The National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care has launched a new initiative to track and report aggregated data on seniors housing actual rents using a standard file format with standard field definitions.

The effort is designed to provide information sought by operators and investors for benchmarking, strategic planning efforts and day-to-day business operations. NIC says it is the first organization to collect and report on these data and has the backing of the majority of the nation’s largest healthcare real estate investment trusts — HCP, LTC Properties, Omega Healthcare Investors, Sabra Health Care REIT, Senior Housing Properties Trust, Ventas and Welltower — and major lenders Capital One Healthcare, KeyBank Real Estate Capital, PNC Real Estate and Wells Fargo Senior Housing Finance.

The expanded reporting is expected to begin in the third quarter and will provide NIC MAP Data Service subscribers with actual rents — the in-place and move-in rents, which can vary from the asking rents that NIC MAP traditionally has tracked. Also included will be leasing activity velocities, which are measured by move-in and move-out rates. The operators included in the current sample data collection for the initial data release are larger, professionally managed and investment-grade.

“This expanded reporting shows the increasing professionalism and sophistication of the seniors housing operators who are able and ready to report the data in a standard file format with standard field definitions,” said John Cobb, executive vice president and chief investment officer of Ventas, who has championed the initiative among capital providers.

In addition to support from the large REITs and lenders, the data initiative is endorsed by the board of directors for Argentum (formerly the Assisted Living Federation of America), as well as software provider MatrixCare, which is making software changes that will allow clients to generate reports in the NIC format. NIC also is working with other software providers to incorporate the NIC reporting format.

Twenty-seven rental operators currently supply the actual rent and leasing data on more than 3,000 properties. They include Aegis Senior Living, Atria Senior Living, Belmont Senior Living, Benchmark Senior Living, Brandywine Senior Living, Brightview Senior Living, Brookdale Senior Living, Elmcroft Senior Living, Enlivant, Five Star Senior Living, Gardant Management Solutions, Harbor Retirement Associates, Holiday Retirement, Kisco Senior Living, Leisure Care, Legend Senior Living, Life Care Services, MBK Senior Living, Pathway Senior Living, Principal Senior Living Group, Senior Lifestyle, Senior Resource Group, Silverado Senior Living, Spectrum Retirement Communities, Sunrise Senior Living, Vi Living and Vista Springs.

“Providing this level of data increases transparency into seniors housing and care, which should attract more capital, thereby lowering the cost of capital,” said Scott Estes, executive vice president and chief financial officer for Welltower. “We hope more operators will join NIC in this initiative so we can put the right information in the hands of industry decision makers.”

NIC is collecting data from operators with five or more properties. All data are kept confidential and reported only in the aggregate, according to the organization. Those interested in participating may contact Brian Connolly at [email protected] or (443) 837-2420.