Barwon buys Peninsula Private Hospital from Australian Unity for A$291.25m

Barwon Investment Partners, majority owned by Hillhouse’s Rava Partners, has acquired the 350-bed Peninsula Private Hospital in Langwarrin, Victoria, for A$291.25m from Australian Unity. The deal is the largest ever sale of a private healthcare facility in Australia, according to broker JLL.

Barwon Investment Partners, an Australian alternative asset manager majority owned by Hillhouse Investment Partners’ Rava Partners property division, has acquired the 350-bed Peninsula Private Hospital in Langwarrin, Victoria, for A$291.25 million (US$208.1 million) from Australian Unity. The transaction is the largest ever sale of a private healthcare facility in the country, said Simon Quinn, Sydney-based head of alternative investments and capital markets at JLL.

The hospital, located about 45 kilometres southeast of Melbourne near the town of Frankston, is fully leased to Ramsay Health Care, Australia’s largest private hospital operator, under a long-term lease with inflation-indexed rental increases. Barwon is investing through its Barwon Institutional Healthcare Property Fund, which targets annual yields of 4.5 per cent to 5.5 per cent and a total return of more than 8 per cent net of fees.

“The acquisition is an important step in the continued growth of the fund and demonstrates our ability to execute on investments at this point in the cycle,” said Tom Patrick, Barwon’s managing partner and head of healthcare property. The asset had a weighted average lease expiry of 34 years and an unlevered internal rate of return of about 10.7 per cent as of 31 July 2026.

Australian Unity had acquired the asset in 2006 for A$47 million, plus acquisition costs, and has since expanded the property through a series of brownfield projects. The member-owned mutual revalued the asset at A$317 million in August 2025, then reduced the valuation to A$291.25 million as of 31 July 2026. The sale is the first major divestment from the Australian Unity Healthcare Property Trust since it announced in May an A$600 million sell-off to reduce debt and strengthen its balance sheet.

The deal marks the first major acquisition by Barwon since it was taken over earlier this year by Singapore-headquartered Hillhouse, which ranks among the world’s largest private alternative asset managers with US$100 billion in assets under management. Outside healthcare, Rava Partners last year took a majority stake in Australia’s biggest student housing operator, UniLodge, in a deal valued at A$600 million.