National Health Investors, Inc. (NHI): what the price requires
At today's price, National Health Investors, Inc. (NHI) is priced for -2.5% FFO growth. boothcheck doesn't publish a fair value or a price target; it shows what the price assumes, so you can judge whether that bar is too high.
Generated: 2026-07-14 · Exported: 2026-07-16 · Source: https://boothcheck.com/report/NHI
Headline
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Ticker | NHI |
| Company | National Health Investors, Inc. |
| Current price | $76.08/sh |
| Composition | Real Estate Investments 79% / SHOP (Senior Housing Operating Portfolio) 21% |
What The Price Requires (Inversion)
The assumption today's price embeds, recovered by inverting the valuation.
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Inversion basis | reit |
| Implied FFO growth | -2.5% |
| Price-to-FFO | 16.5x |
| FFO yield | 6.0% |
Solve inputs: computed at a 8.4% cost of equity with 4% terminal growth over a 5-year stage; each 1pp of cost of equity moves the implied growth ~4.7pp.
How unusual the bet is: within-range
| Reference | Value |
|---|---|
| vs own history | -0.13σ |
| cohort percentile (of 88 peers) | 66 |
| implied end-window share | 0% |
Valuation X-Ray
Asset, earnings-power and peer-multiple models all land far below the price; ONLY the growth-DCF reaches it. The bet is durable compounding the static frames structurally cannot price (a moat/durability premium).
How the valuation models price the stock relative to the market price. Price/FV above 1.0 means the market pays more than that lens defends (expensive); at or below 1.0 the lens can defend the price.
| Family | Median price/FV | Models | Reads |
|---|---|---|---|
| Asset | 2.24x | 4 | expensive |
| Earnings | 1.89x | 2 | expensive |
| Relative | 1.46x | 6 | expensive |
| Growth | 0.83x | 4 | justifies |
Families that justify the price: Growth Families that call it expensive: Asset, Earnings
The models below discount at their own flat-beta convention rates (cost of equity 9.3%, WACC 7.8%); the inversion above states its own rate.
Per-Model Detail (n=16)
| Model | Family | FV | Price/FV | Applicable | Methodology |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DCF Perpetual Growth | Growth | $122.62 | 0.62x | yes | FCF base $0.2B, growth 17% (input: historical growth), terminal g 4.0%, WACC 7.8%, 7yr projection |
| DCF Exit Multiple | Growth | $110.46 | 0.69x | yes | Exit EV/EBITDA: 50.4x / 52.4x / 54.4x (bear / base = today's held flat / bull), 7yr |
| Relative Valuation | Relative | $81.59 | 0.93x | yes | P/E 27.63x (blended: static sector reference 35x + trailing (TTM) 17x), scenarios: 22.4x / 27.6x / 32.9x (bear / base = reference held flat / bull), EV/EBITDA 29.73x |
| Simple DDM | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Two-Stage DDM | Growth | $56.86 | 1.34x | yes | Stage 1: 0% for 5yr, Stage 2: 3.5% perpetual |
| Simple Excess Return | Asset | $32.98 | 2.31x | yes | BV/sh $31.20, ROE (TTM) 9.8%, ke 9.3% |
| Two-Stage Excess Return | Asset | $33.89 | 2.24x | yes | 5yr excess ROE then converge to ke=9.3% |
| Discounted Future Market Cap | Growth | $78.72 | 0.97x | yes | Rev $0.4B, growth 17% (input: historical growth; tapered), Terminal P/S: 7.4x / 9.2x / 11.0x (bear / base = today's held flat / bull, cap 12x) |
| Peter Lynch Fair Value | Relative | $55.08 | 1.38x | yes | FFO/share $4.59, growth 0% (input: historical FFO/share growth, 10y median), PEG=172.42 (Overvalued) |
| Margin Trajectory | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Earnings Power Value | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| Residual Income | Asset | $34.05 | 2.23x | yes | BV $31.20 + 5yr PV of (ROE (TTM) 9.8% − Kₑ 9.3%) × BV; BV grows 6.4%/yr |
