory care, independent living, residential and home care across Tennessee, Georgia and South Carolina.

Country Gardens is a 50-bed assisted living community with memory care services. The property spans 26,731 square feet in two stories. There are nine units consisting of 12 beds located in the secured memory-care portion of the community; the remaining 31 units, consisting of 37 beds, are located on the first and second floor of the north wing, and the second floor of the western wing.

Written by Carlo Calma

The post Senior Housing Finance Activity: Capital One’s $551 Million Loan to KAREA appeared first on Senior Housing News.

This coverage of the 2017 National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care Spring Investment Forum is brought to you by Mainstreet. As the nation’s largest developer of transitional care properties, Mainstreet specializes in real estate development, value investments and health care. With Mainstreet’s support, SHN is bringing event coverage of the NIC conference, which draws developers, providers and operators within the post-acute and preventative health care services space.

After entering the senior housing space about three years ago, Oppidan Investment Company is going big, with a $400 million development pipeline in the works and partnerships with well-established operators.

Founded in 1991, Oppidan built its reputation largely as a developer of retail properties; it now has completed more than 400 projects valued at more than $2.7 billion. The company seized an opportunity that came its way in 2014 to develop a senior housing community in the community of Woodbury, close to Oppidan’s headquarters in the Twin Cities suburb of Excelsior, Minnesota.

That project—dubbed Red Rock Senior Living—moved quickly, going from groundbreaking in 2014 to being open and fully leased up in 2016, Oppidan Vice President of Development Shannon Rusk told Senior Housing News last week at the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care (NIC) Spring Investment Forum in San Diego.

Though not intending to sell the property, Oppidan again took advantage of an opportunity that came its way, Rusk said. Toledo, Ohio-based real estate investment trust (REIT) Welltower Inc. (NYSE: HCN) bought the property for an undisclosed price, Oppidan announced earlier this month. The 77-unit building includes 39 high-end independent living and assisted living apartments, 32 for memory care, and six suites. It is operated by Ebenezer Management Services, the senior housing arm of Minneapolis-based Fairview Health Services.

However, the sale of Red Rock did not mark the end of Oppidan’s involvement in the senior housing space. Currently, the company has an estimated 1,100 units either open or under construction. There are four active projects in Minnesota and one in Napa, California. The total development pipeline represents a $400 million investment, Rusk estimated.

This week, a new community in the Twin Cities suburb of White Bear Lake is scheduled to open its doors. The other Minnesota developments are located in the city of Mankato, the Twin Cities suburb of Shorewood, and near the University of Minnesota in the Minneapolis neighborhood of Prospect Park. The Prospect Park community is slated to be the largest, at nearly 300 units, with university partnerships in the works for programming. Ebenezer is the operating partner for all of these projects.

Even as it becomes a major presence in the Land of 10,000 Lakes, Oppidan is eyeing coastal markets, according to Rusk. And it already is in the process of obtaining permits for a community in Napa, California, to be operated by Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark Retirement Communities.

The Oppidan Model

With concerns about senior housing oversupply circulating, Oppidan is highly disciplined and empirical in its market selection, Rusk emphasized.

“We spend an inordinate amount of time on the pro forma,” she said. “We’ve selected locations and sites with supply and demand that’s going to make sense, and we’ve passed on many. We listen. We’ve got a few third-party market study companies we work with … and we look to our operator to make sure we’re not suggesting rents that just make a pro forma look good.”

Oppidan’s first foray into senior housing, with the Woodbury project, initially involved an operator relationship that did not work out. The relationship with Ebenezer began through a request for proposals that Oppidan issued, Rusk said. Similarly, the Watermark relationship began through an RFP.

“I’m not sure if we just got lucky. Half of this is luck,” Rusk said of connecting with these operators. “They’re great. I think we’ve got the best of the best, and that’s probably more important than having a good location.”

Oppidan developments are amenity-forward, with the goal of creating an active lifestyle vibe rather than a clinical one, although the health care piece is present in the background. Independent living and assisted living units are fully interchangeable, with the only difference being that the level of services provided is higher in AL.

One benefit of this arrangement is that residents do not feel like they have to re-locate to a different class of unit as their needs increase, Rusk said. It also allows the property to respond nimbly to market demands.

“We plan per pro forma that there will be this many independent living and this many assisted living units, but if you have 50 IL units and 50 AL and on day one you get 100 IL [customers], we can move them all in,” Rusk said.

So far, Oppidan itself has provided all the equity and financing for its senior housing developments, but it is open to other partners as lead volume in this space grows. And the company expects to keep expanding its senior housing portfolio, given the favorable demographics.

“There hasn’t been day-one for the baby boomers moving into senior housing yet, so it’s going to be here for a long time, but you’ve got to be smart,” Rusk said.

Written by Tim Mullaney

The post Retail Developer Oppidan Pursues $400 Million Senior Housing Pipeline appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Imagine, for a moment, a group of senior living residents riding their own horses daily via an on-site stable and on-staff trainers.

That may soon be a common sight at the Hacienda at the River, a new assisted living, memory care, skilled nursing and rehabilitation community operated by Watermark Retirement Communities in Tucson, Arizona.

Tucson-based Watermark currently owns and manages 40 senior living communities across the country, and it plans to add another nine in the next two months. Throughout the years, Watermark President and CEO David Barnes and Chairman David Freshwater have had plenty of ideas for how to make the senior living sector more innovative—like equine therapy—but they haven’t had the chance to implement all of the concepts into their existing properties.

Happily, The Hacienda at the River, which opened to residents this spring, represents the “maiden voyage” for a variety of the ideas Barnes and Freshwater have been bouncing around for some time, they told Senior Housing News.

“We don’t know how successful [the ideas will] be,” Freshwater admitted.

So far, however, the combination of equine therapy and data-centric research at The Hacienda has managed to intrigue both academics and residents alike.

Horse therapy in ‘Old Tucson’

Due to The Hacienda’s unique “Old Tucson” feel, having residents’ horses actually live on the community’s campus was almost a no-brainer, Freshwater told SHN.

The land on which Hacienda was built “has traditionally been equestrian,” Freshwater added, noting that it has been a dude ranch and home to riding stables in the past.

“My wife trained horses on this site,” he commented.

Barnes and Freshwater had also read a couple of articles on how interaction between humans and animals—specifically, interactions between older humans and horses—had positive effects on the humans. They realized that Tucson was home to many horse therapy programs, but they were mostly for children.

So, Barnes and Freshwater brought Barbara Rector, an equine therapy pioneer who works at the University of Arizona, on board to create the “In the Presence of Horses” program at The Hacienda.

Now, Rector leads therapeutic equine programs at on-site stables where residents touch, brush, groom and ride their own horses, or horses owned by Watermark. The programs are meant to help promote residents’ physical and emotional well-being, and Rector believes The Hacienda at the River is the only senior living community in the country to offer these equine therapy programs on-site, according to a Watermark press release.

To start, the equine therapy program will be available to assisted living and memory care residents, but Barnes and Freshwater hope it will eventually be opened up to patients in rehab.

‘Real results with real data’

The Hacienda’s innovation doesn’t stop at equine therapy.

Among other forward-thinking ideas, the University of Arizona’s McKnight Brain Institute has a designated space at The Hacienda that it will use as a cognitive assessment center, Freshwater explained. There, both Hacienda residents and the public can receive cognitive assessments, which the University of Arizona can incorporate into future longitudinal studies.

“Longitudinal studies are very, very difficult for universities to do,” Freshwater said. “We’ll help them with that.”

Eventually, studies conducted at Watermark will produce “real results with real data” that Watermark would be happy to share with the rest of the senior housing industry, Barnes said.

The hope, ultimately, is that The Hacienda will pioneer concepts that could “become a part of every community in America, not just Watermark’s,” Freshwater added.

Written by Mary Kate Nelson

The post Why Some of Watermark Retirement’s Newest Residents are Horses appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Happy Monday!

Hopefully your weekend was as exciting or as relaxing as you’d intended. Before this week gets too busy, be sure to catch up on last week’s most-read stories on Senior Housing News:

Gardant Management Solutions CEO Rod Burkett flies Southwest Airlines a lot—and he looks to the company for inspiration in running his senior housing business.

HCR ManorCare’s financial situation has so deteriorated, with recurring losses and negative working capital, that auditors have “substantial doubt” over whether the company can continue to operate as a going concern.

AdCare Health Systems (NYSE MKT: ADK) fired Chairman and CEO William McBride III for intentionally misrepresenting his educational background. McBride had claimed he received an MBA from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), which is not true.

Some of the residents at Watermark Retirement Communities’ newest community in Tucson, Arizona, will be horses.

Kindred Healthcare (NYSE: KND) would reportedly be “willing to engage” in a complete buyout “if a buyer is willing to pay a significant premium.”

