Former MorningStar CFO Ranzan Joins Solera as President

Solera Senior Living hired Jamie Ranzan as president, in the latest hiring move for the growing Denver-based company.

Ranzan comes to Solera from MorningStar Senior Living, where she was chief financial officer. She joined MorningStar in October 2016, as that company was beginning its own sustained period of growth, she told Senior Housing News in a “Bottom Line” interview last December.

She joined Solera last month, according to her LinkedIn profile. She confirmed her hire but was not immediately available for further comment to Senior Housing News on Tuesday.

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Solera’s portfolio includes nine communities under management or in development, and the provider is pursuing a multi-brand strategy as it gains further scale. And it has cast a wide net in recent months to add to its team, looking for the best qualified candidates within and outside the senior living industry.

In the early days of the U.S. Covid-19 outbreak, Solera made proactive moves to hire laid-off workers from the hospitality industry. And even before the pandemic, the company was building out its leadership team.

Solera’s other notable hire includes Controller Julie Heiberger, whose extensive accounting experience includes handling operations for real estate firms, particularly with multifamily developers and operators. Heiberger was most recently assistant controller with Chicago-based residential firm Laramar Group.

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Solera’s pipeline includes two high-profile developments: Solera Reserve at Kensington, a $75 million, 135-unit community in Kensington, Maryland; and Trulee, a 163-unit community in Evanston, Illinois in being built in partnership with Chicago-based developer Condor Partners.

Ranzan brings a lifelong passion for the industry to Solera, as well. She noted in her Bottom Line interview that she wanted to work in the space since she was 10.

“Nobody believes me, to the point where I’ve had to break out my childhood yearbook and show them,” she said.

She will find a kindred spirit in Solera CEO Adam Kaplan, a second-generation executive whose father, Bill Kaplan, co-founded Chicago-based Senior Lifestyle Corporation, one of the largest providers in the nation. Adam Kaplan was an executive there until he left to found Solera in 2016.

“We want to focus on [people] who have the skillset and values that meshed with the culture that we encompass at Solera, that we can help train on the seniors housing side but would be a contributor from day one,” he said in 2016.

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