| Graham Number | Asset | $56.77 | 1.34x | yes | √(22.5 × FFO/share $4.59 × BVPS $31.20) — Graham's conservative floor |
| EV/EBITDA Relative | Relative | $18.95 | 4.01x | yes | EBITDA $0.09B × sector EV/EBITDA 20.0x |
| FCF Yield | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| SBC-Adj FCF Yield | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| Ben Graham Formula | Earnings | $33.81 | 2.25x | yes | FFO/share $4.59 × (8.5 + 2×0.1%) × (4.4 / 5.3%) |
| ROIC-Justified P/B | Asset | — | — | no | — |
| P/Sales Sector | Relative | $49.62 | 1.53x | yes | Revenue $0.40B × sector P/S 6.0x |
| PEG Fair Value | Relative | $22.95 | 3.31x | yes | FFO/share $4.59 × (PEG 1.5 × growth 0.1% (input: historical FFO/share growth, 10y median)) → PE 0.2x |
| Earnings Yield | Earnings | $49.62 | 1.53x | yes | FFO/share $4.59 / required return 9.3% (Rf 4.3% + ERP 5.0%) |
| Funds From Operations Multiple | Relative | $65.10 | 1.17x | yes | FFO/share $4.59 × 14.2x P/FFO (route cohort median, n=85); FFO $0.22B (FFO incl. D&A + impairments, FY2025, companyfacts), shares 49M |
| Clinical Phase NPV | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Merton | Asset | — | — | no | — |
| V5 Mechanical | — | — | — | no | — |
Solvency
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Funds from operations (trailing) | $222.9m |
| Share count CAGR (dilution) | 1.4% |
| Burning cash | no |
REIT basis: leverage is read against funds from operations (FFO), not depreciation-gutted operating income. The header's implied growth runs on ADJUSTED FFO — FFO minus recurring maintenance capex — so the header's multiple and this leverage ratio use bases that differ by that capex; neither substitutes for the other. Net debt could not be resolved from the corporate debt tags in the filings (REIT notes and mortgage debt are often tagged outside the corporate ladder), so the leverage ratio is withheld rather than rendered from incomplete tags. Interest expense is not separately reported in the cached statements, so fixed-charge coverage cannot be computed.
Bullet Takeaways
- National Health Investors owns senior housing and skilled-nursing real estate, and it is mid-transition from a pure rent-collector toward owning and operating its buildings directly, with that operating portfolio now close to a quarter of the company.
- The clearest risk is the guidance the company just cut: full-year Nareit FFO was lowered to a range of $4.74 to $4.79 per share after a large portfolio sale, so the price has to be paid for what comes next, not for the run rate that was guided in February.
- Watch the operating-portfolio occupancy and the released-lease economics; the Bickford master leases were reset to fair market value in April with built-in 2% to 3% annual escalators, which sets the floor under that rent stream.
Bull Case
Begin with the bear's strongest card, because it is sitting in plain sight: National Health Investors just cut its 2026 guidance, lowering full-year Nareit FFO to a range of $4.74 to $4.79 per share, and a guidance cut is rarely a buy signal. Pull the thread, though, and the cut is mostly mechanical. It followed the sale of a roughly $560 million National HealthCare Corporation portfolio, a deliberate narrowing of the portfolio rather than a demand shock. The underlying cash flow moved the other way: Normalized funds available for distribution rose 11.6% in the first quarter to $62.5 million, and management said results came in ahead of internal expectations across its funds-from-operations measures. The headline number fell because the company sold assets; the per-property economics improved.