Also in the News

Remembering the World’s Oldest Person, in the Objects She Left Behind—The world’s oldest person, Emma Morano, passed away on April 15 at 117 years old. In this article, The New York Times takes a look at the “few worldly possessions she left behind,” which included a drugstore brand anti-aging cream that she applied every night before bed and the pot she used to cook until she was 112—usually “pasta to which she added raw ground beef.”

Love & Company Named ‘Premier Google Partner’

Senior living marketing firm Love & Company was recently named a “Premier Google Partner,” according to a press release.

To qualify, Love & Company’s digital staff were tested on their knowledge of Google search advertising, and they met Google’s standards of campaign performance.

“The digital landscape is constantly changing and you have to make sure that you’re not only aware of the latest trends, but that you also know how to successfully implement these trends within your campaigns,” Love & Company Media Manager Hayley Gurtler said. “We have a responsibility to our clients to be experts at what we do, and by capitalizing on training provided by the leader of the industry, it ultimately allows us to enhance our clients’ results.”

Written by Mary Kate Nelson

The post Monday Jump-Start: AdCare Fires CEO, Kindred Buyout Rumors appeared first on Senior Housing News.

HCP Names New Senior Vice President and Chief Accounting Officer

California-based real estate investment trust (REIT) HCP (NYSE: HCP) named Shawn Johnston to the role of vice president and chief accounting officer, the company announced. Johnston starts his new job on Aug. 15.

Johnston is replacing HCP’s current Chief Accounting Officer, Scott Anderson, who is leaving the company “to pursue other career opportunities,” the announcement reads.

Before joining HCP, Johnston worked as Chief Accounting Officer of UDR, Inc., a multifamily REIT.

Sabra Health Care REIT Hires Executive Vice President

Senior housing owner Sabra Health Care REIT (Nasdaq: SBRA) has hired Brent Chappell as an executive vice president of portfolio management.

Chappell now oversees Sabra’s portfolio of health care properties in the U.S. and Canada, according to a press release.

Chappell came to Sabra with 30 years of experience in real estate portfolio management, finance and health care. He most recently worked with LTC Properties in the role of senior vice president of investment and portfolio management.

MBK Real Estate Appoints New Chairman of the Board

MBK Real Estate (MRE), the parent company of MBK Senior Living, appointed Katsuo “Katsu” Yamanaka as its next Chairman of the Board, the company announced.

Yamanaka, who joined MRE’s parent company, Mitsui & Co. Ltd., in 1989, is now responsible for the overall management of MRE. In his new role, he will also oversee the development and execution of the company’s fiscal strategies and direct MRE’s subsidiaries.

Newmark Knight Frank Picks Up Senior Housing Investment Experts

Global real estate service firm Newman Knight Frank is bolstering its senior housing investment business with the addition of two new directors.

The firm recently added Rob Black and Sean McNee as senior managing directors. The two hires are “recognized as national investment sales leaders within the senior housing and care industry,” the company said in a press release.

The Goodman Group Names Director of Operational Development

The Goodman Group has promoted employee Bill Howell to the role of director of operational development within its architectural and interior design services company, JBG Design & Development, according to a press release.

Howell will oversee Goodman’s forthcoming $70 million senior living campus in Stillwater, Minnesota. The campus is scheduled to open in late 2018.

COO of LifeSpire of Virginia to Retire

The chief operating officer of LifeSpire of Virginia, a company that manages four continuing care retirement communities (CCRCs) throughout the state, is retiring after 34 years in the senior living industry.

COO Mick Feauto will retire from the company on Dec. 31, a press release reads. Feauto joined LifeSpire in 2015. Before that, he oversaw 28 CCRCs with Life Care Services.

Houston Community Gets New Executive Director

A Senior Quality Lifestyles Corporation community in Houston has a new head honcho.

Darrell Sheaffer has been appointed to the role of executive director of The Buckingham, according to a press release. Sheaffer is tasked with managing the day-to-day activities of the community.

Sheaffer comes to The Buckingham with a background in managing luxury hotels and resorts and over 35 years of experience in the hospitality industry.

Legacy Appoints Executive Director at Texas Community

Legacy Senior Communities has announced the appointment of Laura Levy as the new executive director of The Legacy Willow Bend, a life care retirement community in Plano, Texas.

Levy began working at The Legacy Willow Bend as director of assisted living nearly five years ago, the company said.

New Executive Director Takes the Reins at Watermark Community in New Jersey

Woodbury Mews, a Watermark Retirement Communities property in Woodbury, New Jersey, has promoted Annette Simmons as its new executive director, the company has announced.

Simmons previously served as the community’s resident care director and most recently as interim executive director. She has 28 years of nursing experience.

Erickson Living Community in Pennsylvania Gets New Associate Executive Director

Ann’s Choice, a senior living community developed and managed by Erickson Living in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, has promoted Melinda Dechert to the role of associate executive director.

Dechert, who officially starts her new job on Sept. 1, has served as Director of Continuing Care at Ann’s Choice since last June.

Van Dyk Health Care Bolsters Clinical Care With Two Hires

New Jersey-based provider Van Dyk Health Care has appointed Virginia Conrad to the role of vice president of clinical and quality care and Liliya Serada to post-acute care navigator, according to a press release.

The hirings are meant to enhance the company’s clinical capabilities and help provide more personalized care, the company said.

Conrad, who has more than 30 years of nursing experience, will evaluate clinical practices and patient outcomes at the company’s two skilled nursing and post-acute care facilities in Ridgewood and Montclair, New Jersey. Serada will work at Van Dyk Health Care at the Ridgewood location, following patients closely throughout their stay and developing discharge plans to keep them in their own homes.

Dallas Community Names New Sales Counselor

Highland Springs, the Erickson Living retirement community in Dallas, Texas, announced the hiring of Terese Mugno as sales counselor.

In her new role, Mugno will assist members and prospective residents to select a residence of their choice, review financial considerations and make a seamless move to Highland Springs. She will also lend her expertise on the senior living industry and the local real estate market in Dallas, Erickson said.

Senior Living Design Firm Promotes Interior Designer to Director Role

Thoma-Holec Design, LLC, an interior design firm with a focus on senior living, promoted Keith Stanton to the job of director of design development. Stanton currently serves as senior interior designer, the company said.

In his new role, Stanton will be responsible for design direction of interior spaces, budgeting, and decisions regarding safety and welfare of senior living residents.

Written by Tim Regan

The post Movers & Shakers: HCP, Sabra Name New Executives appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Attracting the Right Candidates

At Watermark Retirement Communities—which operates more than 40 senior living communities across the country—the response to a recent staffing crunch was to reevaluate its hiring process.

“Benefits help, but it’s not what keeps people around,” Mast said.

Many senior living communities put out marketing materials and cover their websites’ career pages with details on their positive workplace environments. This in itself is not enough, Burkhart said.

Securing High Tenures

“Not everyone wants to be a manager or supervisor, but everyone wants to feel needed and included,” he said.

Written by Elizabeth Jakaitis

Industry Update — 7/10/17

The post Why Staffing Battles Should Not Escalate to ‘Nickel and Dime Wars’ appeared first on Senior Housing News.

(Thrive Dining photo courtesy of Watermark Retirement Communities)

The way some memory care programs feed their residents is rapidly changing.

From finger foods to family-style dining, here are a few hot new dining trends that are popping up in memory care programs across the country.

Bite-sized balance

Turkey cutlet with Spanish rice / photo courtesy of Watermark Retirement Communities

The idea is simple: turn regular Watermark meals into one- and two-bite hors d’oeuvres that can be eaten by hand and on the go.

“The Thrive Dining meal is a complete, balanced meal in a finger-food form,” Rob Bobbitt, Watermark’s national director of dining services, told Senior Housing News.

Though the end result may resemble an appetizer platter, it still contains the flavor and nutritional value of a normal Watermark meal.

“The beauty of this program is we’re taking our fresh food that we’re providing daily [in other parts of the community] and giving access to our memory care residents,” Bobbitt says.

Watermark aims to have the program in all of its communities by the end of the year.

Photo courtesy of MorningStar

“It’s all about making it less confusing for the resident,” Michael DeGiovanni, vice president of culinary operations at MorningStar tells SHN.

Mealtime can help memory

Photo courtesy of MorningStar Senior Living

The general idea is to get residents back into a familiar environment that might help them rekindle old memories, DeGiovanni explains.

“[The towels] help engage the resident’s sense of touch and smell,” Bobbitt says. “That really helps set the stage for a better dining experience for our residents.”

Then, caregivers offer residents a scoop of citrus sorbet that’s meant to reinforce the idea that it’s time to eat.

“There’s science behind this that eating a citrus-based sorbet will help activiate the appetite and the salivary glands,” he adds. “That’s your body’s cue to eating.”

Nutrition and normalization

Photo courtesy of Silverado

Irvine, California-based Silverado, which runs 36 memory care communities in seven states, recently revised its menu to more closely resemble something called the “MIND Diet.”

The goal of the menu is to prolong residents’ cognitive abilities, Nick Giampietro, Silverado’s vice president of culinary services, tells SHN.

