Buffett Brain · Research note
Score updated 21 May 2026
WELL· Real Estate
Welltower
Welltower owns irreplaceable senior-housing real estate but trades at 106x earnings while diluting shareholders 11.9% annually.
Buffett fit
Weak fit
Owner
51
Durability
74
Management
12
Price
18
Score updated 21 May 2026
Buffett's checklist
Each number against Buffett's bar, and where it ranks among Real Estate stocks in our database.
How much profit the business makes on each dollar invested in it. Higher is better.
What is left of each sale after the cost of making the product. A high number often means pricing power.
The cash the business earns for its owners, compared with the price of the whole company.
How fast sales grew each year over the last five years.
How many years of today's profit you pay for at today's price. Lower means cheaper.
How much the company owes compared with what it owns outright. Lower is safer.
The four pillars
How the business measures up on each of Buffett's four tests.
As a 100% owner you'd sit on 1,500-plus senior-housing properties throwing off cash flow that funds an aging-baby-boomer thesis, a story so widely understood it's already priced.
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The underlying demographic, 75-million-plus Americans aging into the seniors-housing demand curve, is as durable a tailwind as exists in real estate.
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Management's scorecard tells you what to think: market cap has increased $34.76 less per dollar of retained earnings, and shares outstanding are growing nearly 12% a year to fund acquisitions.
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A 106.27x and 467.84x EV/ in a real-estate business with 0.82% is a price you'd pay only if you believe NAV and FFO are wildly understated by GAAP earnings.
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For and against
The strongest points on each side, with the numbers behind them.
In its favor
5- 1Owns scale-driven real estate in seniors housing, the single largest demographic tailwind in U.S. real estate
- 2Five-year revenue CAGR of 22.68% reflects real underlying demand growth
- 3/Net Income of 3.04x shows depreciation overstates true economic decline
- 4Net income has stayed positive each of the last five years
Concerns
6- 1 of 106.27 and EV/ of 467.84 leave zero room for disappointment
- 2Share count grew 11.87% per year, dilution is funding the growth
- 3 of 0.82% TTM and 1.14% 5-year average is below cost of capital
- 4Interest coverage of 0.76x means does not cover interest expense
Price history
$238+193.8%· 5-year return
Weekly closing prices. Touch or hover the line for a date.
The business
How the business works
Welltower is a healthcare REIT that owns the physical real estate where seniors live and recover, independent living, assisted living, memory care, and post-acute facilities. The portfolio generates a 38.87% but only a 4.62% once depreciation, interest, and operating expenses on the senior-housing operating portfolio land. sits at just 0.82% TTM, which tells you most of the return arrives as appreciation and rent escalators rather than internal .
What other investors would say
The same company, judged by three other documented playbooks.
Keep researching
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