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Editor’s note: SHN Senior Editor Tim Regan and SHN Reporter Andrew Christman also contributed to this article.
In 2025, senior living providers are reinventing their models to meet the evolving expectations for older adults as demand grows.
Providers are testing out new changes in meeting affordability concerns, building new partnerships and harnessing new technology to meet customer expectations.
Companies continue to fight through the challenges and their work is worth charting. What follows is a list of senior living operators worth monitoring in 2025:
United Church Homes
In 2025, the senior living industry is still hammering out new models to serve the incoming generation of older adults and their financial needs. United Church Homes is at the front of the pack in that regard, and is worth watching this year for that and other reasons.
The company has three tiers of rental fees based on a resident’s income, with certain communities capable of carrying starting rates for independent living that are on average 53% lower than competitors, according to a 2024 NIC case study. Residents can supplement their stay by acquiring more services on a private basis, including home care and some meals.
The organization keeps cost bases for new projects lower by partnering with real estate developers on joint ventures where the non-profit underwrites some of the pre-development expenses of design and marketing.
While senior living operators have for years sought to widen their potential customer base by making their services more affordable, scaling such services is a barrier. For that reason, United Church Homes’ burgeoning and expanding platform of middle-market projects is worth following.
United Church Homes is also going through a period of change in 2025, making it especially worth keeping an eye on this year. The organization in February named President Ken Young as its new CEO, with former CEO Rev. Dr. Kenneth Daniel staying on until June as strategic advisor. Young, who is now both president and CEO, is this year seeking to strengthen the organization’s middle-market and healthcare offerings, among other services.
How the organization continues its middle-market evolution will no doubt help inform the wider industry as it steps into an important period of demand and resident need.
Silver Birch Senior Living
Silver Birch Senior Living is one of the largest operators of affordable assisted living communities in Indiana, and has plans to expand access to affordable senior living options to other states, highlighting a critical issue on affordability facing the industry in the years ahead.
The Chicago, Illinois-based senior living provider operates nine communities in the Hoosier State, with plans to develop up to 10 affordable assisted living communities in Ohio in the near future, according to CEO Jo Ellen Bleavins. The company’s development wing, Vermillion Development, currently has multiple sites under contract.
Silver Birch offers a financing program that allows assisted living residents to offset costs with Medicaid dollars, and has pushed for expanding access to Medicaid waiver-supported senior living options in the Midwest. The contrast of challenging development conditions due to high financing and construction costs and a demand for affordable living options place Silver Birch at the center of these critical issues.
In August 2024, the Family and Social Services Administration (FSSA) reopened the Indiana Medicaid waiver waitlist, but since then, only a limited number of waivers have been released monthly. In response to the bottleneck, Silver Birch is expanding its offerings beyond waiver availability to long-term care settings.
“By expanding partnerships beyond traditional Medicaid Waiver leads, we are building a more resilient foundation, and one that is less reliant on waiver availability and better positioned for sustainable growth,” Bleavins said.
Earlier this year, Silver Birch also acquired two communities in Phoenix, Arizona totaling 271 units to provide affordable assisted living and memory care options with four apartment layouts available for residents of the newly added properties.
Vermilion Development is active and is advancing the company’s pipeline of new assisted living communities in Ohio, Bleavins said, with Silver Birch and Vermilion celebrating the opening of one community and is “making progress” on multiple sites in varying stages from entitlements to completion.
Also in 2024, the Ohio Department of Medicaid and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) improved an increase in the assisted living reimbursement rate and resulted in the pipeline for 10 projects in Ohio. Construction started on the company’s first Ohio community in December 2024 with plans to “break ground on several more” in 2025, Bleavins said.
The company’s push on affordability exemplifies a growing need for affordable senior housing for older adults unable to pay market-rate or luxury rental rates as the industry faces a “call to action” to meet affordable and middle market demand.
Other operators in the space have called the mounting need for affordable living options for older adults a “crisis,” and force the industry to adopt affordable options.
Millions of older adults currently are unable to pay for senior living units, known as the “forgotten middle,” with the cohort expected to grow to nearly 16 million by 2033, according to NORC at the University of Chicago.
Silver Birch has been named a provider to watch due to the operator’s commitment to affordable senior housing options for older adults, and exemplifies the many challenges associated with building toward
Allegro Living
Allegro and Spring Arbor merged earlier this year to create Allegro Living, showcasing a growing industry trend of operators joining forces to create greater scale and tackle challenges in operations.
