Have you ever played a round of golf and thought, 'This is a lot like running a business'? Chad Anfinson, Executive Vice President of Franchise and Acquisitions for Silver Treasures Senior Living, has. Join us as Chad shares how his love for the fairways applies to his approach in the senior living sector, and how striking that delicate balance between personal passion and professional acumen can lead to a hole-in-one in business.
As we navigate the course of our discussion, we delve into the pressing issues faced by the senior living industry, including the ever-rising labor costs, the impact of building size on care, and the concern of affordability. Yet, as with any challenging round of golf, strategies, and solutions are at hand. Take a swing into how Silver Treasures employs innovative strategies, such as the Character Traits Assessment and Universal Employee Model to keep the ball in play and ensure quality care for seniors.
Finally, we'll be putting for the future, discussing the burgeoning impact of baby boomers on the senior living industry and the potential rewards of investing in this sector. We'll also explore the benefits of smaller unit facilities. To wrap up, we share insights on maintaining communication with potential customers and the importance of networking in the industry. So, grab your clubs and join us on this enlightening journey with Chad Anfinson. It's time to tee off!
Have you ever played a round of golf and thought, 'This is a lot like running a business'? Chad Anfinson, Executive Vice President of Franchise and Acquisitions for Silver Treasures Senior Living, has. Join us as Chad shares how his love for the fairways applies to his approach in the senior living sector, and how striking that delicate balance between personal passion and professional acumen can lead to a hole-in-one in business.
As we navigate the course of our discussion, we delve into the pressing issues faced by the senior living industry, including the ever-rising labor costs, the impact of building size on care, and the concern of affordability. Yet, as with any challenging round of golf, strategies, and solutions are at hand. Take a swing into how Silver Treasures employs innovative strategies, such as the Character Traits Assessment and Universal Employee Model to keep the ball in play and ensure quality care for seniors.
Finally, we'll be putting for the future, discussing the burgeoning impact of baby boomers on the senior living industry and the potential rewards of investing in this sector. We'll also explore the benefits of smaller unit facilities. To wrap up, we share insights on maintaining communication with potential customers and the importance of networking in the industry. So, grab your clubs and join us on this enlightening journey with Chad Anfinson. It's time to tee off!
My favorite story is we have a franchise that's in the Jacksonville Florida market and they came here in their 20s and became citizens and they had a dream. They had a dream to be owners of their own business. That's why they came here. They came here from the Philippines. They came to us and said we want to own our own building. So, make a long story short, we helped them get that down payment to open up their own 16 bed. We presented them with an opportunity. They had some of it and they asked their family, friends, loved ones, everything they scraped what they could, backed up the rest of it to help them. That's how much we believed them. Open the building, built the building 16 units, they stabilized that building in nine months and now they're sitting on 32 units on three and a half acres and they do very well.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Senior Housing Investors Podcast. If you are an owner operator, investor, developer or buyer of senior housing, you've come to the right place. The best way to stay connected with us is to sign up for our weekly newsletter at HavenSeniorInvestmentscom. This podcast doesn't exist without you and our community. Thank you for listening and reach out to us anytime.
Speaker 3:Welcome back everyone. Today, our host, john Haber, is having a conversation with Chad Anfinson, with Silver Treasures Senior Living. Listen in as they discuss a variety of important topics, including current concerns in senior living, as well as success stories from their unique franchise model, john.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Kelsey. Today we have Chad Anfinson with us. Over the last 20 years His focus has been in the senior living industry. He's worked in all facets of senior living and has a firm concept and experience, from ground floor daily operations to upper level executive decisions. He is currently the executive vice president of franchise and acquisitions for Silver Treasures Senior Living. Welcome, Chad. Thank you for being on the show.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thanks for having me. I appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no problem. Tell us a little bit about yourself. What do you like to do personally? Tell us a little bit about your current position and what you do in the business.
