Australian Unity Investments' head of healthcare and retirement property funds, Chris Smith, said investors in healthcare property could benefit from this in terms of both capital value and income yield.
Mr Smith said there are three main areas that are currently driving demand for healthcare services: population growth, the increasing proportion of the population living beyond 65 and the dramatic rise in lifestyle diseases.
“There will undoubtedly be ongoing and growing demand for healthcare and medical services that federal and state governments will increasingly face difficulties in funding,” said Mr Smith.
Australian Unity Investments is continually seeing opportunities to invest in existing healthcare property assets, he added.
“Both the pace and frequency of these developments have picked up substantially over the past few years, and we expect that more expansions in the future will play an increasingly important role in the delivery of community healthcare services,” he said.
“We continue to see a lot of interest in healthcare investments by both on and offshore REITs and institutional funds, which is a good indicator of the strong outlook for the sector.”
Mr Smith said that consequently, healthcare property is increasingly worthy of consideration as part of a well-diversified portfolio.
