Shankh S. Mitra
Chief Executive Officer at Welltower
Thank you, Matt, and good morning, everyone. I'll review our second quarter results and describe high-level business trends and our capital allocation activities. John will provide an update on the performance of our senior housing operating and outpatient medical portfolios. Tim will walk you through our triple-net businesses, balance sheet highlights and revised guidance. Nikhil is also on the call to answer questions.
We're delighted to report results, which exceeded our expectations in both our senior housing business, as well as Outpatient Medical segment. Let me first dig into the senior housing segment. The key drivers of this business occupancy, rate, and expenses, all came in better than expected this quarter, supported by accelerating demand of our product, and plummeting new deliveries. From a top line perspective, our senior housing operating portfolio achieved approximately 10% growth on a same-store basis and 17.8% growth on a total portfolio basis, driven by another solid quarter of year-over-year occupancy growth and significant pricing power.
Last quarter, I discussed with you how the strong pricing trends, along with moderating expenses, are resulting in significant margin expansions that we've been all waiting for. I'm pleased to report to you that this trend intensified in the second quarter, as we saw revenue per occupied room or RevPOR growth of 7.3%, coupled with just 3.5% expense per occupied room or ExpPOR growth, resulting in an approximate 25% operating margin, a level not seen since the onset of the pandemic.
And while that still leaves significant upside before achieving our pre-COVID NOI margin of above 30%, we expect to meaningfully exceed our pre-COVID level of profitability over time through John's build-out of the operating platform. All regions and product types contributed significantly this quarter resulting a 24.2% NOI growth for our senior housing operating segment, while assisted living continues to outperform independent living, driving exceptionally strong results in the US and UK. Canada is also joining the party with 17.2% NOI growth.
We firmly believe that our Canadian portfolio is finally in sustainable growth mode. In fact, we're in process of significantly optimizing our Canadian business and have recently allocated a meaningful amount of investment dollars to the region. I'll comment on both in a minute. It is also important to mention that our senior -- Seniors Apartment business continued to drive double-digit NOI growth despite the broader deceleration in the apartment industry. We have put significant effort in last six years to build our wellness housing business, which now nearly -- totals nearly 17,000 units and we're pleased to see that our thesis is playing out.
All in all, we've finally exceeded $1 billion of annualized net operating income in our senior housing segment for the first time since COVID and believe we have a ton of growth left in the tank. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I want to reiterate our core belief on how to make risk-adjusted return in senior housing. Unlike a lot of empirical -- empirical August -- empirical years in the business, which either focuses on the location or the operators, we believe it is a four-dimensional optimization problem of location, product, price point and operators. And we do this objectively through machine and statistical learning using our data science platform, Alpha.
I am delighted to inform you that we made perhaps the most significant impact in this pursuit through a mutually beneficial restructuring of our joint venture with Revera. Through a series of buy/sales, we materially simplified our balance sheet and we matched specific products and locations with the right regional operators in order to achieve meaningful density in their local markets.
In the UK, we took 100% ownership of 29 premier communities, many of which are located in the Greater London markets and considered some of the best care homes in the country. We transitioned these care homes from signature to Avery and believe we have a material upside in this virtually impossible-to-replicate portfolio, which was 72.8% occupied at the time of transition to Avery at the beginning of June. Though two months does not make a trend, I am delighted to inform you that this communities are showing positive trends right off the bat under loan as leadership, with current occupancy around 73.5%.
In the US, we took 100% ownership of -- in nine extremely well-located assets recently built by Sunrise in high barriers to entry submarket in the West Coast, East Coast and South Florida at a favorable bases and sold the minority interest in 12 other assets. We also moved management up 28 incredibly well-located California billings to Oakmont. This California communities were 77% occupied when they transitioned to Oakmont at the end of June. I fully expect this portfolio to be materially additive to our growth in 2024 under Courtney's leadership.
As you can see in the case study on the page 32 of our business update, highlighting previous Oakmont transitions in California. Courtney's team has taken occupancy from 64% to 90% in two years at these communities. Though these occupancy as far surpassed their previous high occupancy up 86% in 2016, I fully expect these communities will hit mid-90s occupancy in near future. All things being equal, that stabilization path should be faster for the most -- most recent portfolio of 28 communities. That they have assumed the management off. If not for the lessons learned previously, it will be for a higher starting point. And just after four weeks of operations under Oakmont, these properties are on a path to achieve approximately 100 basis points of occupancy growth in first month and are showing positive NOI traction in NOI out of the gate.