Speaker 1:Well, you've got to have good work-life balance. I am an avid golfer. I enjoy the game tremendously. Just being outside, I enjoy the game of golf. I like being outside, like being with my family. We do a lot of stuff in the outdoors but when you get to a particular age you can't play the contact sports anymore. So no more football and basketball and things such as that. So golf is what it is. Love the game tremendously. It does translate over into from a business standpoint for me. I have learned quite a bit on the golf course and have been able to apply it into business. As someone who's been involved in senior living for multiple years, all the way from the bottom to the top, I've learned quite a bit on different facets of the business and the industry in itself and been very fortunate over my career. So it's senior living and golf, I guess is what you'd say and family, let's not forget that.
Speaker 2:There you go. So tell us what facets of golf correlate to the senior living industry and what have you learned from the game of golf that helps you in the day-to-day business of senior housing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, what a good question. Patience right. I think patience more than anything. We open up a new building or a new facility or a new community and right off the bat we want to have it full. We need that census right. But I think sometimes we have to be patient in terms of how we collect that census. We have to be careful that we are setting up and building the right reputation so that we can continue on what I would call like positive census, a positive type move in. Understandably, we've got to pay the bills and whatnot, but sometimes risk doesn't always reap the reward that you're looking for. So I've learned that in golf as well. Right, can I carry it, you know, 240 over water to a tuck pin? In my mind I think I can, but is it going to be the best shot for me? It's kind of the same thing when we go into business in general Does the risk it doesn't outweigh the reward and do we need to be patient and just kind of wait a little bit?
Speaker 2:That's awesome, man. I get out on the golf course and those frustrations associated with my setup and my swing. You know, it's really about practice. It's about practice, practice, practice getting out there and hitting the ball and having a great swing. So how did you get into senior living and what companies have you worked for?
Speaker 1:I like to tell people it was a calling, but I think the reality is is I kind of fell into it. I got out of college and went to go work for Warner Brothers and it just didn't suit me, is what I would say. So I came back to Florida and, you know, got an apartment close to where my dad lived and just wanted to be back around family and I was like I got to do something. You know, I've got these degrees hanging on the wall and I've got to do something with them. So next thing, you know, I see this sales director opportunity presented itself in a brand new facility in St Augustine, florida. That was my dream. I never wanted to move further away from the beach, I just wanted to be closer to St Augustine's, right there on the beach. So I said, well, let's go interview and see what we can do, to see if we can make it happen. Lo and behold, I get the job.
Speaker 1:Never worked in senior living but I had a real firm understanding about marketing and sales and some say I would have the gift gap and I was very comfortable around seniors. I was raised around. My grandparents, raised primarily, did a lot of raising me, so I was very comfortable in that environment and that's kind of how it all happened. And lo and behold, I meet the right people and they take me under their wing and they just taught me as much as possible. And I was at that time I was I was young and gunning for it and I wanted the big CEO positions and I would take anything they do at, me Didn't matter. So pretty fortunate in that situation and that's kind of how it all came about.
Speaker 2:What are some of the companies you've worked for?
Speaker 1:I spent a majority of my time with Emeritus Senior Living, which was based out of Seattle Washington. It was in a time where they were in this growing phase. By the time I came on board they were probably had 80 buildings nationwide give or take. By the time that Brookdale purchased them or some say purchased, some say acquired, what are you know by that time I think they were close to like 700 plus buildings. They had really done really well for themselves. I had opportunities to go out to Seattle quite a few times and meet the Dan Bates of the world and what have you.
