Welltower upgrades dozens of community break rooms in push to improve senior living turnover

Welltower (NYSE: WELL) is renovating dozens of senior living community break rooms in a move aimed at helping its operating partners reduce turnover and improve worker satisfaction.

The company’s capital allocation team in 2024 and 2025 has started or finished renovations at 90 senior living employee break rooms, the Toledo, Ohio-based real estate investment trust (REIT) noted Tuesday in a business update ahead of its fourth-quarter earnings call. In one instance, Welltower renovated 40 break rooms, covering employee spaces in almost three-quarters of the properties managed by one of its operating partners.

Before-and-after photos shared by the REIT show employee spaces at communities in Texas, Oregon and California transformed with new stainless steel appliances and new flooring, cabinets and furniture.

The move is aimed at “delighting site-level employees to hire and retain talent and ultimately deliver a killer customer value proposition,” the company noted in its business update.

According to the REIT, a renovated break room makes a difference when it comes to employees sticking around. In communities with renovated break rooms, Welltower noted that turnover fell 41% in the last quarter versus the start of last year. Those communities’ turnover rates also were 13% below that of unrenovated properties within the same operators’ portfolios.

Via Welltower Feb. 11 2025 business update

Welltower CEO Shankh Mitra has previously stressed the importance of senior living employee break rooms, noting in a 2023 interview that quality employee-facing spaces are a must for senior living operators as they grow and evolve for the future.

“We want to show the industry that if you start from the beginning with a fresh approach — nothing fancy, just common sense — you can get to a viable model,” he previously told SHN.

In addition to renovating dozens of senior living break rooms, the REIT also renovated units at certain communities in its portfolio to create “like-new communities in an industry with no new product.”

The company renovated certain communities’ in-unit kitchens to include new backsplashes, interior finishes with “specialty paint designed to contribute to better indoor air quality,” and wine storage. Other upgrades included renovating bathrooms with features like color temperature lighting, magnifying mirrors, ergonomic toilet paper holders that double as grab bars and heated ventilation; and rejuvenating community hallways with new paint and carpeting.

Welltower will hold its fourth-quarter earnings call Wednesday Feb. 12.