The UK's Impact Healthcare REIT has invested in a portfolio of six care homes which were owned and operated by Morris Care.
The purchase price is £56 mln (€63 mln), which will partly be paid in cash and partly with an issue of new shares in the company.
The vendors have granted a licence for the homes to continue to trade under the Morris Care brand for three years, while the operational management team of Morris Care will transfer to Welford Healthcare (Welford), which will operate the homes.
Welford is an existing group tenant and the investment will take the group's relationship with Welford to 18 care homes across England with 1,087 beds.
The portfolio has 438 high quality beds, of which 400 have en suite bathrooms, with five homes in Shropshire and one in Cheshire. The homes each have an established track record of delivering strong operational performance.
Four of the homes have EPC ratings of B, and two are rated C, with outline strategies in place for achieving an EPC rating of B.
80% of the £56 mln consideration is payable in cash (£44.8 mln), with the balance to be paid in shares. The funding of the investment has been made initially by way of a loan by the group to Welford.
The structure enables Welford to take immediate operational control of the six homes, thereby avoiding a potentially lengthy transition period while regulatory approvals are sought to register the operation of the homes in new legal entities. New 35-year leases on Impact's standard terms have been agreed, generating initial rent of £3.9 mln, reflecting a gross initial yield of 7.0%.