Furthermore, Silverado’s chefs take extra care to prepare those beneficial foods in a healthful way.

“A lot of our items are baked in the oven,” Giampietro says. “Our meats are raw and then we prepare them… they’re not frozen, prepared or full of sodium.”

Interested in the latest dining trends in senior living? Senior Housing News is partnering with top operators and chefs to create the future of dining. Find out more at our upcoming Dished event.

Written by Tim Regan

The post Dished: Hot New Trends in Memory Care Dining appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Private equity investor Kayne Anderson Real Estate Advisors (KAREA) is partnering with Watermark Retirement Communities to bring more upscale senior housing to New York City.

KAREA has acquired a historic 16-story building (pictured above) in Brooklyn Heights formerly owned by the Jehovah’s Witnesses, which it will redevelop into private-pay senior living and place under the operational management of Watermark, the companies announced Wednesday.

Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark operated 40 properties and was the 15th-largest senior living operator in the nation last year, according to recent rankings from the American Seniors Housing Association (ASHA). It currently manages two communities in New York state, in the towns of Millbrook and Tuckahoe.

While KAREA did not publicly disclose the purchase price, The Wall Street Journal reported that it was about $200 million and that $100 million is the planned budget for revamping the tower for seniors.

This is the third high-profile senior living project underway in New York City.

Toledo, Ohio-based real estate investment trust Welltower (NYSE: HCN) and McLean, Virginia-based operator Sunrise Senior Living have partnered on a 15-story assisted living and memory care building, while Hunt Valley, Maryland-based REIT Omega Healthcare Investors (NYSE: OHI) is working with Westport, Connecticut-based operator Maplewood Senior Living on a 23-story independent living, assisted living and memory care building. Both of those projects are in Manhattan.

The Sunrise and Maplewood communities are expected to command rents as high as $20,000, and they are banking on pent-up demand due to very little private-pay senior living in NYC.

KAREA noted this lack of supply as well.

“This acquisition will enable KAREA to create value by delivering seniors housing to this incredibly supply-constrained market,” KAREA Managing Partner and CEO Al Rabil said in a press release.

While supply-demand dynamics in New York City are especially stark, other large metros across the country also are hot locations for senior living development, as urban centers attract aging adults.

The KAREA/Watermark building, which was a hotel when it opened in 1928, will be dubbed The Watermark at Brooklyn Heights. Currently, the structure has 310,000 square feet and 295 residential units, as well as a commercial kitchen, large dining rooms, a library and a 20,000 square foot rooftop terrace. After the redevelopment, it will include 75,000 square feet of amenity space, according to KAREA.

“We are honored to partner with Kayne Anderson on another significant landmark project,” stated Watermark President and CEO David Barnes. “Watermark is excited about the opportunity to share our experiences and lessons learned over the past 30 years and to continue to learn from our future residents and associates in the culturally rich, historic Brooklyn Heights neighborhood.”

Written by Tim Mullaney

The post Watermark, KAREA to Create Senior Housing Highrise in Brooklyn appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Senior housing providers on the whole may be far too reluctant to let bad employees go, and this could be just as detrimental as the plethora of other staffing challenges they’re facing.

That’s according to Paul Gross, the founder and owner of Ohio-based assisted living and memory care provider Blue Bird Retirement. Blue Bird currently operates two senior living communities in the Buckeye State.

“Because we have a staffing challenge, we take too long to fire,” Gross explained last week at PointClickCare’s 2017 SUMMIT in Orlando, Florida.

“People say, ‘Oh my god, I can’t fire so-and-so because I don’t have anybody [to replace them]—but that [line of thinking] contaminates the whole workforce,” he said.

One rotten apple can spoil the bunch, in part by preventing the best workers from having maximum impact.

“We’ve all seen that our best and our worst employees inside our buildings are constantly competing to influence all the other employees,” he said.

Now Gross is determined to always let unqualified or incompatible employees go, even when there isn’t a clear replacement lined up.

Still, this approach hasn’t been widely adopted by other senior housing providers—and for potentially good reason, as other panelists at the SUMMIT explained.

Don’t jump the gun

Firing shouldn’t always be the first course of action when dealing with an employee who isn’t meeting expectations, Heidi Elliott, vice president of operations at Edina, Minnesota-based Welcov Healthcare, argued. Welcov currently has more than 50 locations throughout Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Montana, South Dakota and Wyoming.

First, she said, administrators should determine why an employee isn’t performing at acceptable levels.

One of Welcov’s employees, for instance, hadn’t shown up to work for three days, and that employee’s manager called Elliott to say it was time the employee was fired. Instead, Elliott told the manager to find out why that employee hadn’t been coming to work.

As it turns out, the worker was in a domestic abuse situation, and she was embarrassed to share that information. Once she did, though, Welcov was able to present her with various resources to get help, and she started coming to work again.

“She is one of our most loyal employees today,” Elliott said.

All of this isn’t to say senior living frontline staff should never be fired, however. Some turnover is actually good for senior housing communities, Gross argued.

“We talk about a real high turnover ratio,” he said. “Well, you don’t want zero.”

The tambourine man

Better engaging frontline staff is a great way to protect against them leaving of their own accord, which is another staffing issue that routinely plagues senior housing providers, according to panelist Chris Casteel, managing director of health care operations at Watermark Retirement Communities. Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark currently operates 51 senior housing communities in 20 states.

That’s why Watermark decided to open its Watermark University programming up to staff, in addition to residents, Casteel said at SUMMIT.

“Watermark University [presents] an opportunity for residents to showcase their passions with other residents,” Casteel explained.

Through the program, residents teach their peers new skills and information in various “courses” throughout the year.

More recently, Watermark opened Watermark University up to frontline staff and other associates.

“We have housekeepers teaching [residents] conversational Chinese, conversational Portuguese,” Casteel said. There’s a maintenance worker in one of Watermark’s communities who, after teaching music courses, is now known among residents as “Dan the Tambourine Man.”

Watermark believes that its direct inclusion of staff in resident programming helps administrators develop better relationships with their subordinates and gives greater variety and meaning to employees’ day-to-day grind.

Plus, it benefits residents, too.

“In order for our residents to thrive, our staff has to thrive,” Casteel said.

Written by Mary Kate Nelson

The post Staffing Crisis Keeps Bad Employees in Senior Living Too Long appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Head north on Halsted Street in Chicago’s Boystown neighborhood—just one block of Wrigley Field—and you’ll see it: a modern, multi-unit residence decked in green and blue hues. No, this isn’t a new condominium for the city’s young, urban professionals, but rather an affordable housing unit that has become a haven for the city’s low-income older lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) residents.

Established in 2014, the Town Hall Apartments is a 79-unit, independent affordable housing owned and operated by Center on Halsted (CoH), an LGBT community center in Chicago, as well as Heartland Alliance, a Chicago-based non-profit whose work fights against homelessness and poverty.

Since opening three years ago, the community has been at full occupancy and its waitlist has closed. This apparent high demand really speaks to the need for this type of housing for the city’s older LGBT population—which currently has a census of approximately 40,000, according to Britta Larson, director of senior services at CoH.

“Realistically, we’ll never be able to build enough ‘Town Hall Apartments,’” Larson told Senior Housing News. “At the end of the day, we really need our community partners and referral resources, and all of the existing aging service providers to become more LGBT competent and LGBT friendly.”

The efforts by CoH in creating the offering for local LGBT older adults has gained national attention, being included in the Top 15 LGBT-friendly senior living communities in the U.S. The rankings were released Tuesday by SeniorAdvice, an online resource that connects consumers to senior living and senior care options.

The rankings show that the growing demand to address the needs of LGBT older adults is not confined to Chicago but across the country, as providers begin to take steps to achieve this goal.

An invisible population

For this reason, the New York-based Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders (SAGE) established its SAGECare training program for seniors housing and senior care providers, centered on LGBT cultural competency.

The needs of the aging LGBT population is often ignored, according to Tim Johnston, director of national projects at SAGE.

“This is a population that is very often invisible, either because people haven’t considered their needs or, what is often the case, is that they are afraid of encountering discriminatory behavior and bias, so they are closeted,” Johnston told SHN. “So, aging providers don’t understand they’re working with LGBT older adults because their LGBT constituents are afraid to self identify.”

Overcoming this mentality is the goal of the SAGECare program, as it provides best practices on how senior care providers can approach LGBT patients and address their needs.

“[The program provides] best practices to know the right things to say, know the right way to ask certain questions, know the right kind of policy prescriptions to help create an inclusive environment,” Johnston said. “The training work is really intended to give [caregivers] those concrete skills to send people the message that if they would like to self-disclose, they would be safe and supported in doing so.”

SAGECare involves a four-hour intensive training for upper management, as well as one-hour in-person/online training programs for frontline caregivers and staff. The program has varying levels of designations: a bronze-level indicates that 25% of a community or provider’s staff has undergone training, while a platinum designation shows that 80% of staff has been trained under the program.

Topics range from bias reduction to programs that center on transgender aging, according to Johnston.

