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The Pandemic Has Made Healthcare More Desirable

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“The pandemic increased demand and made healthcare a more desirable asset class,” Rahul Chhajed, VP and senior director of healthcare at Matthews Real Estate Investment Services, tells GlobeSt.com about how the asset class fared during the pandemic.

For one, medical properties moved onto the list of darling asset classes, and it isn’t hard to understand why.

“It is no longer just a recession that investors are worried about. If there is another pandemic, healthcare services are something that people are always going to need. At the end of the day, everyone needs medical care,” says Chhajed.

With the exception of a temporary pause in the market at the beginning of the pandemic, when elective surgeries and other healthcare services were paused to allow healthcare providers to focus on COVID-19, healthcare properties outperformed other asset classes. Chhajed notes that many tenants didn’t need rent relief and continued to pay rent.

This year, investors have been trading out of more challenged asset classes, like retail and office, in favor of medial facilities.

“COVID really provided a proof of concept for the industry to show that this product type is here to stay. It is not only institutional, but it is an asset class that private capital should look at as well,” says Michael Moreno, VP and senior director of healthcare at Matthews Real Estate Investment Services.

Institutional capital has been the dominant player in the healthcare sector, and that is because it can be a more complicated asset class. Now, both institutional capital and private investors are competing for deals.

“More institutions have definitely entered the ring, but we are also seeing the private markets have started to buy these deals,” says Moreno.

And, there is a third player: owner-occupiers. Existing owners are looking at the demand—which has driven cap rates down significantly—and deciding to sell.

“The sale-leaseback market is really picking up, and a lot of that has to do with pricing,” says Moreno.

Over the last few years there has been significant cap rate compression, and owners would rather take the proceeds and put it back into the business and grow.

“Private buyers love those deals because they typically contain long-term leases and they are triple net,”  Moreno says.

On the lease side, retail owners are finding new users in healthcare. Many clinics and ambulatory centers are signing leases in retail facilities as part of the trend from in-patient care to out-patient care.

“Retail-centric healthcare is great for providers because the care is coming to the consumer,” says Chhajed. “A lot of these healthcare systems are looking for ways to provide ease of access, and retail centers meet those needs to make healthcare more accessible. The confluence of these trends is creating a heyday for medical assets after the pandemic. Now healthcare is looking stronger than ever.”

 

Source: GlobeSt.

Report: Denver’s Medical Office Building Market Picks Up Momentum

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Metro Denver’s medical office building (MOB) market recorded strong fundamentals in the first half of 2021, according to CBRE’s Denver Medical Office MarketView H1 2021 report.

Saint Joseph Medical Office Pavilion, a 99,000-square-foot medical facility completed by Dallas-based Fidelis Healthcare Partners at 1818 Ogden Street in Denver. (PHOTO CREDIT: CBRE)

Positive new absorption of 150,318 square feet was recorded in H1 2021 with On-Campus space contributing to most of the absorption activity. Direct vacancy sat at 10.7% in H1 2021, a modest 28 basis points (bps) increase year-over-year, while overall availability was unchanged at 12.3%.

The average direct asking rate rose to $30.68 per square foot full-service gross (FSG), a 5.4% increase since H1 2020. A total of 174,000 square feet of newly constructed MOB space was delivered to the market in H1 2021 with 70.1% of the space already leased. The Denver MOB investment activity picked up momentum this year totaling $104.9 million in H1 2021, up 101.8% year-over-year.

Outlook

With absorptions rebounding sharply to pre-pandemic levels in the first half of 2021, the Denver medical office market will continue to flourish as owners realign their space needs and discuss future projects.

Though economics is still driving transactions, there has been a flight to quality among tenants that is expected to continue over the next several quarters. The increased demand for healthcare properties is driving strong investor interest as seen by the increased sales activity in H1 2021 which is forecast to be even stronger throughout the balance of 2021 and beyond.

While there has been some impact to the medical office market from the COVID-19 pandemic, the activity during the first half of 2021 showed resiliency and a necessity for healthcare space.

 

Source: Mile High CRE

How Venture Capital Funding Could Give Office A Much-Needed Boost: Healthcare/Life Science Sectors Gained 20% Of Global VC Investment

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Hiring data across hundreds of firms that received venture capital-backed funding may provide a clue into how those cash infusions will impact CRE, according to a new report from Newmark.

The 500 US firms Newmark analyzed and cross-referenced against LinkedIn data raised a total of $44.9 billion and posted 22,582 job openings since April 2021, translating to about 3.4 million square feet of CRE demand. That’s about 7,500 square feet of demand for every $100 million raised, if you assume 150 square feet per worker. If you assume 200 square feet per worker, that equates to 10,000 square feet of demand per $100 million raised. But Newmark analysts say these numbers are likely “considerably lower than the reality.”

Here’s why: according to LinkedIn, about 85% of jobs are filled by networking, and not every company uses the platform to find candidates. And what’s more, the survey occurred in early July, meaning some of the companies funded since April have already filled open jobs.

“Total employment growth from the sample set is likely anywhere from 30.0% to 50.0% higher than what the job postings data suggests,” the report notes. “This means that even using a ratio of 10,000 square feet of demand for every $100 million raised is likely far below the reality, possibly by half. Anecdotal evidence shows the ratio is likely something closer to 25,000 square feet of demand for every $100 million raised, but a number that is easily and logically defensible is a minimum of 15,000 square feet per $100 million raised.”

So far this year, $315.3 billion in new VC money was raised globally, with $166.4 billion raised in Q2. Prior to the pandemic, annual VC investment had averaged around $164.1 billion annually. The B2C and healthcare/life science sectors have gained the most market share and account for about 20% of global VC investment each.

The US is the dominant market for new VC investment, according to Newmark, and accounts for more than half of all funds raised, followed by China. Since the first half of the year, VC funding in the US has been focused mainly on artificial intelligence, fintech, TMT, SaaS, and big data.

“Under normal circumstances, these numbers would suggest a commercial real estate boom in the making, at least within markets where there is a heavy tech focus,” the report states. “They still do, though it will be tempered by the pandemic.”

 

Source: GlobeSt.