Real estate investors are eagerly snapping-up seniors housing assets across the country as rising demand from an aging population, combined with a shortage of new developments is pushing up profitability, brokers say. 

BJ Bhal and David Kalinowsky, seniors housing transaction specialists with Newmark in Toronto, say 2025 was one of the strongest years for senior housing investments, particularly in private-pay residences. 

The year saw about $2.4 billion in transaction volume in seniors housing assets around the country (prior to the holiday season), Bhal, a senior managing director with Newmark, told RENX in an interview. 

A mega-deal set to close in early 2026 will further inflate those totals. Newmark's team advised the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board in the sale of Amica Senior Lifestyles and its assets and affiliates in Canada to Welltower Inc., an international real estate investment trust that invests in seniors housing, post-acute and health system properties and operators.

That deal, worth $4.6 billion, is set to close in Q1 2026 and is the largest-ever Canadian seniors housing sale. Goldman Sachs & CIBC Capital Markets also advised on that deal.

"So that's $2.4 billion (this year) outside of that massive transaction," Bhal said.

The market is being driven by an aging population that requires higher-quality housing with more involved care for residents late in life. Meanwhile, there is a stark shortage of new seniors housing residences being developed. 

"You've got the first baby boomers turning 80 in 2026, so we've got all of this demand coming in, and we are under supplied," Bhal said. "It's simple economics." 

Newmark seeking buyers for Alberta portfolio

Bhal and Kalinowsky’s team, which also includes executive managing director Mark Gallagher, recently announced for sale a portfolio of nine seniors housing properties in Edmonton and Central Alberta.

Called The Christenson Portfolio, it includes 1,127 condo-style retirement suites with a mix of 70 per cent private pay and 30 per cent funded revenue. It also includes excess land potential at four of the sites. 

The properties fell under creditor protection proceedings, according to the CBC, which reported in October The Christenson Group of Companies owes millions of dollars to Alberta seniors and their family members under life-lease housing contracts.

Bhal and Kalinoswky could not provide details on the financial challenges linked to the properties, noting the sensitive nature of the situation, but said they fall within class-A seniors living. They expect the sales process to be competitive among REITs and private investors.

"So far in our process, we've had a significant amount of interest from across the country, and it's been really well received in the market," Bhal said.

Profitability of seniors housing surges

Kalinowsky, a managing director with Newmark, said the existing inventory of seniors housing is typically profitable. 

"National occupancy in 2025 is now about 93 per cent, and most operators have seen healthy revenue and net operating income and growth, and so that is certainly making the investment class very attractive," he said. 

"Seniors housing is projected to have a higher net operating income growth than any other real estate class through 2030," he said, adding projected occupancy nationally is expected to reach 95 per cent in 2026. 

Operational costs climbed during the complexities of the pandemic but have since eased, Kalinowsky said. 

Bhal said private capital groups are seeking seniors housing assets, in competition with the larger institutional investors or REITs. 

"We've had more conversations in the last year (with private groups) than we have in the past five years with these groups, and so there's just a lot of capital out there that is ready to be deployed in the sector," Bhal said.

Most acquisitions during the past year have been by large institutions such as Chartwell, Sienna Senior Living and Welltower. 

The seniors housing inventory in Canada is roughly half private pay and half subsidized or government funded. Kalinowsky said the overwhelming amount of appetite is for private assets due to higher profitability. 

Developers not building enough seniors housing

Developers have not been able to catch up to rising demand. Only one per cent of total seniors housing inventory is being built, proportionally, on an annual basis. Kalinowsky said that means we're losing space as residences become obsolete. 

Canada’s senior population is growing rapidly, with the number of people 75 or older expected to reach around 5.3 million in the next 10 years — an increase of 1.7 million people, according to Cushman and Wakefield's Seniors Housing Industry Overview. "This represents a compound annual growth rate of 4.1 per cent," the report said. 

"The rate of obsolescence of older seniors housing supply is an under-appreciated component of the limited supply outlook," the report said. "In 2024, 1.2 per cent of the existing seniors housing units were removed from the private pay seniors housing inventory in Canada."

Kalinowsky expects more developers to launch new seniors residences, or to convert pending condo projects or purpose-built market rental projects into homes for seniors.

"When we speak to our retirement clients, they say that their phones are ringing off the hook from condo developers looking to find an alternative use for their sites," he said. 

But those developments are not happening quickly enough to match the rising needs of our aging population, he added. 

Investors and seniors housing residents are flying to quality, the Newmark team says. That partly means more residents and their families are seeking homes in residences offering full care, or a continuum of care, for residents as they age in place. 

Residents and families don't want to relocate to another home as medical needs increase, Bhal said.