Commercial/Multifamily News Briefs Nov. 17, 2022
HUD Releases New CNA eTool Training
HUD released new training on its Capital Needs Assessment eTool, with more modules on the way.
HUD’s existing online training can be found here:
https://www.hudexchange.info/trainings/learning-pathways/master-the-cna-e-tool-version-3-0/ . The link for the HUD exchange training is called “Learning Pathway”
- The first three ‘steps’ has video clips of basic level overviews;
- Step six has a list of videos that get more into additional details.
HUD Technical Support Division has developed six modules of Web-Based Training platform and is in the process of completely updating one of the modules using a whole new online training platform using more modern technology.
Freddie Mac Multifamily Identifies Areas that Support Economic Opportunity
A new white paper from Freddie Mac Multifamily introduces a different approach for identifying areas that could offer residents economic opportunity.
Using two methodological approaches to analyze and plot every census tract within an opportunity matrix, the research provides a new way to identify where affordable housing investments might benefit very low-, low- and moderate-income renters. The research, which is a component of Freddie Mac’s Duty to Serve plan, aims to present a spectrum of high opportunity areas with a specific focus on renter households.
“The goal of our research is to build a deeper understanding of what makes an area high opportunity,” said Steve Guggenmos, Vice President of Research & Modeling for Freddie Mac Multifamily. “Supporting affordable housing in these areas can improve residents’ economic and social mobility.”
Freddie Mac’s approach is a hybrid of two key measures: Opportunity Atlas, established by Raj Chetty and his team at Opportunity Insights, and a new proprietary Location Score, created by Freddie Mac Multifamily Research & Modeling team. “One score, Opportunity Atlas, identifies intergenerational income mobility while the other, Location Score, measures the quality of a location based on its correlation with rental property performance,” said Guggenmos. “The combination of the two allows us to focus specifically on renter households’ opportunity.”
Freddie Mac found that its new measure overlapped significantly with the established definition of High Opportunity Areas, as set by the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The researchers identified other areas that are not considered high opportunity areas under the current definition even though they have similar characteristics. The new methodological-based approach also allows areas to be differentiated based on the level of opportunity they may offer renters.
“The key takeaway is that we should view the opportunity an area offers on a continuum and not as a binary choice,” said Sara Hoffmann, director of Research & Modeling at Freddie Mac Multifamily. “Doing so can help ensure that the industry understands and targets areas that can best serve households.”
Freddie Mac’s white paper titled Expanding our Understanding of High Opportunity Areas for Renters is available at FreddieMac.com.
Strawberry Fields Begins Trading on the OTCQX Markets
Strawberry Fields REIT, South Bend, Ind., an owner and lessor of skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities and long-term acute care hospitals in the Midwest and southern U.S., started trading on the OTC Markets Group under the symbol “STRW”.
OTCQX is an operator of regulated markets for trading 12,000 U.S. and international securities.
“My partners and I invested significant time and energy to build our company, starting with the acquisition of 33 properties in Indiana and Illinois from 2005 through 2014. Since 2014, we have since expanding our regional footprint to where we are today with, 74 standalone facilities and four dual-purpose properties,” said Moishe Gubin, Chairman & CEO of Strawberry Fields REIT.
Strawberry Fields REIT currently owns and leases properties in Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas.
Across the Strawberry Fields REIT portfolio, average facility occupancy is 65.1%, as of June 2022. The current payor mix is 73% Medicaid, 13% Medicare, 8% insurance and 6% private. Average facility size is approximately 130 beds.
Aeon Investments: U.S. Institutional Investors Pessimistic about Fixed-Income Market
Further rises in interest rates and inflation are the biggest concerns U.S. pension funds and other US institutional investors have about the fixed income market, reported Aeon Investments, London.
Aeon surveyed U.S.-based professional investors who collectively have nearly $87 billion in assets under management.
Some 95% of survey respondents said they are concerned about further rises in interest rates, with 55% of these calling themselves “very concerned.” The corresponding figures for inflation are 90% and 55%, and for falling valuations of fixed income assets, the figures are 85% and 45% respectively.
Nearly 70% of those surveyed said they are concerned about central bank tightening policies (40% are very concerned about this), and 70% said this about poor yields on many traditional fixed income assets (45% are very concerned about this).
Aeon noted 35% of U.S. pension funds and other institutional investors surveyed expect global bond performance to deteriorate further due to these concerns over the next 12 months – some 25% expect a significant decline. Just 25% said they believe global bond performance to improve over the next 12 months.
