Comparing Community Healthcare Trust (NYSE:CHCT) & Medical Properties Trust (NYSE:MPT)

Community Healthcare Trust (NYSE:CHCT) and Medical Properties Trust (NYSE:MPT) are both small-cap real estate companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, profitability, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, earnings, valuation and risk.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

87.8% of Community Healthcare Trust shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 71.8% of Medical Properties Trust shares are held by institutional investors. 5.3% of Community Healthcare Trust shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.8% of Medical Properties Trust shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Dividends

Community Healthcare Trust pays an annual dividend of $1.32 per share and has a dividend yield of 8.9%. Medical Properties Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.36 per share and has a dividend yield of 19.8%. Community Healthcare Trust pays out 180.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Medical Properties Trust pays out 87.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Community Healthcare Trust has increased its dividend for 3 consecutive years. Medical Properties Trust is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and price targets for Community Healthcare Trust and Medical Properties Trust, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Community Healthcare Trust	1	2	2	0	2.20
Medical Properties Trust	3	1	0	0	1.25

Community Healthcare Trust presently has a consensus target price of $17.50, indicating a potential upside of 18.00%. Medical Properties Trust has a consensus target price of $2.68, indicating a potential upside of 47.44%. Given Medical Properties Trust’s higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Medical Properties Trust is more favorable than Community Healthcare Trust.

Volatility & Risk

Community Healthcare Trust has a beta of 0.68, meaning that its share price is 32% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Medical Properties Trust has a beta of 1.5, meaning that its share price is 50% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Community Healthcare Trust and Medical Properties Trust”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Community Healthcare Trust	$121.19 million	3.52	$5.10 million	$0.73	20.32
Medical Properties Trust	$972.02 million	1.12	-$277.05 million	$0.41	4.44

Community Healthcare Trust has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Medical Properties Trust. Medical Properties Trust is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Community Healthcare Trust, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Community Healthcare Trust and Medical Properties Trust’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Community Healthcare Trust	17.76%	5.34%	2.24%
Medical Properties Trust	24.14%	5.45%	1.69%

Summary

Community Healthcare Trust beats Medical Properties Trust on 10 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Community Healthcare Trust

Community Healthcare Trust Incorporated (the Company”, we”, our”) was organized in the State of Maryland on March 28, 2014. The Company is a fully-integrated healthcare real estate company that owns and acquires real estate properties that are leased to hospitals, doctors, healthcare systems or other healthcare service providers. As of March 31, 2024, the Company had investments of approximately $1.1 billion in 197 real estate properties (including a portion of one property accounted for as a sales-type lease with a gross amount totaling approximately $3.0 million and two properties classified as an asset held for sale with an aggregate amount totaling approximately $7.5 million. The properties are located in 35 states, totaling approximately 4.4 million square feet in the aggregate and were approximately 92.3% leased, excluding real estate assets held for sale, at March 31, 2024 with a weighted average remaining lease term of approximately 6.9 years.

About Medical Properties Trust

Medical Properties Trust, Inc. is a self-advised real estate investment trust formed to capitalize on the changing trends in healthcare delivery by acquiring and developing net-leased healthcare facilities. MPT’s financing model allows hospitals and other healthcare facilities to unlock the value of their underlying real estate in order to fund facility improvements, technology upgrades, staff additions and new construction. Facilities include acute care hospitals, inpatient rehabilitation hospitals, long-term acute care hospitals, and other medical and surgical facilities.