Healthcare Real Estate, 2013 - How Is It Shaping Up?

With just over half of the year under our belts, it's a good time to look back and evaluate the year thus far.  This can be a valuable exercise – it can help us better understand where we’re headed.  (To look back beyond that, click here for Healthcare Real Estate Insights' review of top trends in healthcare real estate from 2003 to 2012.)

Some predicted that 2013 would be the year that “we become the health care (sic) nation”, with health care being the largest issue that the USA would face in 2013 (Fortune/CNN Money). Although some will not agree with the “largest issue” prediction has been the case, I believe that we can all agree that healthcare and healthcare real estate have been major players in 2013’s economy.

Generally speaking, the reviews thus far this year regarding healthcare real estate have been  overwhelmingly positive, if not outright celebratory, using those terms developers love such as “booming”, “growing”, and “heating up” (see e.g., Construction of Medical Buildings Booming on South Shore (Enterprise News), Demand Accelerates for Medical Office Buildings (NBI Properties), Demand for MOBs Greater Than Ever (GlobeSt.com),  and Construction Booming in Medical Office Building Market (American Medical News)).

Looking back on the first half of 2013, the articles and reports are overwhelming positive.  In making my rounds lately, listening to investors, developers and lenders, their outlook on healthcare real estate is a bit more cautious than much of what I read, but it is still very positive.  And most telling of all?  They are in the game, investing time, money, and effort in healthcare real estate.  In other words, they are looking forward….