Investment manager Downing announced it has invested about £27 million in a specialist and elderly residential care business in recent weeks.

Downing announced it has supported an existing operator to acquire a closed 120-bedroom property near Leicester, which will be refurbished and repositioned from an elderly care home into an 80-bed specialist care facility delivering acute services to vulnerable end users. It also provided investment for a trading 59-bed, purpose-built specialist care home in Stafford and a recently constructed, 68-bed, premium, elderly residential care home in Fife. 

This comes after Downing completed the sale and leaseback of an existing specialist care home in the West Midlands to a European asset manager in June.

These transactions were led, from the Downing side, by Edmund Motley and Hannah Kenny.

Mark Gross, partner at Downing, said: “Providing expansion capital to leading care operators allows them to enhance facilities and increase capacity at a time when quality care is needed more than ever. We strongly believe in the resilience of this sector and are delighted to support these businesses making a difference in vulnerable communities across the UK. This investment activity, along with our successful exit of a care home in June, demonstrates our commitment and optimism about the space. We look forward to partnering with our existing partners and potential new partners to help them grow and continue delivering outstanding service.”