Speaker 1:So I spent most of my career with Emeritus. In between there I spent a little bit of time with Somerville, which was acquired by Emeritus, and then Brookdale, spent quite a bit of time with Brookdale and kind of branched out a little bit and worked with some smaller companies. I think that was kind of a trend. We started to see management companies that were a little bit smaller. They had 10, 15 buildings under in their portfolio. I really felt like I wanted to kind of get that experience. So I went on and worked with a company called SRI, which stood for Superior Residents Incorporated. So I had this big mix of big publicly traded corporate conglomerates, whatever I had, and then down to I wouldn't call them mom and pops, I would call them that middle of the road growth. They're wanting to grow. They wanted to get those management contracts or wanted to do a lot of new development. So those are primarily the companies I spent a majority of my time with. Not only that and then kind of breaking out of my own.
Speaker 2:Well, you know that's great to hear that. You've had both the big shop experience, the public companies and then the smaller 10 to 15 facility, and now you're part of an organization that is ground up, growing, and so all your experience coming into Silver Treasure senior living is going to benefit Florida for now and as you expand nationwide, it's going to be a great benefit for your experience to come in and help them grow. But you know, one of the things that we always talk about is what are our concerns about the senior housing industry, the senior. You know what's going on in senior living today and how can we see things change. And I understand, based on our previous conversations, you have a heart for change in this industry. So what areas of concern do you have?
Speaker 1:Probably at the top is the affordability factor for seniors and then from there it's like a trickle down effect because a lot of things affect that cost, right, a lot of those items are passed through to the consumer, ie the seniors. So you know, labor costs are that. That's going to be something that we're going to be battling for the next. You know, 10, 15 years I remember times where a caregiver in Florida you could just be a caregiver, you didn't have to be a CNA. But I can remember a time where $8.50. We were kind of looking at that and going, oh my goodness, you know that's a dollar more than we paid two years ago and we were trying to factor that in into our operating expense ratios. You know, now we're talking 2025, we're going to see $15 an hour, primarily in the state of Florida, just for somebody who's never worked in caregiving per se. That's a direct pass through to the consumer.
Speaker 1:Our labor is the largest expense in our business and primarily when we're looking at rent rates and those items, you know we take a strong look at the cost. We take a strong look at our revenue and what's the percentage of labor that that revenues paying? And the higher the number, the higher my rent has to be. So with that being said, I mean labor cost costs to the seniors. How can they afford it? Probably the other thing that's a little bit of a concern is the size of the buildings, and that's what the volume based business and that's what majority of investors want to see. You know your top three investors in senior housing. They want to build 100, 120, 150 unit buildings and they're gorgeous. They're beautiful. However, they're all going to be fighting for that two or 3% of that demographic, not the 20, 25% that are more middle market. You know we don't really have a strong focus in middle market, so there's another concern. So those are some of the top concerns that I think about regularly.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about labor real quick, chad. Yeah, it's on everyone's mind, it's not only in the senior living industry. I spoke with a long-term owner of assisted living in Pennsylvania and he says that 10 people respond to an opening for a CNA position and none of them show up. What is it going to take for this industry to encourage and ties make the position of caregiving high on a list of individuals who want for a job?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I really wish I had the answer. I think when you have a Wendy's or a Wawa gas station that's starting people out at $16 an hour and we're talking to people about doing a role that might be a little more labor intensive, at 13 to 15 an hour, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. What we do know is that there are very passionate and caring people out there that have been presented with the calling to take care of others. We do know that. I think it's about attracting those people. And then how do we make those people more efficient and productive so that we're not having to put so much stress on the labor cost, the total labor cost, which in turn increases the rent cost?
Speaker 1:What type of technologies can we start to look into so that a caregiver can have a lot more information at their fingertips so they know exactly what that person may need at that particular time? Let's take a better look, in my opinion. Let's take a better look at that. Let's get the passionate, caring people. Let's pay them what they deserve if we have to meet that $15 an hour, but let's also, too, make them extremely efficient and productive by using technology.
Speaker 2:How do you uncover an individual that is passionate and caring when someone's sitting across from you? How do you determine whether or not that individual is going to have those traits?
