Rural real estate – a crisis of care

By: Bert Belanger//Guest Columnist//February 14, 2019

Winding down my guest writing, I decided to shamelessly seek ideas on a unique brokerage listing of mine that reflects a problem ultimately relevant to us all. While I recognize this involves self-interest, I highlight the growing trend of rural hospital closures.

Now owned by a private bank and vacant on the outskirts of Sayre, an otherwise beautiful, state-of-the-art health care facility sits unavailable to meet the needs of the good folks of Beckham County and beyond. This 54,790-square-foot building, built in 2009 on 16 pristine acres next to Interstate 40, was universally supported by its community. This support is clear from the donor plaques inside and a 1-cent sales tax by the city of Sayre; this tax now is retiring $2 million of debt (of the total $20 million original cost) for the Sayre Memorial Hospital.

In tackling this unique assignment, I enlisted fellow broker Jim Snoddy, and I have learned much in a short few weeks about the nuances of this real estate niche. I have learned that, since January of 2010, more than 93 rural hospitals have closed throughout the U.S., eight of them in Oklahoma, including Sayre, Pauls Valley, Eufaula, Wilburton and El Reno.

Demographic trends are at work, but they are exacerbated by seismic shifts in the health care industry and the government policies and programs that now drive its business models.

Scratching my head while walking the hospital’s halls in Sayre, with the still gleaming operating room, critical care components and comfortable patient and waiting rooms, it seemed to me that there should be a way to connect the dots. Drawing from families working in farming, ranching and energy-related businesses, intuition says that all of these folks continue to give birth, age and have ailments that need treatment.

The emerging model seems to be one of a medical mall, the components of which each target a particular need that can actually translate to a sustainable market for services. Senior/assisted living? Emergency and primary care? Surgery center? Substance rehab? The rub is that market means ability to pay. In health care parlance, I have learned that this means either private pay, or being reimbursed through private health care insurance, or government benefits such as Medicare or Oklahoma’s SoonerCare. My preference is to report future success at seeing the Sayre hospital reopened in some sustainable fashion.

Bert Belanger is a broker with Adept Commercial Real Estate and a real estate attorney with Riggs Abney (bbelanger@riggsabney.com).