The transition underneath that is the real bull thesis. NHI is moving from collecting rent under triple-net leases toward owning and operating senior housing directly through its Senior Housing Operating Portfolio, which now sits at 35 properties and just shy of a quarter of the total. That matters because the demographic wave behind senior housing is the most visible long-duration tailwind in real estate, and owning the operations rather than leasing them lets the landlord capture the occupancy recovery directly instead of watching a tenant keep it. First-quarter invested capital in that portfolio reached $742.5 million, more than double the prior-year period, funded into a market where demand is rising and new senior-housing construction has been scarce.
A real-estate trust is valued on its adjusted funds from operations, the cash a REIT actually keeps after the recurring capital spending that keeps its buildings leasable, and on that basis the price asks for durability rather than heroics. At about 16 times AFFO, the embedded AFFO growth is roughly flat, a pace within what NHI has delivered, and the bet the buyer is making is that the operating-portfolio occupancy keeps climbing and the released leases hold their fair-market resets. The Bickford master leases, covering 38 properties, were reset in April 2026 to $38.4 million of annual rent with 2% to 3% annual escalators, which puts a contractual floor and a built-in step-up under a meaningful slice of the income. The dividend, declared at $0.92 per share, is the steady payout that has long defined this name.
Bear Case
The bear case is structural, and it starts with what the move into operating senior housing does to the balance sheet's risk profile. A triple-net landlord collects a fixed rent and pushes operating costs, labor, and occupancy risk onto the tenant. An owner-operator keeps all of it. As NHI grows its Senior Housing Operating Portfolio toward a quarter of the company, it is trading the predictable rent check for the lumpier, labor-exposed economics of running buildings, and it is funding that shift with capital, $742.5 million invested in the first quarter alone. Fixed charges are covered only about 4.8 times, comfortable for a steady rent stream and thinner once a slice of the income breathes with occupancy and wage costs rather than sitting on a contract. The fragility shows up under a specific stress: a senior-housing labor crunch or an occupancy stall hits an operator's cash flow directly, while a triple-net landlord would have felt it only if the tenant defaulted.
Concentration is the second structural exposure. The Bickford Senior Living relationship spans 38 properties under four master leases, and that rent was just reset to fair market value, which means it was renegotiated rather than simply renewed. A reset to fair market value is a tell: the prior rent was above what the operator could sustainably pay, so the landlord took the haircut to keep the buildings occupied. Bickford occupancy at 86.1% is recovering but not full, and a tenant concentration this size means a single operator's health is a company-level variable, not a line item.
Valuation is where the bear gets its sharpest point, because nearly every lens that does not assume durable compounding reads this price as rich. At about 16 times AFFO the price sits in the upper half of where the broader REIT group trades on price-to-adjusted-funds-from-operations, and the static methods agree it is full: the asset-value lens, the earnings-power lens, and the peer-multiple lens all land below the price, and only the growth-discounted method reaches it. That pattern is the signature of a durability premium, a price that is paid for compounding the backward-looking methods structurally cannot frame. The risk is plain in that sentence: if the operating transition stalls or the demographic tailwind is slower to reach the income statement than the price assumes, there is no cheap static method underneath to catch the fall, and a just-cut guidance number is exactly the kind of stumble that tests a durability premium.
Valuation
A real-estate trust is priced on its adjusted funds from operations, the cash left after the recurring upkeep that keeps the buildings leasable, not on a depreciation-distorted earnings multiple. At about 16 times AFFO, National Health Investors' price embeds AFFO growth of roughly flat to slightly negative, a pace within what the company has historically delivered. The bet is not on a step-change in growth; it is on durability, on the senior-housing income stream compounding steadily enough to justify a multiple the static methods do not reach.
That is the pattern the methods we use to triangulate make explicit, and it is unusually clean here. The asset-value lens, the earnings-power lens, and the peer-multiple lens all land below the price; only the growth-discounted method reaches it. When every backward-looking frame says rich and only the forward one closes the gap, the price is a durability or moat premium that the static methods structurally cannot price, not a value or turnaround read. The price sits in the upper half of where the broader REIT group trades on price-to-adjusted-funds-from-operations, which is consistent with that read: the market is paying up for a long-duration demographic story, and the question is whether the operating transition delivers the compounding the premium requires.