Speaker 1:I think. One, we have to be a good judge of character. Two, we have to be able to hire from the beginning. We got to get out of this mode where we are hiring just to fill a spot, because we're concerned about overtime or we're concerned about using agency at almost a quarter or more of the overtime cost that you would have. We should be very comfortable in testing the waters with somebody and being very open and honest and hopefully seeing them put their best foot forward and really earning the role.
Speaker 1:Then, if it's something that just doesn't meet, it's like a relationship. If this isn't going to work, why drag it out for either party? Because we're all going to be miserable. I don't know if you're just straight capable of noticing that right off the bat. If we all sat there and said I just had this gut feeling, we would probably rip through 100 interviews and maybe two people gave us that gut feeling. If we're truly as leaders and we truly find ourselves compassionate and caring and are willing to do that role and be able to, willing to show people, then we've got to see in others what we see in ourselves.
Speaker 2:That's understandable. I go back to Jim Collins book Good to Great. Jim says put the right people on the right seat on the bus. We go here to Haven Senior Investments. Our consulting division actually has an area called people strategy. Part of that people strategy is assessing our people using what we call the predictive index. From the predictive index we're actually able to predict an individual's behaviors and be able to build a team off of that. I was at the NIC conference and I asked a bunch of operators do you assess your people before you hire? Not one of them said yes. It's one of the first industries I've been in that doesn't use assessments in the hiring process. It's very interesting to hear you say gut feeling. I tend to go, yes, gut, but also assess. Just a thought.
Speaker 1:It's funny to say predictive index. In my years with Emeritus and their growth years, they pulled a lot of stuff like that out. I think that's, at that time, is what made them grow so quickly. I can remember coming on board when they went public and the stock price was like 14 cents it may have been a little bit higher, that's as a youngster. I remember being super low and being concerned. I didn't know enough about the stock market then. With that being said, they grew up to $40 a share. In my mind it was because they were using innovative tools such as that to try to build very successful teams and be able to predict how those teams would react to certain indicators. A lot of those folks that I worked around went on to lead their own companies. They're leading some of the best senior living companies today. They went out and started their own that predictive indicator. That was a tool, something very similar to that, that they used. It might have been 2005 that we're using it or somewhere in that ballpark.
Speaker 2:One of the others that I was introduced to by one of my partners in the business was the Energy Leadership Index. This assessment actually assesses what behaviors happen when a person is under stress. One of the greatest tools we've used in the senior living business is because we want to make sure that those who are taking care of our seniors especially when you're dealing with dementia or you're dealing with behavioral issues they respond effectively with love and kindness rather than if I'm going to lose, you're going to lose too. It's really how do they handle situations under stress? Do they go to a very low level of fear or anxiety or do they go into a stressful situation with a high level of love? That's the Energy Leadership Index. The Energy Leadership Index and the Predictive Index are the two of the four that we use. We also use the Enneagram.
Speaker 2:My son introduced us to an assessment called the Character Trades Assessment. The Character Trades, basically, is a very quick assessment that has 24 different character traits and it ranks you on those traits. It's interesting is that one of those traits that we find absolutely necessary to be part of our executive team is honesty. If honesty is not number one, number two or number three of those character traits. We know that that individual is not going to be honest with us in terms of what they feel, how they act with others and such Very interesting. We've gone from labor into how we deal with labor. I appreciate the conversation. It's really awesome. You talk about the universal employee model. What is that? I've never heard that term.
Speaker 1:We take a look at it because of how we build models and how we develop our buildings more of a boutique style, middle range size, geared towards middle market. To do that we won't have the revenue streams per se that a 120-bed or 120 unit facility has. We are not going to have a mass influx of employees that work in different departments. They're universally. They're a staff member. Universally they are working to help dietary get out the best meal imaginable. Universally they're working to help make sure that we maintain a very clean environment. They're universally are helping to give proper care. They're also customer service oriented. When family members walk in, when guests walk in, they're being greeted by one of our staff members who is a universal employee. We like to say that they wear a lot of different hats. We're not going to be really heavy staffed in that middle management type positions, it's just one. It's not really sustainable for us.
