Q&A
Taking the care home environmenttothenextlevel
Avnish Goyal is chairman of Hallmark Care Homes and chief executive of care home builder Savista Developments and retirement village developer Santhem Residences. He is also chairman of representative body Care England. Here, in conversation with editor Tim Probert, Goyal explores the post-Covid future of the care home environment
How will Covid-19 change the long-term dynamics of the residential care home market?
Goyal: I don't think it will. With the ageing demographic profile of the UK and greater numbers of people requiring care and support, I think we’ll see demand picking back up but adjusted to the new normal of coping with these kinds of viruses.
I am fairly optimistic that the bottom is not going to fall out of the care home market, this is a temporary pause and frankly the care sector weren't prepared or ready for it. The good thing is next time round - and who knows when the next virus will be? - we will be far more prepared for it, with PPE, guidance, visiting and testing.
TCHE: Do you see a trend towards more provision of assisted living instead of residential care?
Goyal: If you look at providers of extra care, retirement village providers and so on, they will say they have evidence of more sales and enquiries, and those residents who have lived in the community during Covid fared better because of social distancing, they have got their own front doors and a bit more
independence and so on.
It is not quite comparing apples with apples, it is a different client group. People who live in care homes have different needs to people living in retirement communities. However, those on the borderline may choose the care village option because they know they’ve got more flexibility, albeit they may need to move as their dependency levels increase or they may need to buy more care into their homes It will be interesting to see how the markets develop, I think it will accelerate the desire for retirement villages. But time will tell, it is perhaps too early.
TCHE: You are building your first retirement community as part of the new Santhem Residences brand. Do you have plans to develop more in the coming years?
Goyal: Our first retirement community is in Shenfield in Essex. It has 55 retirement apartments that will provide care delivered through Santhem Care, our own domiciliary care agency. Those residents will have access to the restaurant, the café, the library, gym, hairdressing salon, cinema room, therapies and so on. It is a proper retirement village that will open in July.
We are looking to build at least one retirement village a year over the next ten years…we are looking at four different schemes at the moment each between five and seven acres
14
Avnish Goyal
We have a number of sites under consideration and we are working on what our retirement village offering will look like. We are going through a major exercise at the moment to work that through.
We are looking to build at least one retirement village a year over the next ten years. We are looking at four different schemes at the moment each between five and seven acres. They are all in south-east England, close to our central support office in Essex so that we minimise travelling and (maximise) the ability to manage and support the communities, and the teams that will manage them.
TCHE: What are your development plans for Hallmark Care Homes?
Goyal: Hallmark currently operates 20 care homes, there are three under construction plus we have a number being worked on in our pipeline either through the sites we have bought, or are subject to planning permission. Hallmark Care Homes plans to build three to four new homes a year for the next five to ten years. That is the plan for the foreseeable future.
www.thecarehomeenvironment.com • January 2021
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54