SAGE has trained approximately 20,000 providers, with more than 150 agencies receiving a SAGECare credential.

“The credential is a way for the service provider to distinguish themselves from others to say we’ve made a commitment to invest our resources and our staff time in this training because the [older LGBT population] is important to us,” Johnston said. “It’s a very public way of making that commitment known.”

Measurable experiences

Out west, Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark Retirement Communities aims to communicate this commitment by pursuing the SAGECare platinum credential.

So far, five of its communities within the region, totaling roughly 600 associates, have undergone SAGECare training, according to Shannon Ruedlinger, managing director at Watermark.

By next year, the senior living provider aims to have its remaining 46 communities trained under the program.

“We want to make sure that we have some other measurable experiences and training from an organization like SAGE to guide us in the right direction as we move our company and culture to be inclusive,” Ruedlinger told SHN.

Since training some of its associates, Ruedlinger explained that staff have become more adept in addressing the care needs of LGBT patients, as well as their families.

The training program doesn’t apply to just seniors housing providers but to other providers in the senior care industry, including home care.

This includes the New York-based in-home care provider Visiting Nurse Service of New York (VNSNY), who is also seeking a platinum credential from the training program, according to Richard Rothstein, vice president of corporate communications at VNSNY.

“Our people have been trained what not to say, how to initiate a conversation, how to create a welcoming and safe place for an LGBT patient so that the LGBT patient is comfortable speaking openly and honestly about their family and living situation, their partners,” Rothstein told SHN.

A very real fear

Back in Chicago, Larson and the staff at Town Hall Apartments are actively working to ensure that residents are receiving the care resources they need.

At Town Hall, residents pay 30% of their income to live in the community, while an on-site case manager connects them with care resources, like physicians and even in-home care services.

Apart from these efforts, Larson is also working to make sure that local senior care providers are aware of the unique needs of aging LGBT adults.

“Because Town Hall is so affirming … there is a very real fear that wherever they move might not be as affirming or as accepting,” she said. “So, we want to work with local senior care providers who can provide increased levels of care to our seniors.”

While the SAGECare training program is a step in the right direction to address the needs of older LGBT adults, creating more housing options for the population is another issue that needs to be addressed—an area where senior living providers can prove helpful, according to Kelly Kent, director of national housing initiative at SAGE.

“I think more developers could really add a great deal of value to this discussion by stepping forward with their expertise in housing development and partnering with LGBT service providers in developing affordable housing that is LGBT friendly,” Kent said.

Written by Carlo Calma

The post Providers Rise to New Standards for LGBT Senior Living appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Aging baby boomers are attracted to urban centers, but meeting the demand for downtown senior living is not easy. Two operators, Mather LifeWays and Watermark Retirement Communities, are getting in on the action but taking different approaches to offering senior housing in the city.

Evanston, Illinois-based Mather LifeWays is making its first foray on the East Coast, planning to build two high-rise towers near Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark is repurposing an existing, historic building in Brooklyn.

The two providers are both betting that seniors will line up to live in amenity-rich communities embedded in walkable neighborhoods with easy access to all that major metros have to offer—and they could be creating templates that other organizations look to emulate as more older adults seek city living in the coming years.

A first for Mather

Mather LifeWays is making its play with an upcoming $400 million, 668,435-square-foot senior living community that’s set to open in Tysons, Virginia, in 2022.

The Evanston, Illinois-based senior living provider—which, a few years ago, worked with LeadingAge to coin the term “Life Plan Community”—currently operates three senior living properties nationwide: a life plan community in Evanston, an independent living community in Wilmette, Illinois, and a life plan community in Tucson, Arizona.

The Washington, D.C.-area community, notably, will be the brand’s first property on the East Coast. The location made a lot of sense to Mather, CEO Mary Leary told Senior Housing News.

As a company, Mather has long been drawn to “well-educated, urban markets” that are also highly walkable, Leary explained. So, when it came time to select a location for its newest community, “D.C. was at the top of [its] list.”

Rendering courtesy of Mather LifeWays

Mather plans to branch out in its community design in Tysons, as well.

“Mather LifeWays does not have a cookie-cutter approach when it comes to new communities,” Leary noted.

The new Tysons community will be a high-rise, comprising two towers—one that’s 18 stories tall and one that’s 27 stories tall—with 300 independent living units, 78 assisted living units, skilled nursing beds and memory support. The property will also include more than 18,000 square feet of restaurant and retail space.

“It would be fantastic to get a boutique grocer in there,” Leary said. “Either that, or possibly some new restaurants.”

Leary may get her wish, as a major national grocery chain has already reached out to Mather about the space, she told SHN.

Opening a community near D.C. will have its challenges, and Mather knows it’s going to have to compete against nearby residential options for older residents.

“We have to make sure the experience that’s provided will be very different, both from what you’d get at a high-end condo as well as what you’d get at a typical retirement community,” Leary said.

The project is expected to be a 50/50 joint venture partnership between Mather and a for-profit equity partner, the identity of which Mather hopes to announce in early 2018.

“Even though Mather LifeWays is a not-for-profit organization, the project will be a for-profit life plan community,” Leary explained.

Accordingly, Mather will take the lead on the development, the presales and ongoing management, and the community will provide financial returns back to Mather, she said.

Stars align for Watermark

Farther up the Eastern Seaboard, New York City is another urban market where well-established senior living operators and investors are creating some new highrise senior living options.

Most recently, Watermark and private equity investor Kayne Anderson Real Estate Advisors (KAREA) announced that they are partnering to turn a historic 16-story building in Brooklyn Heights into senior living.

Unlike the Mather project in Tysons and the two senior living developments underway in Manhattan, this project is an adaptive reuse. It’s rare in a high-density urban area, particularly New York City, to find a building that fits the bill for this type of endeavor, Watermark Chairman David Freshwater told SHN.

“Because real estate is so precious and expensive, few buildings have extra space for common areas,” he said. “We do need common areas and kitchens, and to retrofit a buiding to get all of that in, it’s hard to make a conversion work.”

The Brooklyn Heights building is the rare exception. That’s because it previously was owned by the Jehovah’s Witnesses and was used in part as a residence for the organization’s many volunteers. Its kitchen was turning out upward of 1,000 meals a day, and the building boasts 50,000 square feet of common space and larger-than-average individual units. One floor had been a medical wing with a clinic space and infirmary for sick volunteers.

So, the building lends itself naturally to being renovated for senior living, complete with multiple dining venues, yoga and fitness studios, an indoor pool, library and other features, Freshwater said. The former medical wing will be a “natural conversion” to memory care. The remainder of the building is slated to be a mix of independent living and assisted living.

Total renovation costs are estimated to be about $70 million, according to Freshwater. The purchase of the building ran to about $200 million and the capital stack is rounded out with about $30 million in reserves and to cover other costs. Watermark has less than a 5% ownership stake.

The building’s location in Brooklyn Heights, right across the East River from Manhattan, also appears to be ideal. Market research revealed that average rents in the neighborhood are nearly identical to those on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Freshwater said. With that in mind, Watermark and KAREA plan to peg rents at a level they feel is conservative. Memory care rents are projected to be about 20% to 25% lower than the $20,000-a-month memory care rate planned for the NYC building being developed by real estate investment trust Welltower (NYSE: HCN), to be operated by Sunrise Senior Living.

Moreover, thanks to zoning laws, most nearby buildings are low-rise or mid-rise, keeping the neighborhood “human scale,” replete with brownstones, front yards and green spots, Freshwater noted. And it means there will be great views of the Manhattan skyline from the Watermark at Brooklyn Heights, as the senior living highrise will be called. It is projected to open within two to three years.

This is not the only project that Watermark and KAREA are working on together—they have teamed on eight ventures and are working on two more currently. But this one is special, given all the pieces that fell into place.

“The stars aligned in terms of the opportunity,” Freshwater said. “Now, we just have to execute.”

Written by Mary Kate Nelson and Tim Mullaney

The post Mather, Watermark Hammer Out Plans for New Highrise Senior Living appeared first on Senior Housing News.

Now that 2017 has officially come to a close, the senior housing industry is looking ahead to what 2018 may bring.

Here’s what some top industry executives are predicting when it comes to staffing, regulations, resident preferences and more in the new year:

Chris Winkle, CEO of Sunrise Senior Living: “2018 will bring continued opportunities to provide residents and families with comprehensive, coordinated care in ways that anticipate their needs for both today and tomorrow. An ongoing focus on helping to promote seniors’ overall wellness will lead to positive health outcomes and customer satisfaction.”

Brenda Bacon, President and CEO of Brandywine Senior Living: “The change in the expectations of our residents, families and team members will continue to challenge our industry to focus on customer service and customized experiences. No more doing the same thing next year as you did five years ago. The physical design of the next-gen buildings will be different and the demand for hospitality services will continue to grow. Both innovation and sophisticated management will be the fundamental requirements for success.”

