Blue Owl Plans $2.4B Acquisition Of Medical Office REIT
As investors and analysts scrutinize its artificial intelligence bets, Blue Owl Capital reached outside the sector and cut a $2.4B deal for a net lease healthcare REIT.
Funds associated with the publicly traded alternative asset investor will pay a 19% premium compared to Sila Realty Trust’s closing price Friday to acquire the REIT's 140 mostly single-tenant properties and delist the stock, Sila announced Monday.
“This transaction provides us with a compelling opportunity to acquire a scaled portfolio with durable cash flows and attractive long‑term growth characteristics, while further expanding Blue Owl managed funds’ exposure to an asset class and sector we view as both resilient and essential,” Marc Zahr, Blue Owl’s global head of real assets, said in a statement.
The deal has unanimous approval from the Sila board and is expected to close by October, pending shareholder approval. Tampa, Florida-based Sila plans to continue paying quarterly dividends for the first and second quarters. The REIT is no longer planning to host a first-quarter earnings call, but it will still file its financial results with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Sila ended the year with 5.3M SF of real estate across the United States, with a concentration of assets in Texas and Florida and most of the rest of its portfolio spread across the East Coast and Midwest.
Its properties were 97.8% leased at the end of the year with an average remaining lease term of 10 years. The vast majority of its properties hold one tenant, with 14 assets leased to multiple tenants. Two properties were vacant at the end of the year.
The REIT posted $33.1M in net income for 2025, down from $42.7M in 2024, and paid out a dividend of $1.60 per share. It closed a $600M revolving credit facility last February to replace the $500M line of credit that was at maturity, opting not to exercise two six-month extension options.
Sila shares jumped to just under the $30.38-per-share buyout price when markets opened Monday. Shares had been trading between $23 and $26 each for the past year.
Blue Owl rose to public prominence in the last two years with massive loans to tech giants to build out the data center infrastructure needed to power mass adoption of AI, which has brought the public firm intense scrutiny as analysts and investors begin to question whether the huge bets on AI will pay off.
Earlier this month, Blue Owl capped redemptions at 5% on two tech-focused funds after investors rushed to pull cash, asking to withdraw 22% of its private credit from the Blue Owl Credit Income Corp. fund and 41% from the Blue Owl Technology Income Corp fund. The firm pushed back in February on reports that a project it backed in Pennsylvania was facing financing struggles.
Shares in Blue Owl were trading flat Monday, along with the major indexes. It has shed more than 35% of its value this year.
Public REITs were prime acquisition targets in the first quarter, with roughly $20B worth of buyouts announced through March as firms with capital to spend look to pick up publicly traded companies that have been trading at discounts to their asset values because of sectorwide headwinds from the era of cheap debt and the pandemic.
Funds have raised billions of dollars to buy senior living assets and medical office buildings to capitalize on the demographic bubble of aging baby boomers.
Investors are also interested in buying apartments, with deals including a plan to take Veris Residential private at a $3.4B valuation and a $2.3B partnership to take Minto Apartment Real Estate Investment Trust off the market, but alternative assets like industrial outdoor storage are also drawing interest.
