Aspen Group announced that it has entered conditional contracts to acquire the Wodonga Gardens Retirement Estate in West Wodonga, Victoria from Wodonga Gardens Retirement Estate Pty Ltd. Settlement is expected to occur in August 2021. The acquisition will increase Aspen's retirement assets 1 to seven across four states and land development pipeline by 49% to 370 approved sites. West Wodonga is located within the NSW-Victoria border region of Albury-Wodonga. Wodonga is on the Victorian side of the border and is about 3.5 hours by car and express train to the Melbourne CBD. It is about 3.5 hours by car to Canberra. The region is serviced by Albury Airport with flight times of 55 minutes to Melbourne and 75 minutes to Sydney. The Significant Urban Area (SUA) of Albury-Wodonga is around the 20th largest in Australia with a population of approximately 100,000 people. It is a major regional hub with a diverse economy and its socio demographics are typical of Australian averages (2016 census): Wodonga Gardens is the largest retirement village under development in Albury-Wodonga. The property spans 8.8 hectares and is approved for a Retirement Village with 172 houses of which 51 have been built and leased to date. It has a large, good quality community building which was completed in 2020, and road and site infrastructure is in place for approximately the next 20 houses. The average age of the residents is about 75 years. The existing houses are occupied under a traditional retirement village `loan/lease' agreement with total exit fees of up to 36%. Recent sales of the houses have been priced around $300,000 on average equating to average total exit fees $108,000 per house. Their aim is to provide the accommodation on more competitive terms whilst still generating attractive investment returns. Albury-Wodonga is a large and growing market, and they expect to be able to develop and sell at least 10 houses per annum, which is consistent with the sales rate over the past few years. There are currently holding deposits for 8 new homes for the next stage that has not yet commenced. The purchase price is $6.01 million (excluding transaction costs), equating to about $35,000 per approved site including the existing 51 dwellings under retirement village contracts. The existing dwellings have a current re-leasing value of around $15.3 million (average of $300,000 per dwelling) in their opinion, which equates to maximum exit fees payable under the existing contracts of about $5 million. These fees would reduce to about $3.8 million if they reduced total exit fees to 25%, assuming the re-leasing value of the retirement village houses did not improve. Any reduction in exit fees would be contingent on Aspen gaining approval to develop the rest of the community under a land lease model. The acquisition will initially be funded with debt.