And finally, Canada. Perhaps, the most exciting part of this year's long effort to optimize our portfolio. Through -- though there is a multi-dimensional value-creation opportunity in this effort. I am delighted to inform you that we're launching a new platform with our partner Mathieu Duguay in English-speaking Canada. As you know, Cogir under Mathieu's leadership is one of the best operators in the business and we cannot be more excited about launching our first operating platform in a post-PLR Ward. We will double down on our -- we'll double down on our investments in these communities, dramatically enhance resident experience and materially improve employee experience, resulting in exciting long-term career growth opportunity. I predict this operating JV will witness rapid growth in very near future.
This series of steps, which is known as project transformer inside Welltower is one of the most complex, yet value-accretive transactions we've ever done. Under Eddie Cheung's leadership in Canada and UK and Russ Simon's leadership in the US, this multi-dimensional project will truly transform our company in the next chapter of its evolution. This transaction marks the conclusion of our seven-year journey of contract modernization, as virtually all of our contracts are now in RIDEA 3.0 and RIDEA 4.0 structures. I cannot emphasize enough how important this milestone is for our firm, as we have now full alignment with all of our key senior housing operating partners. We think all swim together.
To continue this team of capital allocation, the favorable transaction environment that I described to you last quarter has resulted in an incredibly active summer for us. We currently have approximately $2.3 billion of deals under contract in 26 different off-market privately negotiated transactions. Opportunities within senior housing segment represents the bulk of these transactions, with approximately $2 billion of deals comprised of 8,900 units across all three regions. We estimate our investment in these deals to be very attractive 30% to 40% discount to today's replacement costs, with accretive in-place cash flow and significant growth potential.
While I don't like to get into individual transactions, I would like to highlight our transaction in Canada with part -- with our partner, Cogir. We're recapping Cogir's existing institutional investor at Propco in highly desirable ZAS portfolio and Mathieu is investing his equity going forward. This CAD935 million transaction of both recently built an attractive stable assets are a testament to the power of our relationship in this industry. Eddie and his team has been working tirelessly over the past two years on this transaction and we're delighted to inform you that we signed a definitive documents few weeks ago.
Additionally, following the completion of this deal and others under recently under contract, we've achieved another company milestone having closed or signed over a $11 billion of transaction, since our pivot to offense in fourth quarter of 2020, but we are busier than ever with a robust, visible and actionable pipeline of opportunities that we're underwriting right now. Again heavily senior housing but we're also seeing some outpatient medical and skilled nursing opportunities up and down the capital stack. All of which, we expect -- all of which we expect to keep us very busy for rest of the year. Our deal teams didn't get much of the summer vacation and looks like they won't get much of the Christmas holiday either as many of these deal will close in Q4.
As I described last quarter, both debt and equity capital continued to rapidly evaporate from the commercial real estate space. We're getting hit, left, right and center from counterparties, who truly appreciate our handshake approach to the business, where we can bring both cash and operator to the closing tables. We're seeing that the banks are no longer willing to kick the can down the road, and in fact, are showing willingness to sell the loan book, partially or completely. A handful of these transactions have taken place and many more are growing. The increased capital requirement directly from the regulators last week will only intensify this trend and we're ready to help banks, release the capital as they execute their other strategic priorities.
Nikhil and Tim cell phone number has been on full display in our full page ad of the American Banker Magazine since the summer of 2020. Please give them a call, I promise you, they will respond within hours, not days, as it is customary acceptable standard in senior housing industry. I predict Welltower will play a meaningful role in helping to recapitalize distressed commercial risks and loan portfolios that fall within our circle of confidence.
And lastly, at the risk of stealing Tim's thunder, I would like to point out that our meaningful spending of our balance sheet over the last few quarter. Just in last one year, our leverage has fallen from high-6s to mid-5s, through a combination of outsized organic growth and prudent capital allocation activity. We're now armed with approximately $7.6 billion of near-term liquidity to address upcoming debt maturities and fund our various capital deployment opportunities.
In summary, we have never been more delighted with our operating performance and have never been busier on the deal side and build out of our platform. While no one knows what future may hold, my partners and I remain as optimistic as ever on the future of our business.
And with that, I'll hand the call over to John.