Speaker 1:It sounds great in theory to add more people to the mix, but I think there's a couple rules and theories out there that say the more people you add, the less productive you come. I learned that firsthand in college when I worked for a bread company that made specially breads and I was a business student, I thought I knew everything. A gentleman from Albania who was the bread chef, so to speak. I looked at him and said we should add two more people, we could make more bread. He looked right at me and said too many hands in on the bread makes for bad bread. I didn't understand it then. Then, later on in life, I started reading about productivity and productivity scales, and at what point does productivity drop off, and so on and so forth. That's how we classify a universal employee or staff member.
Speaker 2:Thanks, chad, appreciate that. Tell our audience about Silver Treasures and why you feel that what they're doing is providing multiple solutions to the problems that we just spoke about.
Speaker 1:We own our own buildings. We have some buildings that we own outright. We also have a franchise division. That's where I come in. The beauty of the design that our majority owners had was they wanted to be able to focus on middle market, focus on boutique style, build a very strong, well-received community, but also to give the smaller investor or the smaller owner operator an opportunity to take care of others.
Speaker 1:We typically our models. We look between 16 and 32 units of assisted living. We try not to go outside of that unless it's an acquisition and one of our franchisees is interested in that type of model. We also, too, we focus on keeping independent and assisted living separate. For us. We may look at a piece of land that's not 10 acres. We don't need 10 acres to do what we need to do. We can build what we do on three acres as long as zoning is permitted. We like to have a separate, independent living so that we can have a different focus and we can transition those residents to assisted living at a much later date.
Speaker 1:We build based on needs and not necessarily wants. We're not throwing in the amenities that we have in bigger buildings and gorgeous buildings that we have to beg residents to use. We're not going to have the pools. We're not going to have the movie theaters. We're going to have multi-purpose rooms but we're not going to have these rooms that look great and they look great to the children that are touring with mom and their mom. The children are really wanting mom to move in. There are an increased cost on the bill cost or an increased cost on the upkeep. That again is all a pass through to the consumer.
Speaker 1:We feel with the 16 to 32 unit model, that we can reach out to a much larger base of future owners because of the cost. We can help them. We also feel as if we can capture a lot more of that middle market. We're not going to have on average $6,000 rent rates that are geared towards the upper echelon of seniors who have a large disposable income. We also feel from a labor perspective that using Universal Worker and having that middle of the road size, so to speak, we're not having to staff at a level because we have so many departments and so many residents to take care of. We're not going to staff at a level where our labor to revenue is going to be 35, 36, 37, 38% of your revenue goes to pay labor. We're not even going to be close in that ballpark. Those are some of the things how we see not only our buildings, our current buildings, but also, too, how the franchise of Silver Treasures can help those and provide a strong environment for middle market seniors.
Speaker 2:I got my start actually at Haven Senior Investments when I walked into a 16-bed in Denver. It's the first time I've ever seen a 16-bed built and walked in. It was beautiful. It was in a residential neighborhood, on a commercial lot. These are not residential care facilities, these are commercial properties. Walking into it it was just like walking into a home. The kitchen was open, individual residents could come and get an apple out of the refrigerator if they wanted to. The staff were happy, the individual resident didn't have to walk very far for activities, didn't have to walk down a long hallway and the staff had their eyes on them. What is the difference between, in terms of margins, in terms of staffing, between a 16-bed and a 32-bed facility?