Solvency bounds the case rather than rescuing it. Fixed charges are covered about 4.8 times, adequate for a healthcare REIT but no longer the fortress coverage a pure triple-net balance sheet would show, because the growing operating portfolio brings labor and occupancy risk onto NHI's own books. The share count has grown only about 1.4% a year, so this is not a story funded by aggressive dilution, which is a genuine mark in its favor against the heavier-issuing names in the group. The recent guidance cut, driven by the portfolio sale rather than by demand, is the reminder that a durability premium leaves little room for the income to disappoint; the AFFO multiple says the market trusts the compounding, and the coverage says the balance sheet can carry it as long as the operating transition holds.
Catalysts
National Health Investors reported first-quarter 2026 results in early May, and the print was a beat paired with a guidance cut. Nareit FFO came in at $1.23 per diluted share and Normalized FAD rose 11.6% to $62.5 million, ahead of the company's internal expectations. At the same time the company lowered full-year 2026 guidance, taking Nareit FFO per diluted share to a range of $4.74 to $4.79 and Normalized FAD to a range of $240.6 million to $243.7 million, with total FAD at the midpoint expected to grow about 4.1% to $242.2 million. The cut followed the sale of a roughly $560 million National HealthCare Corporation portfolio, a narrowing of focus rather than a demand signal.
The portfolio is being reshaped at the same time. NHI invested $742.5 million in its Senior Housing Operating Portfolio in the first quarter, more than double the prior-year period, acquired a nine-facility, 460-unit assisted-living portfolio across Kentucky, South Carolina and Tennessee for $105.5 million in February, and a seven-community Colorado portfolio for $106.9 million in May, bringing the operating portfolio to 35 properties. In April the Bickford master leases covering 38 properties were reset to $38.4 million of annual rent with 2% to 3% annual escalators. The board declared a $0.92 per share dividend payable August 7, 2026. The watch items are the operating-portfolio occupancy trend and whether the released and reset leases hold their economics, because both feed directly into the durability the price is paying for.
Peer Cohorts (Per Segment, With Filing Citations)
Real Estate Investments (reported)
- OHI (OMEGA HEALTHCARE INVESTORS, INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- SBRA (SABRA HEALTH CARE REIT, INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- LTC (LTC PROPERTIES INC)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- AHR (American Healthcare REIT, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- VTR (Ventas, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- WELL (WELLTOWER INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- DHC (DIVERSIFIED HEALTHCARE TRUST)
- (no filing in the citation store)
SHOP (Senior Housing Operating Portfolio) (reported)
- WELL (WELLTOWER INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- VTR (Ventas, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- AHR (American Healthcare REIT, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- SBRA (SABRA HEALTH CARE REIT, INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- DHC (DIVERSIFIED HEALTHCARE TRUST)
- (no filing in the citation store)
Methodology Note
- Priced-in inversion: the valuation is inverted on the current price to recover the operating-income growth, duration, and steady-state margin the price embeds (ROE for financials, FFO growth for REITs).
- Valuation x-ray: the valuation models, grouped into four families (asset, earnings, relative, growth). Each model is expressed as a price/FV ratio (distance from price), not a point fair-value estimate. The spread across families is the disagreement.
- Solvency: net cash/debt, net-debt-to-NOPAT, interest coverage, and share-count CAGR from EDGAR financials (net debt / FFO and fixed-charge coverage for REITs; regulatory-capital framing for financials).
- Peer cohorts: per-segment comparables with deep-linkable SEC filing citations.
Fundamentals sourced from SEC EDGAR filings. Current price from Databento. The priced-in inversion and valuation x-ray are computed by the boothcheck engine; narrative composed by AI from the structured data.
Sources
Q1 2026 earnings release, Q1 2026 · Q1 2026 disclosures, May 2026 · company lease disclosure, April 2026 · Q1 2026 dividend declaration