Senior living operators are moderating their rent increases for residents in 2026, according to a new analysis of senior living rates from LivingPath, a Chicago-based technology company.
For the most recent analysis, LivingPath reviewed over 2,700 senior living properties spanning 375,000 units.
Independent living operators increased rental rates between 6.1% and 9.2% this year depending on unit type and year-over-year totals, according to LivingPath’s analysis. Operators most aggressively grew rates for studios with a 9.2% increase. Operators increased rental rates for two-bedroom units by an average of 9%.
Assisted living operators have increased rates between 6.8% and 8.5% this year, while memory care operators grew rental rates between 6.8% and 8.1%.
Shared units in assisted living saw the most significant slowdown with 6.8% rate growth compared to 9.2% in 2025 and 10.5% in 2024. Meanwhile, growth for studios, one-bedroom units and two-bedroom units reached 8.4%, 8.2% and 8.5% respectively, representing a decrease of 1.1 to 2.2 percentage points compared to the previous year.
Care delivery and medication costs increased between 3.8% and 8.5%, according to the report.
Active revenue management is “here to stay,” LivingPath CEO and Co-Founder Jonathan Woodrow told SHN.
“The best performers are regularly evaluating unit-level and submarket-level rate adjustments,” Woodrow said. “Rate increases at above inflationary levels still have a lot of room to run given the challenges of adding new inventory.”
He added: “The data shows pricing is getting more targeted and more intentional, and it’s a sign of the sector maturing.”
“The thing we did not necessarily expect is that rate growth is remaining at two- to three-times higher than inflation and there still seems to be a lot of runway as operators push their sales and marketing teams to continue testing the market as units turn over that may have an internal waitlist,” Woodrow said. “There’s going to be less and less of that kind of leakage.”
In 2024, assisted living and memory care operators increased care fees by approximately 11% in what Woodrow called the “great unbundling.” That came as there was an “industrywide structural repricing” of how operators charged for care services. Operators rebased their care fee models, with many separating and re-tiering care services that would have previously been lumped into past annual increases.
Today, operators can more efficiently pass through labor costs with unbundled care fee structures, and it makes it easier to communicate with families armed with care data to demonstrate a loved one’s increased care services, Woodrow said.
Independent living one-bedroom rates saw the sharpest deceleration of any unit type, falling to 6.1% in 2026 from a peak of 11.3% in 2024.
Multifamily rent growth rose 0.4% nationally as of March 2026; senior living one-bedroom rates for independent living grew roughly 15 times the rate of comparable multifamily units, Woodrow said.
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