Nursing home chain with 175 facilities files for bankruptcy… as devastating senior care crisis hits new low

A major nursing home chain with 175 senior living facilities across 17 states has filed for bankruptcy.

The bankruptcy plunges a further 15,000 senior residents into the ongoing care crisis sweeping the United States. 

Genesis Healthcare said it was shelling out $8 million a month on personal-injury and wrongful death claims, a situation that became financially untenable. 

At its height in 2016 the company was operating more than 500 senior homes but found the scale to be unsustainable. 

However, even after selling off more than three fifths of their facilities, the company was tied into legacy liabilities including costly legal claims, legal filings submitted to the US Bankruptcy Court in Dallas reveal.

Genesis has debts of around $700 million which it owes to its main landlord, another real-estate entity that leases it facilities and private lender White Oak. 

‘We believe this financial reorganization is a necessary step for our organization to sustainably deliver on our mission of improving lives through delivery of high-quality healthcare and everyday compassion,’ Lauren Murray, Genesis’s chief operating officer, told the Wall Street Journal. 

The company has around 27,000 employees which it aims to keep in their positions as it enters bankruptcy. 

Genesis Healthcare has 175 senior living facilities across the country 

Genesis’s creditors have committed $30 million to fund the bankruptcy proceedings and said residents will be able to stay in their homes and be cared for throughout. 

Private investment company ReGen Healthcare has made $100 million initial bid to purchase most of Genesis’s assets out of bankruptcy, however the business is holding out for a bigger offer. 

Genesis teetered on the edge of bankruptcy during the pandemic but secured financing for ReGen. 

In return the investment entity put its own directors on the board, according to court papers. 

Genesis was founded in 1985 with nine nursing centers, a network that grew substantially over time with a focus on Medicare patients, the Journal reported.

In 2024 the company’s income came 61 percent from Medicaid, 17 percent Medicare, and 13 percent commercial insurance.  

There are almost 2,000 senior living facilities dotted across the country.  

At least 16 have filed for bankruptcy since the pandemic hit in March 2020, according to Wall Street Journal analysis. 

A further 15,000 senior residents have been plunged in to the ongoing care crisis

Harborside in Port Washington on Long Island filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October

Residents organized a protest after the October bankruptcy, pleading with authorities to help them save their homes and life savings 

Those Chapter 11 filings wiped out $190 million worth of savings from 1,000 families, including 212 from the recently bankrupt Harborside on Long Island, New York.

Harborside, a continuing-care retirement community in Port Washington filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October last year. 

Its elderly residents each paid a substantial entrance fee – between $425,000 and $1.7 million depending on the package – as well as thousands of dollars in monthly fees. 

Entrance fees can be refunded to family members on a resident’s death or returned to the retiree if they choose to leave the facility. 

However, when a facility such as Harborside enters bankruptcy the process ensures that secured creditors are paid before residents. 

This can mean that once debtors are paid the money due to families has been decimated. 

Arlene Kohen, an 89-year-old resident at Harborside paid the standard $945,000 entrance fee by selling her Great Neck home for $838,000, according to The Wall Street Journal. 

Following the bankruptcy her family now expects to receive less than a third of the $710,000 refund the facility promised her.