Chicago-based Greene Park Capital has launched a senior living investment platform to “focus on maximizing value by combining our access to capital and deep investment pipeline that includes strong real estate portfolios and operators,” Greene Park Co-Founder and Managing Director Carrie Hiebeler said in a statement.
Founded in 2020, the healthcare real estate investment firm intends to concentrate on small to mid-sized operators with “sophisticated management teams poised for substantial growth,” according to Jason Simmers, co-founder and managing partner.
Greene Park Capital tapped veteran senior living executive Kevin Carden to lead the new platform. According to Simmers, Carden has the ideal background to help the company grow in the senior living investment arena.
“Over the past 30 years, [Carden] has originated and/or completed over $1 billion in senior living and healthcare transactions,” he added.
Carden was senior vice president acquisitions for REDICO, a real estate investor, and American House, its senior living operating company, from 2014 until 2022. Before that, he was senior vice president of corporate finance for specialty investment bank Ziegler from 2002 to 2014. Earlier in his career, he was portfolio manager for senior living for the RREEF Funds and was director of acquisitions for Classic Residence by Hyatt, now known as Vi Senior Living. Carden started his senior living career as a nursing home administrator at Manor Care.
Carden told the McKnight’s Business Daily that now is the perfect time to work on the platform, as the industry moves further toward recovery. He noted that, historically, senior living and care has been a needs-based and resilient sector as far as returns go. The senior living industry has generated consistent returns even during the great financial crisis of 2008, he noted. And then the pandemic hit.
“As we’re emerging from the pandemic, we’ve continually had rising rates, inflation, rising occupancies. There’s also been very little new development,” Carden said. “Additionally, there’s a large demographic shift, which starts to accelerate this year.”
In the current economic climate, he said, a large number of developments need capital, and there are “underperforming situations that need to be resolved.”
“Developments are selling well below replacement costs,” Carden added. “It’s a great time to come in with freshly devoted operating partners, which we intend to do.”