Andy Smith, President and CEO of Brookdale Senior Living: “In 2018, senior living companies will have to focus even more on the people who work for them. Demand for talented, dedicated employees keeps growing. We are in an environment where new jobs are being created and unemployment rates are dropping, so companies will have to step up to improve and communicate about the employee value proposition they offer. This employee value proposition is not just about the job, the wages or the benefits, but also about the culture, growth opportunities and the leadership offered.”

Mary Leary, President and CEO of Mather LifeWays: “I think we’ll continue to see a change in buyer behavior, both in how they make purchases, and the relationships we create with them. There will be more self-education through online research and doing more ‘homework’ before they contact us. The small home trend has also reached the senior housing market with an emphasis on experience and what a community provides in terms of things to do, versus size of homes or living space.

The industry is nearing a true ‘disruption.’ So-called ‘old school’ services and programs will not be enough for future residents, who will very likely have a more holistic or organic approach to their next chapter. Continuing education and volunteerism—including ways for residents to contribute to and interact with the larger community—will be important, and a more diverse population will also require a wider variety of offerings. More self-determination of programs and services for greater enrichment will be the norm.”

Sean Kelly, President and CEO of The Kendal Corporation: “Here and now, contracts, programming, quality in every aspect of care and service, and price, matter a lot. Conspicuous as these drivers may be, for the future our work can’t ever lose sight of the importance of quality in all its forms. The market will be ever more discerning in a world that is increasingly complex and competitive. Our ability to deliver what the market will require will lead us to establish deeper partnerships with hospital systems, institutions of higher learning and community organizations. We will need to be accessible and useful to older people who live in our communities, as well as those who want to stay in their own homes. Going forward, strength lies in an authentic organizational culture and a demonstrated ability to foster communities, on or off of a campus, where residents and staff are engaged in meaningful ways with one another and the wider world. Enduring resident and staff satisfaction will be essential.”

Collette Valentine-Gray, CEO and COO of Integral Senior Living: “We will continue to see our average age higher than in years past as residents are waiting longer to move into an assisted living community. As a result, we will see a higher acuity resident moving into the assisted living setting. They will want multiple dining venue options as well as parallel activity programming offering more choices. From an associate perspective, as minimum wage increases continue to grow, this will impact the search for talent into our industry as we are competing with other industries for like associates.”

Doug Leidig, President and CEO of Asbury Communities: “I think there is going to be a greater emphasis on collaboration than ever before, including an increase in collaboration among ‘competitors’ in our market space. Continuing care retirement communities (CCRCs) will look to join together to offer services both on their campuses and outside the walls to reduce duplication of services, create efficiencies and increase market share, and I expect much more actual collaboration activity between hospitals and CCRCs versus just talking about it. In addition, we’ll see greater stress on occupancy levels in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) as older adults move from hospital to home, increasingly bypassing traditional short-term stays and causing more SNFs to reinvent themselves as specialty care units. At the same time, we must be mindful of the evolution of both our workforce and governance structure. Companies will offer creative adjustments and changes in benefits to attract a new workforce, while Board leadership will continue to progress to assure appropriate oversight of the organization in today’s increased regulatory environment, focusing on the strategic direction of companies and the demand on their financial resources.”

Patricia Will, President and CEO of Belmont Village Senior Living: “Despite continued headwinds due to increased supply and increased payroll costs, we are very bullish on our portfolio. Our latest Bay Area opening has had stellar results; our stable portfolio has enjoyed terrific year-over-year growth. We expect that this will continue in 2018.”

David N. Barnes, President and CEO of Watermark Retirement Communities: “In 2018 and beyond, successful operators and managers will be sought by investors, spurring growth and expansion. This will create an even greater reliance on technology to communicate and operate smoothly and efficiently. One of the biggest challenges Watermark faces as it continues to grow, is maintaining a strong culture and delivery on our vision of creating extraordinary and innovative communities where people thrive. To that end, Watermark is launching a new technology platform called the Vision Center within our intranet, WatermarkConnect. Every associate will be able to better understand the Vision and the Operating Principles through videos and photos and to learn how to help their individual community bring the vision to life. We foresee a growing need for interactive technology such as the Vision Center to assist in keeping associates engaged and inspired.”

Lynne Katzmann, Founder and President and CEO of Juniper Communities: “2018 is likely to be a busy year of continued change and evolution in our industry. The new tax legislation may impact home values particularly in states and locales with high property taxes which in turn will depress housing prices for those looking to sell prior to moving into senior housing. Perhaps more importantly, the new bill will decrease federal revenues and put pressure on entitlement programs that some of us rely on for revenues.

Given the tightening of immigration laws, I also see continued pressure on labor. The move to increase home care as a post acute option also means that with their expansion there will be more competition for the same employees. Recently we heard that changes to overtime rules are likely to be revived and these too will impact us.

Technology will continue to change the way we do business, whether it is related to our internal operations, ability to communicate with different stakeholders or fuel the way we learn about individuals by monitoring their everyday activities with smart devices that soon are likely to be everywhere!

The value of a strong corporate culture will grow in importance as new development and competition forces us to differentiate ourselves. At Juniper, our culture is embedded in both word and deed and after many years, the positive and strong culture helps us recruit new team members more easily, hopefully retain them but equally important is what it means to our prospective and existing residents and their families. Our largest source of move-ins: friends and family referrals!

2018 will also see a greater shift in segmentation of the market we serve. In general, we are seeing people move in older and with greater needs. There are many companies seeking to attract younger cohorts and building environments and development engaging programs to do so. I think that we will see active recruitment and product differentiation for the 79- to 82-year-olds with a focus on couples and also on 82- to 85-year-olds.

But most important in 2018 will be the continued shift of health care into value-based care. Depending on who you read, within the next couple of years, a great majority, or 60-75% of Medicare beneficiaries, are likely to be members of a Managed Care plan. In my mind, seniors housing has great opportunity as a result. The work Juniper has done shows that what we do—provide enriched housing with services, particularly when coupled with the security of on-site chronic care management—reduces use of high cost acute services (hospitalizations) and hence keeps people healthier longer and for the government means great Medicare savings. In 2018, I believe that more providers will see that moving to a program that provides this foundation of medical care will benefit them in the short run by increasing length of stay and increasing care charges. But here’s the real win: We can share in some of the savings that today are accruing to Medicare. Seniors housing with services can provide services under a managed care offering and share in some of the savings. Like Sunrise has done, we also can also sponsor a health plan. While the latter assumes we take risk for all of the services a member uses, if done right, we can offer extra services to attract people to our communities and share in the profits of the plan. Moreover, as managed care is a standalone business with value, it also offers a new avenue for increasing profits and hence, enterprise value.”

Written by Mary Kate Nelson

The post Senior Housing Crystal Ball: Top Execs’ 2018 Predictions appeared first on Senior Housing News.

SHN’s Movers & Shakers Column is sponsored by the SHN Job Board. To look for assisted living jobs for yourself or a friend, visit https://jobs.seniorhousingnews.com. If you’re an employer, post your senior living jobs with us and attract the industry’s best-read professionals today. Have hiring/staffing announcements? Send them to editor@seniorhousingnews.com

Lancaster Pollard Hires Managing Director for M&A Group

Senior living lender Lancaster Pollard has hired Adam Zeiger as a managing director for the firm’s mergers and acquisitions (M&A) group, according to a press release.

In his new role, Zeiger will join Lancaster Pollard’s Chicago office and lead the firm’s sell-side and buy-side advisory services for seniors housing properties. Before joining the firm, Zeiger was a senior investment officer at Care Capital Properties, where he helped lead the company’s investment and marketing strategy.

Lancaster Pollard was acquired last September by ORIX USA, a division of international financial services group ORIX Corporation.

Lifespace Communities Announces New Lifespace Foundation Director

Senior living owner and operator Lifespace Communities has named Amy Brainard as director of the Lifespace Foundation, an organization that uses philanthropy to forward the health and welfare of the company’s residents.

The Des Moines, Iowa-based nonprofit chose Brainard for her fundraising experience and her vision for the foundation, according to company CEO Sloan Bentley.

Brainard came to Lifespace from the University of Iowa, where she helped lead advancement fundraising.

Meet Ziegler’s New President and CEO

Chicago-based specialty investment bank Ziegler has named Dan Hermann as its new president and CEO, effective March 31. Ziegler’s current CEO, Tom Paprocki, plans to retire that same day.

Hermann a 30-year veteran of Ziegler, currently serves as the company’s head of investment banking. He will continue to serve in that role once he assumes the title of Ziegler’s president and CEO.

Read more at Senior Housing News.

Florida Watermark Community Hires Leadership Team Ahead of of Spring Opening

Watermark Retirement Communities has hired Karyn Brinkley as executive director of its The Watermark at Vistawilla assisted living and memory community.

The Watermark at Vistawilla will have 87 residences available for rent in a variety of floor plans and sizes. Amenities include gardens and nature paths, a library, cafe, game room, movie theater, beauty salon and barbershop. The community, which is slated to open in March, is located in Winter Springs, Florida.

