Runwood Homes, one of the UK's largest care home operators, has been sold for £615 million in a major deal for the British social care sector. US healthcare investor Omega Healthcare Investors and Foundation Partners have bought the business and its portfolio of 55 care homes across England.

Runwood is the UK's sixth-largest for-profit care home group, with 3,930 registered beds. The company was founded 40 years ago by Gordon Sanders and has grown into a major elderly care business. The homes will now be managed by Evera Living, a new care platform set up by Foundation Partners.

Evera Living will be led by John Forrest as chief executive and Vishul Seewoolall as chief operating officer. Mr Forrest was previously chief operating officer of Spire Healthcare, while Mr Seewoolall held the same role at Signature Care and was a regional operations director at Bupa. Between them, the pair bring more than 45 years of board-level experience in the care homes sector.

The deal takes Omega's UK portfolio from around 300 facilities to more than 350 care homes. Omega, a real estate investment trust listed on the New York Stock Exchange, holds a global portfolio of around 1,100 care homes and has been investing in the UK for many years. In 2025 it was named as the buyer of the majority of the remaining homes in the Four Seasons care home portfolio.

Omega funded the purchase with a £631.7 million loan to Foundation Partners, secured against the Runwood portfolio of 48 homes owned outright and leasehold interests in seven more. The loan carries interest of 8.72%, rising to 8.94% in its second year, and matures in November 2031. Omega holds an option to buy the underlying property once regulatory conditions are met, and expects to lease the homes back to Foundation Partners on a long-term basis.

Foundation Partners has invested around £750 million in healthcare over the past decade and has built six care platforms covering more than 70 homes and 3,000 beds, including New Century Care, Hartford Care, Graham Care, Select Healthcare and Towerview Care. Knight Frank advised on the sale, while Browne Jacobson acted as legal adviser to the seller.

Vikas Gupta, chief investment officer at Omega, described the deal as "a landmark investment" reflecting the firm's ambition to back outstanding healthcare businesses over the long term. Ben Puddle, co-founder and managing partner at Foundation Partners, said the partners were "thinking in decades, not towards a short-term exit".

Mr Forrest said the deal was "an exceptional opportunity to build a truly best-in-class, care-first national operator", promising to strengthen operations from the ground up with regulation, compliance and high-quality care at the heart of the business. Mr Sanders said the company was "operating from a position of strength, both financially and from a regulatory perspective".

The buyers say their strategy will focus on person-centred care, with investment in buildings, recruitment, training, systems and care technology to give staff more time with residents. They also plan to grow the Evera Living portfolio further, in a sign that consolidation in the UK care home sector is set to continue.