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The price paid per bed for skilled nursing facilities continued to dip last year, though not as precipitously as 2017, according to a new analysis.

The average SNF bed sale clocked in at about $77,000, a 5% dip from the previous year, and the lowest level recorded since 2014. That drop still an improvement, however, from the 18% plunge that operators experienced the previous year, Irving Levin Associates revealed in data released Tuesday.

Investors have “clearly backed away” from the unsustainable price levels tallied in 2015 and 2016, when SNF beds were going for an average of almost $100,000 apiece, the firm noted.

“In many ways, 2018 was a tough year for skilled nursing facilities,” Stephen Monroe, a partner with Irving Levin, said in an announcement. “Medicare Advantage programs have eaten into both reimbursement and lengths of stay, and that, coupled with labor and occupancy pressures, has made it a difficult environment to operate in.”

Those low prices have brought an “unprecedented” level of purchasing activity into the sector, according to the firm’s 2019 Skilled Nursing Acquisition & Investment Report. There were about 426 transactions consummated last year, about 100 more than the previous year. Despite the uptick in deals, spending totaled about $13.6 billion, a dip from the $15.9 billion spent in 2017.