Brinkley, a licensed assisted living administrator and a certified dementia practitioner, will oversee the community’s operations and financials while promoting high occupancy and resident satisfaction, according to a press release.

Watermark also hired Debbie Mercadante as the community’s sales director and Lisa Celona as its community life director. Additional hires include Bob Garcia as maintenance director; Arlene Richardson as program director; Pamela Craft as human resources director and business office manager; and Chester Dibas as dining services director.

HumanGood Appoints Executive Director at California Community

Non-profit continuing care retirement community (CCRC) organization HumanGood has hired Rochelle Balaban to oversee its Rosewood community in Bakersfield, California, according to a press release.

Balaban has more than 20 years of senior living experience, including time spent as a registered nurse, director of nursing and administrator at two HumanGood sister communities in San Diego County.

Erickson Adds Interior Design Expert at Houston Community

Erickson Living has appointed Jessica Ceballos to serve as facilities manager at Eagle’s Trace, a CCRC with 825 residents in Houston.

In her new role, Ceballos will meet with future and current residents to provide them with options and amenities meant to enhance their floor plans. She brings more than 12 years of interior design experience to her the position, including at Frontier Custom Builders and Elizabeth Cole LLC.

EPOCH Community in Boston Hires Executive Chef

EPOCH Senior Living has named Jason King as the executive chef of Waterstone at the Circle, a 92-unit luxury independent living community in Boston, the company announced.

In his new role, King will design seasonal menus for residents with locally grown and sourced ingredients. Dining options at Waterstone at the Circle currently include organic produce, fresh seafood, cage-free poultry and farm-to-table selections.

Prior to joining Waterstone, King served as executive chef for a different senior living community in Lincoln, Massachusetts. His 25 years of culinary experience includes time spent under several James Beard award winners and in the kitchen of Starwood, Hilton and Wyndham hotels. King has also worked as a butcher and operated his own catering company.

Written by Tim Regan

The post Movers & Shakers: Lancaster Pollard, Lifespace Communities appeared first on Senior Housing News.

When David Freshwater, chairman of Watermark Retirement Communities, and David Barnes, the company’s president and CEO, set out to build a skilled nursing facility for the first time, they had decades of experience with SNF design to show them what was needed— and what to avoid.

The result was The Springs at Hacienda at the River in Tucson, Arizona, the winner of the 2017 Senior Housing News Architecture and Design Awards in the Skilled Nursing and Post-Acute Care category. With the look of a boutique hotel or resort, it’s designed to promote wellness “the second you walk in the building,” Barnes told SHN.

Hacienda at the River, which was completed in the first quarter of 2017, features a dozen long-term care (LTC) suites on the ground floor and 50 private and two semi-private guest suites on the second floor. It includes a studio for therapy spaces and the Acacia Cafe, where guests and residents can dine and which is open to the public. It’s part of a larger campus that also includes assisted living and memory care. Tucson-based Watermark is expected to operate more than 52 senior living communities in 21 states as of March 1.

The Springs at Hacienda residents also include horses, and while these are for memory care and assisted living programs, their presence on the campus adds to the unique ambience of the property.

“It had traditionally been a horse facility and before that a dude ranch, and even though it was right in the middle of the town, it sort of had that heritage and feel,” Freshwater told SHN. “We knew the property— my wife actually trained horses on the property when she was in college—so we had a long history of hanging out at this property, if you will, and when it came on the market it was fortuitous.”

The Concept

The equine presence, plus the arched opening, the look of adobe, the use of stone and wood, tree trunks supporting some of the canopies, and the Spanish Colonial elements of the architecture, creates the look “of a village that would be typical in Tuscon,” said Jeff Anderzhon, senior planner and design architect at Eppstein Uhen Architects and one of the awards judges.

This assessment was echoed by Eric Krull, executive vice president of THW Design and another judge.

“The reflection, feels, colors of the landscape, and that type of Spanish Colonial revival architecture tells me I live in Tucson, and I either used to ride those horses that they showed in the pictures or I lived on a ranch,” he said, painting a picture of how a prospective Hacienda resident might assess the place. “Even if I was in the urban neighborhoods, if I drive outside the city, I’m going to be driving right past those kind of shapes and forms. That kind of reflectivity fits right into people’s memories and history. When I’m 80 years old there in long-term care, I can connect the dots and I can feel safe and comfortable.”

Patient comfort was a crucial first step in achieving the vision Watermark had for Hacienda at the River, Freshwater told SHN.

“We think the healing begins when you get to the front door, because you aren’t walking into a place that automatically you just don’t want to be in,” he said. “Because who wants to be in a nursing home?”

Barnes and Freshwater have spent the past three decades inheriting and acquiring existing buildings, and and so are familiar with how skilled nursing facilities were designed twenty or thirty years ago, Barnes explained.

The focus in the past was on the efficiency of the operation, with the result being a lot of so-called “spoke and wheel” facilities where residents are grouped around a nurse’s station, he said.

To combat the years of institutional thinking in SNF design, Watermark took a bold step: They hired CallisonRTKL in Los Angeles, which designed resorts and upscale housing, but had never before designed a nursing home.

RTKL was very familiar with Watermark, with whom the firm has been working since the early 2000s, according to Daun St. Amand, senior vice president in the Los Angeles office and leader of CallisonRTKL’s residential sector.

“Theoretically skilled nursing— it could be long-term, short-term— they’re homes, but they’re also a lot like hotels,” St. Amand told SHN. “You don’t have individual kitchens, of course, inside the units. So you start to think about the dining amenities, common areas, those places which are really the heart of the project.”

Click to view slideshow.

The Construction

The first concepts for Hacienda at the River were sketched on a napkin in a Starbucks in 2012, Jim Goebel, director of design and construction at Watermark, told SHN. The company got its development plan in March 2014, and purchased the land later that same year. Construction on the facility, which was contracted for about $21.06 million, began in July 2015.

Financing for the project included debt and equity, $14.5 million from the EB-5 program—which allows global investors in a project to get U.S. citizenship after five years—and perks from the city of Tucson in exchange for annexing the project from Pima County to the city.

The project was completed in the first quarter of 2017, for exactly what was budgeted, Freshwater said. But it wasn’t an easy ride. One of the most notable hurdles related to the decision to annex the project. It was a move that came with waived fees, building permits and certain entitlements.

It also nearly derailed the whole venture.

It was expected that annexation might cause major problems for Watermark, according to the experience of both the company and the consultants with which it was working, Freshwater said. This was because the city was prone to changing agreements and making difficult demands.

“I said we’re going to be different, because we’re going to hire the best law firms and we’re going to paper this thing to the Nth-degree,” he told SHN. “We’re going to have have what’s called a pre-annexation development agreement and it’s going to call for absolute approval of all our plans and specs.”

The annexation went through, Watermark went to its first meeting with the city—and was told to redesign the building, Freshwater said. A subsequent meeting went no better, with proposed compromises from Watermark on various aspects of the building rejected.

At the time the city raised objections, the facility was three months into its construction. But the battle with the city dragged on for months before Tucson changed its mind and accepted Watermark’s plan.

As for the building process itself, the site is somewhat constricted, at least in the component allotted to skilled nursing, St. Amand noted to SHN. Creating spaces for leisure time, wellness and social interaction, for instance, requires design flourishes, and including those on the amount of land available was a challenge, he said. But the firm drew from its hospitality experience to create a space that was compelling and avoided feeling institutional.

“When you look down our corridors, they’re fairly short but there’s interesting things happening on the way,” St. Amand said. “We have door drops where the doors recess, and so you create these rooms leading to the next room to the next room so you don’t feel this long corridor. It feels more intimate, more personal if you can divide that up.”

The views from the windows also add to the experience, particularly for skilled nursing patients. To the north are mountains, to the south a river, and sunsets to the west, St. Amand said.

“Essentially what we’re trying to do is create a healing environment, and the things that really create that or support are things like having a connection to nature,” he explained.

The Completion

Hacienda at the River is currently about 60% occupied, with assisted living filling 22 of 36 openings, memory care at 25 of 35, and skilled nursing at 30 of 52. The hospice division is full and LTC has about half of a dozen accommodations filled.

This matches expectations at this stage for the project, and though Hacienda at the River is in an early enough stage that it hasn’t yet returned the investment, its long-term prospects are strong, Freshwater said.

The facility has numerous relationships and links to the community, with partnerships ranging from the University of Arizona to local animal shelters. And with outpatient therapy and the cafe open to the public, the Hacienda at the River is becoming entrenched in the community.

It adds up to a unique experience for anyone who needs skilled nursing healing.

“I’ve been a jurist on the Senior Housing News design jury for four years now, and this is in my opinion one of the best if not the best examples of skilled nursing design,” Anderzhon told SHN. “It’s design that serves the residents needs really well, and as a subset of that, serves the need of the care provider really well.”

Written by Maggie Flynn

The post Best Post-Acute Design 2017: Hospitality, Horses Meet Skilled Nursing appeared first on Senior Housing News.

