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Ventas Acquires High-Quality Healthcare Campus in Providence

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Ventas, Inc. (VTR - Free Report) , the Chicago, IL-based healthcare real estate investment trust (“REIT”) announced the acquisition of a high-quality life science, research and medical campus in Providence, RI from affiliates of Blackstone Real Estate Partners VIII L.P. This acquisition not only enhances Ventas’ portfolio but also strengthens its partnerships with top research universities and opens up huge opportunities for future growth.

The main assets in this transaction include a 269,000-square-foot renovation of South Street Landing (“SSL”), fully leased to Brown University for academic administrative offices, and the Nursing Education Center. It also includes a newly constructed garage, bought for around $130 million. Additionally, this transaction includes nearby sites aimed at development and redevelopment in order to meet demand from universities and research companies.

Ventas is primarily engaged in the acquisition and ownership of seniors housing and healthcare properties, and leasing them to unaffiliated tenants or operating them through independent third-party managers. In fourth-quarter 2016, the company reported normalized funds from operations (“FFO”) per share of $1.03, in line with the Zacks Consensus Estimate as well as the prior-year quarter.

With this acquisition, Ventas has completed more than $350 million of follow-on acquisitions and development projects in university-centered life science, medical and innovation center portfolio. The company anticipates this investment will be accretive to normalized FFO per share in 2017.
 
Currently, Ventas carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Shares of Ventas underperformed the Zacks categorized REIT and Equity Trust - Other industry over the past three months. During that time frame, shares of the company declined 1.7%, whereas the industry gained 0.8%.


 
Investors interested in the REIT sector, may consider stocks like Global Net Lease, Inc. (GNL - Free Report) , CoreSite Realty Corporation (COR - Free Report) and CorEnergy Infrastructure Trust, Inc. . All these stocks carry a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

In the last 30 days, Global Net Lease’s FFO per share for first-quarter 2017 escalated 11.1% to 60 cents.

In the last 30 days, CoreSite Realty’s FFO per share for first-quarter 2017 increased 1% to $1.06.

CorEnergy Infrastructure Trust’ first-quarter 2017 FFO per share estimates moved up 4.7% to $1.12, in the last 30 days.

Note: FFO, a widely used metric to gauge the performance of REITs, is obtained after adding depreciation and amortization and other non-cash expenses to net income. All EPS numbers presented in this write up represent FFO per share.

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