Foundry Commercial announced the deal to merge the providers and result in Allegro Living consisting of 53 communities operating under multiple brand lines. Allegro brings a reputation in high-end, purpose-built communities and Spring Arbor brings the backing from Foundry Commercial.
The companies also had a geographic footprint overlap in 13 states in the Midwest, Southeast, Mid-Atlantic and Northeast.
“We realized that Allegro was in markets that we would really like to access, and vice versa,” Foundry President of Healthcare Services Kevin Maddron told Senior Housing News. “It kind of snowballed into a much bigger conversation where we said, ‘Why don’t we just do this together?’ We both have very strong organizations, so on a combined basis, it will really be a one plus one equals three.”
The newly combined operator plans to operate multiple brands located in different markets, with services ranging from active adult to memory care.
In response, companies have pivoted to buying at a greater value to replacement costs, at least for now.
Since February 2024, Senior Housing News has tracked multiple mergers and affiliations. In February, Ally Senior Living merged with Onelife Senior Living, creating a 19-community portfolio across 8 states. Then in May of last year, Distinctive Living acquired Validus Senior Living Management, creating an operator of 56 communities in 8 states. Other senior living operators have recently affiliated or merged, including: Garden Spot Communities and Frederick Living, Fellowship Life and Balfour and Kisco Senior Living.
In 2025, growth via new development remains tough as lenders remain relatively cautious. Acquisitions have included Sagora Senior Living acquiring 14 Texas properties and Solera Senior Living expanded to three new states with a five-property portfolio after acquiring smaller senior living operator SageLife.
Allegro Living’s growth maintains a similar trend regarding the future of senior living, as operators look to combine forces and create greater scale to capture new demand. For this reason, Allegro was named a provider to watch in 2025.
Arete Senior Living
In 2025, senior living operators are looking to scale up and evolve for a new customer without growing too quickly. That balance is exemplified in the growth strategy of operators like Arete Senior Living.
The Tigrad, Oregon-based operator now has 31 communities in its portfolio following its formation by spinning off from Avamere in 2022, and is in growth mode in 2025, according to .President Sarah Spreitler-Silva. The company recently took on management of a five-community senior living portfolio in the Pacific Northwest, with more potential opportunities ahead.
Among Arete’s offerings for the next generation of older adults is Ovation at Heartwood Preserve, which opened in Omaha, Nebraska in 2024. The community and Ovation brand exemplify what Arete believes incoming older adults will want from senior living, including “active lifestyle villages,” smart home technology and a lack of skilled nursing offerings, opting instead to have on-site care services through a variety of partnerships.
Arete is growing while fostering social stewardship and diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEIB) efforts. The company over the past year doubled its budget for DEIB programming, with four pillars of inclusion advocacy: People, education, talent and education.
Arete also works closely alongside organizations such as Pride Northwest and the Alzheimer’s Association, alongside community-level organizations to provide further inclusion efforts.
Arete’s spinoff from Avamere and subsequent growth exemplify how senior living operators are catering to a new generation of residents with new concepts. For that reason, the company is one worth keeping an eye on in 2025.
Beztak
Senior living operators including Sonida Senior Living (NYSE: SNDA) and Brookdale Senior Living (NYSE: BKD) are in 2025 distancing themselves from third-party referral partners. As they do so, they are building their own in-house marketing strategies to fill the gap.
That is a trend that’s extending to smaller and mid-sized operators, among them Farmington Hills, Michigan-based Beztak, which has nine communities.
In late 2024, the operator cut all of its contracts with A Place for Mom and put those resources into its own marketing team and efforts like direct physical mailers.
Using that approach, Beztak has notched some wins that include an uptick to its overall leads. It has even garnered some unexpected results, like brochures on upcoming events that garnered lead conversation rates of 30%. Now, Beztak is using social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn and Youtube, with a new customer relationship management system and new website.
Betztak’s occupancy now averages around 94%, which Kohler attributed to its shift to in-house marketing.
“We’ve been on this journey for a couple of years now, and we’re seeing the rewards. It’s good timing for us to make moves like this when it comes to paid referral sources” Kohler told Senior Housing News.
Beztak also is using Agentic AI to create an automated “sales agent” to help senior living marketing and sales teams analyze info and brainstorm new strategies. Beztak is launching the new functionality in the coming weeks after months of training, Kohler said.
Given the demand runway ahead, Beztak is not the only senior living operator experimenting with new sales and marketing techniques, including in lieu of third-party referrals. But the company’s approach exemplifies how operators are in 2025 and beyond rethinking critical parts of their business for a new customer.