In the Pipeline is brought to you by the Senior Housing News Architecture & Design Awards. Sign up for the SHN Architecture & Design Newsletter from SHN for updates on architecture and design trends, the annual SHN Awards Competition.

Construction: Planned

Hunt Midwest Planning New Projects in Florida and Tennessee

Hunt Midwest Real Estate Development has announced the acquisition of a 6.4-acre site in Royal Palm Beach, Florida, with plans to build its first senior housing community outside the Kansas City area there.

The Capstone at Royal Palm is an assisted living and memory care community with 84 suites for up to 114 residents. As planned, the community will have a “resort-like feel” with Mediterranean architecture and amenities such as a great room, formal dining room, fitness center, bistro, sunroom and access to walking trails and a dog park.

Integral Senior Living will operate the community, and construction is expected to begin this fall with an expected opening date in late 2019. Rocky Goins and Asssociates served as the project’s land acquisition consultant, Pi Architects is leading the community’s overall design and Proctor Construction is set to be its general contractor.

That’s not the only metro area Hunt has its eye on, however. The company also recently signed contracts to purchase land in Mt. Juliet and Gallatin, two suburbs of Nashville Tennessee.

High-rise Senior Living Development Planned in Seattle

Columbia Pacific Advisors has secured roughly $114.69 million in financing for the development of 620 Terry, a high-rise senior housing property planned in Seattle.

The new community will have a total of 243 independent living, assisted living and memory care units. The 24-story property, which is due for completion in 2019, will come with amenities such as a full-service restaurant, bistro and cafe, two bars, a top-level club room, auditorium, theater, wellness suite and gym.

Ankrom Moisian designed the project. The development loan was provided to Columbia Pacific Advisors by HCP, Inc. (NYSE: HCP), with additional advising services from Holliday Fenoglio Fowler.

Construction: In progress

Work Underway for Welltower and Sunrise Project in New York City

International real estate firm Hines and Welltower (NYSE:WELL) broke ground on a 16-story tower that will house midtown Manhattan’s first purpose-built assisted living and memory care community.

As planned, Sunrise at East 56th, also known as “The Welltower,” will have 151 units, with retail at the base. Sunrise Senior Living will manage the development, which is slated for completion in early 2020. The community will begin pre-leasing in 2019.

Achitect SLCE designed the community, with interiors by Champalimaud. The property’s design includes large windows, multiple terraces and outdoor gardens, and many common areas. Amenities include dining rooms, a salon, exercise facilities, medical examination rooms, an art studio and a theater.

Other perks for residents include air purification systems, circadian lighting, and wellness programming and close proximity to a number of New York City’s top health care providers—not to mention shopping, dining and entertainment.

Construction Begins for Independent Living Project in Florida

LandSouth Construction, a general contractor specializing in senior housing, multifamily and mixed-use development, has started work on Trinity Independent Senior Living, a $19.3 million independent living community in New Port Richey, Florida.

Watermark Retirement Communities will operate the five-story community, which will have 117 dwellings and amenities such as a fitness center, hospitality bar and cafe bistro with access to covered porches, theater, salon, formal dining, activity room and an arts and crafts studio.

Chancey Design Partnership is the project’s architect. Construction is expected to wrap up in June, 2019.

Preliminary Work Starts for Florida Community

Workers have begun preliminary site work for Thrive at Four Mile Cove, a 140-unit independent living, assisted living and memory care community under construction in Cape Coral, Florida.

The 11-acre, $31 million community will have high-end amenities such as a salon, movie theater, dog park, and putting green. Design firm Studio+ is leading the community’s design, and DeAngelis Diamond Construction is the general contractor.

Work is expected to finish by January of 2019.

Waterfront Renovations Planned at Florida Community

The Fountains at Boca Ciega Bay, an independent living, assisted living and memory care community in St. Petersburg, Florida, is investing $90,000 in a waterfront renovation that will provide residents with a place to socialize, exercise, relax and enjoy views.

As planned, the new waterfront space will have retractable awnings, lounge furniture and outdoor dining and will provide a space for social events and classes.

The upgrades are part of a nearly $300,000 renovation project currently underway at The Fountains. Crews are also hard at work revamping the community’s main dining room, memory care dining room and living room and parking lot. The renovations are expected to wrap up in July.

Construction: Complete

MorningStar to Open Iowa Community This Month

MorningStar Senior Living is scheduled to hold a gala March 28 to celebrate the opening of MorningStar at Jordan Creek, a $12 million, 85-suite independent living, assisted living and memory care community in Des Moines, Iowa.

The community spans 265,000 square feet and is situated on three acres within the residential and retail area of Jordan Creek. Seniors started moving into the community earlier this month.

Illinois Senior Living Community to Open April 1

Brightly Senior Living, formerly Legacy Place, is planning to open an $8 million assisted living, independent living and memory care community in Mascoutah, Illinois.

The 57-unit community will have amenities such as a theater, exercise room, cafe, activity room, private and communal dining areas, salon, chapel and a walking path.

Residents will pay one all-inclusive rent for all levels of care and get services that range from personalized staff assistance and medication management to housekeeping and laundry service.

Other noteworthy projects:

Planned

— Provision Living could open a $40 million assisted living and memory care community in Macomb Township, Michigan.

— A sprawling 84-unit independent living community is in the works for Franconia, Pennsylvania.

— City officials have provided preliminary approvals for a proposed 78-unit assisted living and memory support project in Carbondale, Colo.

— A non-profit senior living organization in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, has plans to turn a former corporate headquarters there into a senior living campus with 78 apartments.

— Waters Senior Living plans to open a 130-unit community near Pittsburgh.

— A farm in Penfield, New York, is set to move and make way for a proposed 162-unit senior housing project.

— A new assisted living and memory care community is in the works for Columbus, Georgia.

— Ryan Companies is planning to build a 281-unit independent living, assisted living and memory care community on the site of a former grocery story in St. Louis.

— Columbia Pacific Advisors has proposed building an 139-unit assisted living and memory care community in Newark, Delaware.

— City officials has approved plans for Vrindavan Resorts, a senior living project planned for 13.7 acres in Missouri City, TX, just outside of Houston.

— A vacant school in Waterloo, New York, could soon become a 32-unit affordable community for seniors.

— A nonprofit could soon move forward with plans for a new affordable community for seniors in Orinda, California.

— A villa community for seniors in Tipp City, Ohio, is adding 46 new apartments.

In progress

— New state funding could be enough to bring a 30-unit assisted living community to Lakebay, Washington.

— Construction crews are now hard at work building a new 118-unit independent living, assisted living and memory care community in Port Orange, Florida.

— A 128-unit independent living property from Resort Lifestyle Communities is on track to open next year in Huntley, Illinois.

— Westminster Village, a senior living community in Bloomington, Illinois, is undergoing $70 million worth of renovations.

Complete

— Construction has wrapped up for LCB Senior Living’s The Residence at Silver Square, a 76-unit community in Bedford, New Hampshire.

— A new senior living community opened last month in Plymouth, Minnesota.

— Totem Lake, Washington, has a new 91-apartment senior living community.

— Wayne Tower, a 154-unit senior living community, has opened its doors in Wayne, Michigan.

— A developer has plans to convert a former hospital in Hannibal, Missouri, into a 54-unit community for low-income seniors.

Written by Tim Regan

The post In the Pipeline: Work Starts for Welltower and Sunrise Project in Manhattan appeared first on Senior Housing News.

HFF Advises on $115 Million Financing for Seattle Senior Housing Development

Holliday Fenoglio Fowler, L.P. (HFF) has advised Columbia Pacific Advisors on the $114.69 million financing for a luxury, high-rise senior housing property in Seattle. The 24-story property—620 Terry—will offer 243 Class A residential units comprising 194 independent living units, 21 assisted living units and 28 memory care units.

The participating development loan was provided by HCP, Inc. (NYSE: HCP). The HFF team representing the borrower included senior director David Fasano, director Sarah Anderson, managing director Casey Davidson and senior managing directors Ryan Maconachy and Chad Lavender.

Located in Seattle’s First Hill neighborhood, the 24-story 620 Terry is due for completion in 2019 and will feature concierge services, a full-service restaurant, a bistro/café, two bars and top-level club room with mountain and city views. 620 Terry will also have an auditorium, theater, wellness suite/gym and other activity spaces.

Summit Senior Living Appoints New Management Team

Starting March 1, 2018, Watermark Retirement Communities will provide professional management services for Summit Senior Living in Salt Lake City, Utah. With the addition of Summit Senior Living, the Tucson, Arizona-based Watermark manages 52 communities coast to coast.

Located at 5524 West 6200 S, Salt Lake City, Summit Senior Living offers assisted living and memory care for up to 95 residents. Watermark and Vancouver, Washington-based Milestone Retirement Communities made the announcement.