Speaker 1:From a 16-32,. Our margins are going to be just as good, if not better, in terms of your PM, your profit margins. It has a lot to do with labor. It has a lot to do with the raw food cost. It has a lot to do with we'll have a stronger well, typically, we'll have a stronger volunteer base because, again, boutique Styles presents more like a family environment. We have that opportunity because we typically look in smaller communities where people are attached to that little town and they want to volunteer and be part of it. Therefore, we can use that to our advantage a little bit. Our margins will be just the same, if not stronger. We have franchises that are currently seeing 43% profit margins. I don't think we've seen that for it's been quite a while since I've seen previous 2020. I think we had some buildings that were out there. In my experience, the highest profit margin building I've ever seen was a Brookdale building that was in the ballpark of like 55% profit margin. I was this. Out of 1300 buildings, it was the strongest PM building they've had. It was one of my older buildings that I turned over to someone who I brought up through the ranks, so to speak. That's another story In terms of staffing, we have to follow the regulations.
Speaker 1:When you take a look at a lot of regulations, especially in the state of Florida, we're counting everybody other than administrative staff, the universal worker. My caregivers are our caregivers. Not only are they providing care, but they're also hands-on in the dining situation. They know exactly what Ms Sherry likes, what she dislikes. They're not having to necessarily go to a binder that's kept that has written down what she likes. They work with her every day. They're like the grandchildren. They know exactly what she's allergic to. Although we do have to keep a document on that. Really, if we didn't have to by state requirements, we really don't have to, because my caregivers can tell you exactly what Ms Sherry likes, dislikes, what she wants to drink, when she wants to drink, what time she's going to go to bed, when does she want to go to bed?
Speaker 1:We're not having to fill in a lot of fluff. As it pertains to the labor side, our labor cost per unit, if we just did it like that as a statistic or an analysis, our labor costs are going to be less per unit period and our labor costs are going to be yet less per resident. We're not going to have your sales director, sales associate, your front desk employee. We're just not going to have that. We've got an administrative assistant in a building with an owner operator primarily, and that is somebody that you look that can wear a lot of hats, right, from a maintenance perspective, sometimes we bring in a part-time maintenance person that helps with room flips and things such as that, but the reality is is we're not needing that person full-time, right, so we can cut a lot of corners when it comes to that, just because of the size of the buildings.
Speaker 2:I appreciate that and I really love the model I've had on the podcast numerous owners that own 16-bed, 32-bed multiple buildings on a piece of land with living and orders for their staff. New models are incorporating daycare onto a piece of land so that their employees can have daycare there on site, and then the intergenerational model where those kids come into the building itself too. So it's wonderful. So tell us a little bit more about the Silver Treasures Franchise Opportunities and the type of franchise partners you currently have.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean we've got everything from former executive directors who work for particular organizations who did well financially as an executive director, but they just really always they're the type that always said if I had my own building, if this was mine and you hear that a lot in the executive director chairs. We have those folks that have joined with us and we have given them the opportunity to finally say I own my own community and this is how I do it, this is how I want to do it, this is how, if I own my own community, I would do it. They've saved up enough to be able to get their foot in the door and we've helped them out along the way, whether that be because we're approved by small business associations and what have you and they're doing really well. We have a couple attorneys. They were former attorneys and actually worked in that type of the healthcare industry as an attorney and just said this is something I want to do. I want to be an owner operator and that's what they are. They have their own building and that particular building does very well. It does very well. They're in a great location. They're around the corner from two rehabs, they're next door to the hospital. They get a lot of drive by, they get a lot of inquiries. They run a very nice community. They stick to the Silver Treasures brand, which is nice.
Speaker 1:In terms of future partners, we have interest from groups that want to do master franchises. We're currently in talks with a group right now. They want to do a lot of new development. They want to help us stretch outside of the state of Florida. We have a couple projects that we're going to be completing here in the near future in the Texas market. We're national and that's what our goal is is we want to provide help to those that really have a calling for it, that really have a desire, that really have a background in taking care of others seniors. We want to be able to give them an opportunity to say, well, yeah, you can own your own community. It doesn't have to be 160 units and then you don't have to build 32 right off the bat. If we can't afford that, what we can do is we can find the right piece of land that we can expand. Once we reach stabilization in our first building, we can leverage that to expand to our second building, even though building up is always a little bit more affordable. But some of our partners have done that.
