The annual MIPIM conference in Cannes provides an opportunity take the pulse of the real estate industry. Nowhere else will you find so many investors and sellers in one place, eying each other up over champagne, mussels and the gangway of 72ft, custom made superyachts – something has to make up for two-hour presentations about covenants! This year healthcare property was a core theme, and to the eyes of a MIPIM virgin, at least, the sector was abuzz.

Not without reason. For starters, internationalisation continues at pace. More investors are crossing borders and arbitraging new opportunities in southern Europe and the Netherlands. That opens up higher yield opportunities and we even see a gradual convergence on lease terms.

Then there is the emergence of healthcare as a core asset class. Historically low interest rates are driving the search for yield and alternatives are benefiting. Why not give healthcare a go – yields are high and risk is low, is it not? After all, people are getting older!

Demography is always healthcare’s strongest advocate and it would be wrong to ignore this sector’s defensive attributes. But from the inside things are a little more fraught. As tariffs fall in France, Spanish governments kick PPPs into the long grass faster than Pablo Iglesias can say dialectical Marxism and German regulators incentivise homecare, regulatory risk has never been higher. Even in the UK, the most mature real estate market, social care is under threat.

As one source told us, healthcare is currently flavour of the month. The deal volume will go up this year and the next, but, after that, things don’t look so good. People are already starting to say yields can’t come down much further and investors are now revising the opco-propco split. The message: rush into healthcare at your and your yacht’s peril.