Capital One Refinances 185-Property Senior Housing Portfolio

Capital One has announced that it has added seven senior housing properties owned by subsidiaries of Healthcare Trust, Inc. (HTI) to HTI’s Fannie Mae credit facility. The total facility is now $216.6 million, up $64.2 million.

HTI is a non-traded real estate investment trust (REIT) with 185 properties focused primarily on health care-related assets, including medical office buildings, senior housing communities and other health care-related facilities.

$29 Million Financing Completed for Senior Housing Property in Visalia, California

Commercial real estate financial intermediary NorthMarq Capital has completed a $29,272,000 construction financing for a 120-unit senior housing property in Visalia, California. The community, Quail Park at Shannon Ranch, will open in early 2019. Stuart Oswald, senior vice president and managing director of NorthMarq Capital’s Seattle regional office, secured the financing.

The transaction was structured with a five-year term. NorthMarq arranged financing for the borrower through its relationship with a regional bank. The property is owned by the principles of Living Care Lifestyles, several local investors and the Kaweah Delta Hospital. It will be operated by Living Care Lifestyles.

Connecticut Senior Housing Facility Completes $35 Million Loan

Grandbridge Real Estate Capital’s Seniors Housing and Healthcare Finance Group has facilitated the closing of a $35 million Freddie Mac mortgage loan secured by Brightview on New Canaan, a 90-unit senior housing community in Norwalk, Connecticut. The loan was originated by Senior Vice President Richard Thomas and Vice President Meredith Davis and closed in early 2018.

Brightview on New Canaan offers independent living, assisted living, memory care and enhanced care. Charlotte-based Grandbridge Real Estate Capital, a subsidiary of Branch Banking and Trust Company (BB&T), arranges permanent commercial and multifamily real estate loans, services loan portfolios and provides asset and portfolio management.

Florida Assisted Living Facility Sells for $6.1 Million

Assisted living facility Summit in Venice, Florida, has sold for $6.1 million. Realtor Krone L. Weidler of Marcus & Millichap represented the buyer of the 40,440 square-foot facility.

Written by Jack Silverstein

The post Transactions & Financings: HFF, Summit Senior Living, Capital One appeared first on Senior Housing News.

As publicly traded real estate investment trusts (REITs) have stood on the sidelines of more senior housing deals in recent years, private equity (PE) has jumped into the game. Major institutional PE players such as Kayne Anderson Real Estate Advisors (KAREA) and Bridge Investment Group have each raised funds in excess of a billion dollars to deploy in the senior housing space, and they are actively on the hunt for their favored types of projects.

Just last week, Los Angeles-based Kayne Anderson announced that it had closed a $1.85 billion real estate fund, with about 90% intended to go toward senior housing and medical office properties. In the third quarter of 2017, Orlando, Florida-based Bridge completed fundraising for its second senior housing fund, which also clocked in at more than $1 billion.

These firms share similar investment strategies, based on current deal flow and their evaluation of where the senior housing market is today and where it is heading in the future. They are bullish on projects in “gateway cities,” and see opportunities to build their portfolios as more distressed properties come on the market and as REITs go through a period of divestment. They’re also less inclined to bet on memory care, but in general are casting a wide net in terms of deal size and location.

Gateways are golden

Los Angeles-based KAREA is building a portfolio that will be “literally coast to coast,” Max Newland, leader of the firm’s senior housing real estate team, told Senior Housing News.

“In terms of geographic locations, we don’t have certain markets that we’ve redlined or that we’re only going to look at,” he said.

Similarly, Bridge Investment Group is looking across the contiguous 48 states, Robb Chapin, CEO of Bridge Seniors Housing Fund Manager, told SHN.

Both Bridge and KAREA are particularly interested in so-called gateway cities—large urban markets such as New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Washington, D.C.

There are high barriers to entry in these locations, such as expensive real estate and complicated entitlement requirements, which constrain supply and limit new competition. In addition, evidence is mounting that the aging baby boomer generation is attracted to urban living in retirement, for reasons such as walkability and the high concentration of amenities and health care providers.

Boston, New Orleans and Atlanta were among the markets that Newland name-checked. He highlighted a $300 million project to convert a 16-story building in New York City’s Brooklyn Heights neighborhood into senior housing. That community is set to be operated by Watermark Retirement Communities.

Large private equity firms might have an advantage in seizing the urban opportunity, given that they are flush with capital, have well-established operator relationships, and possess the sophistication and resources to tackle complicated deals. That said, both KAREA and Bridge Seniors Housing acknowledge that urban projects are hard not easy to come by.

“Our deal in Brooklyn Heights is a perfect example—we spent three years looking for the right NYC deal,” Newland said. “It was worth it because NYC, like may other major gateway cities, has a significant supply/demand imbalance today (and a new construction pipeline that falls well short of what will be needed based on demographic trends).”

Bridge Seniors has made inroads in gateway markets; through its first senior housing fund, it acquired properties in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, and the Los Angeles metro area, among other locations. But because urban opportunities are “few and far between,” and because they tend to have risk-adjusted returns that are both quantifiable and “well worth it,” Chapin looks at them in a different light than other deals.

“We might be willing to take on more of the upfront development costs that go into these types of deals, recognizing the complexity of them, than we would in a typical secondary or tertiary market,” he said. “In those markets, we would only consider new construction when it’s what we define as shovel-ready, fully permitted, fully licensed, with construction financing secured, so that we would not be exposed to typical development risks in those types of deals.”

Cautious on memory care

Another commonality between KAREA and Bridge: neither is going big on standalone memory care.

Kayne Anderson focuses mainly on independent living and assisted living, although it does have some memory care units at its AL communities, Newland said.

Bridge Seniors is drawn to rental communities that have a mix of independent living, assisted living and memory care, and on average are between 90 and 150 units total, Chapin said. The few standalone memory care properties in the Bridge portfolio have underperformed relative to properties with more of a continuum, he noted.

Standalone memory care is a “unique bird” from an operational perspective, he explained.

“For us, it’s almost like the difference between helicopters and fixed-wing planes,” he said. “They both get you there faster than a car, they both fly, but they’re very different to pilot.”

Among the challenges in standalone memory care, one is the difficulty in pre-selling units. This is relatively easy to do for a product like independent living, but memory care tends to be more needs-based, with a potential resident looking to move in quickly. Because these residents also tend to be in later stages of life, length of stay also is shorter. So the approach to maintaining stable occupancy levels is different than in a community with multiple levels of care, and only a few operators have really been able to figure it out, according to Chapin.

“Everyone wants to do standalone memory care” because they recognize the rising need for this type of care, Chapin said, but too few people are considering these unique challenges in running these buildings.

Foreign investment steady

In raising their large funds, KAREA and Bridge Seniors attracted significant interest from foreign investors.

Recent chatter has focused on a slowdown in Chinese investment activity in U.S. senior housing—in part due to the Chinese government’s changing policies regarding offshore real estate investments. However, there are plenty of other sources of overseas capital, Newland and Chapin said.

“Foreign capital has been flowing into seniors housing specifically and health care real estate in general in recent years,” Newland said. “I don’t see this trend changing anytime soon, as the supply/demand metrics are good now and will only get better as the greying of the United States continues.”

Germany, the United Kingdom, the Middle East, South Korea, Taiwan and Australia are among countries and regions actively funneling capital toward the U.S. senior housing market, Chapin said.

In particular, senior housing appeals to more conservative investors—for instance, those based in the Middle East—who saw how resilient the sector was during the last economic downturn, he added.

Dealmaking to accelerate

Bridge Seniors is aiming to deploy a total of $1 billion into the senior housing sector this year, and so far Chapin is pleased with its progress. But the “market is pretty quiet” at the moment, he added, particularly with regard to large portfolio opportunities.

Mostly, Bridge has been “hitting solid singles and doubles” and is open to small deals in the $25 million range—while noting that the fund’s ability to purchase a large portfolio is what “separates us from the pack.”

However, activity should start to pick up in the the second half of 2018 and remain elevated into 2019, Chapin predicted. One reason is that some markets became overbuilt during the recent senior housing construction boom; the fierce competition now is leading to distressed properties. These will be coming on the market in increasing numbers.

Another reason is that the public REITs have been looking at selectively selling non-essential assets from their portfolios, to right-size them after years of rapid acquisitions.

“They have not been really active acquirers in the sector for the last probably two to three years,” Chapin said. “We don’t anticipate that will go on indefinitely, there’s a finite window to this, but in the near-term, it will yield opportunities for us.”

Indeed, just 17% of senior housing and care deals in the first quarter of 2018 involved REITs as buyers, according to data from the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care (NIC).

KAREA also expects to benefit from REITs’ disposition activity.

“It’s a pretty interesting time for us, because the public REITs of the world have traded off pretty significantly,” Newland said. “We’re more competitive than we have been in the past … that’s leading to some unique opportunities.”

Written by Tim Mullaney and Mary Kate Nelson

The post Kayne Anderson, Bridge Group Begin Deploying Billion-Dollar Senior Housing Funds appeared first on Senior Housing News.