National Healthcare Properties agrees to sell 40 outpatient buildings for $531M

National Healthcare Properties has agreed to sell 40 outpatient medical facilities for about $531 million, the second large disposition in a pivot that would leave the REIT with nothing but senior housing. Monday's announcement did not name the buyer and said the deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter.

The 40 buildings work out to about $13.3 million apiece, against $6.1 million in the 86-facility, $528 million May agreement and $2.75 million for each of the final four under a letter of intent, a fivefold spread across properties that sat inside the same 3.7 million-square-foot portfolio at midyear. The announcement offers no breakdown by market, tenancy or building size, and does not say whether the May figure is gross or net of debt, so the gap is documented but unexplained. The May agreement is being executed in pieces: the first tranche of 30 properties closed earlier this month, leaving 56 still to come.

NHP retired the debt on the 40 buildings before putting them up, so it expects to keep roughly 96 cents of every dollar of the $531 million gross proceeds, or $511 million, and to apply that first to its revolving credit facility and then to senior housing acquisitions. The announcement does not say how much is drawn on the revolver.

The 40 buildings now under agreement, the 86 from May and a final four covered by a nonbinding letter of intent account for exactly the 130 outpatient facilities NHP held as of June 30, and their price tags of $531 million, $528 million and $11 million total roughly $1.07 billion of gross proceeds against 3.7 million square feet — about $289 a square foot, and an average of 28,500 square feet a building, a complete exit from the outpatient business. What NHP paid for the book is not disclosed, so whether the sale clears its basis cannot be answered from the announcement.

The operating numbers show the trade from both sides: the outpatient portfolio was 93% occupied at midyear yet saw net operating income fall 2.4% to $20.4 million, a combination that points to rent or cost pressure rather than weak leasing, though the announcement gives no explanation for the decline. Senior housing runs lower on occupancy and higher on rate: NHP's 39 communities, roughly 3,600 units, were 84% occupied at the end of the second quarter, and the average room produced $6,391 a month, up from $6,036 a year earlier, or about 5.9%.

The REIT is trading occupancy for pricing power: it is selling buildings that were 93% full to buy more of a product that fills to 84% but earns more per unit each year, a bet that the rent line determines returns in assisted living and memory care more than the vacancy line does.

Senior housing generated a 10.6% one-year total return in 2025, the best of any commercial real estate asset class, and investors have crowded in even as new construction sits at its lowest point since at least 2012, letting owners raise rents in a sector already expensive to operate. CEO and President Michael Anderson said in a statement that the company believes the long-term demographic trend favors its focused strategy.

A frozen development pipeline and a growing tenant base mean owning communities beats building them, which makes finding properties to buy the constraint for NHP. NHP has lined up roughly $244 million of senior housing purchases covering 724 units, primarily assisted living and memory care, which is about a fifth of the 3,600 units it already operates and less than half the net proceeds from this one sale. The $244 million will need to grow if the roughly $1.07 billion coming in from the exits is to find a home in the sector the REIT is betting on.

The equity record behind the strategy is short: NHP raised $462 million in its April IPO and missed its target, following net losses in each of the prior three years, and the stock has climbed roughly 25% since listing, including a 1% gain on Monday's news — a run that spans the May agreement and this month's first closing under it.

The announcement leaves open what the buyer is underwriting and how the remaining four buildings fit: it does not identify the party taking the largest of the three checks or describe its plans for the portfolio, and it does not say whether that buyer or another would take the final four. A fourth-quarter close would put the biggest slug of capital in motion before year-end and leave the nonbinding letter of intent as the last item standing between NHP and a senior housing business that, at midyear, was 39 communities and roughly 3,600 units, with 724 more identified for purchase.