The National Investment Center’s latest Executive Survey Insights report offered another positive outlook on staffing and occupancy challenges for senior housing providers. Almost all (82%) of participating organizations reported on-going staffing shortages; this is an encouraging decline, as, previously, 90-99% of providers, over the course of the last 18 months’ surveys, reported staffing shortages. In this survey, of the largest providers, 77% reported that 25-50% of all of their properties are experiencing shortages. The top four predominant reasons for these shortages were: inability to hire nurses (48%,) inability to fill nurse aide positions (42%,) wage competition (35%,) and staff turnover (26%.) Since April 2023, providers reported a downward trend in the percentage of open, full-time positions; for example, the April ESI reported that 5% of providers had 0-5% of full-time positions open, whereas this month’s survey reported that same range to be 20% of providers. Correspondingly, the percentage of providers who have 6-10% of full-time positions open dropped from 55% in April to 40% in July. Also encouragingly, 44% of providers felt that staffing challenges will improve by the end of 2023, and another 15% by the middle of 2024.
For the second month in a row, providers reported that other concerns had risen above staffing challenges, including rising operational costs (72%) as the biggest challenge. However, this was offset by promising improvements in occupancy, where the majority of providers reported that occupancy has returned to pre-pandemic levels for IL (47%), nursing (44%) and memory care (37%.) For assisted living, there was an even split between providers whose occupancy has returned to pre-pandemic levels (30%) and those who think occupancy will do so by the end of 2023 (30%.) Overall, the remaining 20-30% of providers felt, across care segments, occupancy would return to pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2023. If providers wish to participate in the next ESI survey, they may do so by clicking here.
(Note to readers: NIC defines “seniors housing” for the purposes of this survey as IL/ AL/ Memory Support/ Nursing care and is not inclusive of affordable housing providers. Additionally, of the 39 organizations submitting data, 54% for for-profit, 41% not-for-profit, and 5% offer both.)