Speaker 1:My favorite story is we have a franchise that's in the Jacksonville Florida market and they came here in their 20s and became citizens and they had a dream. They had a dream to be owners of their own business. That's why they came here. They came here from the Philippines super nice, loving, caring people. They came across as they were working in an assisted living, both of them husband and wife working in an assisted living for another company. One was a nurse and the other was in maintenance. They came to us and said we want to own our own building.
Speaker 1:We went through all of the assessments that you were talking about. We had our own internal assessments and we finally came to the conclusion that these were the right people. So, to make a long story short, we helped them get that down payment to open up their own 16 bed. We presented them with an opportunity. They had some of it and they asked their family, friends, loved ones, everything they scraped what they could. We backed up the rest of it to help them. That's how much we believed in them. Open the building, built the building 16 units. They stabilized that building in nine months we reevaluated and we leveraged it and now they're sitting on 32 units on three and a half acres Once 16 units of memory care, 20, I think it's 26 beds and then 16 units of assisted living.
Speaker 1:I think that one runs 22 beds, I think, somewhere in that ballpark and they do very well. They are looking now to expand to another part of Florida. Those are the type people that we look for. Those are the type people that we know that they're going to be owner operators, they're going to love what they do and they feel like it was a calling for them. That's not to say that some that want to be more of a hands-off type of ownership or we're not opposed to that, but it does. You do have to be engaged in the business and understand that this is a business of taking care of people. There are some parts of real estate to it, however. First and foremost, you got to take care of the people and everything else will follow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we always say to those who come to us that it is an operational play. It is a you're taking care of people, typically at the end of their lives, and so individuals come through Haven Senior Investments website. They Google how do I start an assisted living business? They come to us and we let them know that we work with individuals that want to purchase and or build 16 beds and greater. What are the financial aspects of this business so that we can allow our listeners to understand what it's going to take for them to get into this business from the get go?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, obviously you're going to have different types of loan opportunities, whether that be through small business or that just be standard bank loans or what have you. There are some opportunities where we can talk a little bit more about creative type fundings, depending on what you're purchasing, what the land is. I mean there's there's a lot of ways that nowadays that we can get real creative to help those out. You know our buildings are going to be it's hard to say now because some of the bill costs have gone up at 16 units. You know, depending on where you're at, what state you're in, you know 16 units can be anywhere from 2.5 to 3.5 million, plus you've got your down payment to get your to acquire your loan. You know that sounds like a lot to the everyday Joe, but when you're talking about your competitor five miles down the road just got finished building a $40 million project it's really not as much. It's a little bit easier to acquire that right, especially when we're talking about the down payment.
Speaker 1:If you're going through the SBA, in terms of what your reward is and I don't want to talk about philosophical rewards, you know, because I think those that get into this industry, we should have that caring in our heart to take care of others. But in terms of the financial reward, you know, real estate is still in my opinion. It's still keen. It's still the strongest investment you can make. If I take a piece of land and I put a cash flowing business on it, it's going to reap rewards for a very long time and not only that, I'm going to increase the value of said land. That is one of the best investments you can make to this day. Still so, when we look at that, that couple I talked about that came from the Philippines. When they first came here they had hardly anything. They had friends and families and loved ones. That was it. They didn't have money. Now that couple is sitting on. Their net worth is in the ballpark of about $6.5 million. Where else can you do that?
Speaker 1:We all know why the big investors have gotten involved in senior living. We all know why because it's a needed business. It's driven by need. We have to have it, we have to take care of our seniors and it was an opportunity for them to kind of sidestep the apartments and say you know, maybe we should look at the senior living thing right. They've got a lot of revenue streams above and beyond what apartment complexes do. So why can't we do that for the smaller investor, the smaller owner operator? We can. We just have to think just a little smaller, not necessarily bigger, just smaller.
Speaker 2:I completely agree, and I did want to state that also there are other parts of the assisted living business. That includes mental health assisted living. It includes brain injury assisted living. It's not just seniors, and these smaller 16 to 32 bed facilities are just so wonderful and peaceful that it allows, I think, better care. I think the value that you bring to the resident is, I believe, so much higher than the larger big box. But that's just a bias on my part. There are many examples of high level of care out of Brookdale, out of Morningstar senior living, out of those that build these larger facilities. But it's interesting, the baby boomers have a different take on how they want to live in their golden years. So just one last question. You know, what are you seeing from the baby boomers? Those that are entering, maybe, independent living and those that have dementia are entering memory care. What are you finding that this group wants out of assisted living?
Speaker 1:As we continue to see more of the baby boomers. What we do know about the baby boomers obviously it's the largest generation and whatnot, but they are also part of that sandwich generation. They were taking care of kids and spending disposable income on their kids to get them to college, and then they were also supplementing their parents. They don't have as much of that leftover income as previous generations. Now we're going to have some of those within the baby boomers, but a majority of what we see, what I see are those that look at it and say I don't need the frills. I had a $40 million project in the area that I live in and we had a cafe. We had two dining rooms restaurants is what we call them. We had a huge swimming pool. We had a $1 million value-rated rehab room like we had it all. It was like pulling teeth to get people to use it. Not only are they more price conscious, but they're also two more value conscious. Do I really need that? That's what we see and that's what I've seen over the last couple of years. You're going to have those outliers that come across and they do. You know what they want. The Taj Mahal Good, they know what they want. That's amazing. That narrows down where we can help them, where we can present them to.
Speaker 1:Now, briefly, you were talking about better care in smaller communities. I agree with you 100%. It's not that the bigger communities give bad care, but I think what they lack is communication. The number one thing in any type of business is being able to communicate, and communicate honestly. When we have five different people in a large community laying hands on one resident whether that be from dietary, housekeeping, caregiving, a nurse or what have you if we're not communicating open, honestly, on a regular basis about that person's wants and needs, it gets lost. Therefore, for us it's why we feel universal worker works really well. There's maybe two people we have to communicate with in that day.
Speaker 1:I'm going to go to the cook. Let the cook know Today she's not feeling the mashed potatoes. I'm going to shift change. Hey, just FYI. Ms Sherry is not feeling really well today. She's been in her apartment most of the day, but I did get her out, so just keep an eye on her. It's period blank. Those are some of the things that we see from the wants and needs of the baby boomers that are coming that in fact, they're not really wanting to move out of their house. They really don't. We understand that If we can provide them with an environment that is more closer to a home-like setting less people being intrusive, less people knocking on the door at 6 am, scheduled your shower for 6.10,. Whatever we can do that, then let's do it.
Speaker 2:Chad. I'm really proud of you. I'm proud of what you've done for the industry. I'm proud that you are leading up the effort to spread the word on the 16 to 32 beds. How do people get a hold of you?
Speaker 1:You can give it. You can get a hold of me a couple of different ways. I'm to be honest with you. I call my cell phone. It's the easiest way. I take more franchise possibility calls and acquisition calls through my cell phone and that number is 904-309-3363. If I don't answer, leave me a message or shoot me a text. I'm very good at follow-up when it comes to that. I learned that in my early sales days. Outside of that, I would give you my email, but it's long and drawn out. It's theanfensenatlifestyles, the number for seniorscom. No, it's not a Silver Treasures. It's not a Silver Treasures email. But there's a reason for that, because we are looking at other opportunities and branching out within the senior living industry.
Speaker 2:Well, I appreciate your time. Our listeners appreciate your input. And have a great day and get out on the golf course and shoot those low numbers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I appreciate it and I appreciate the opportunity. Thank you very much, it's been a pleasure.
Speaker 2:You're welcome, thank you.