The Wellness Real Estate Premium: When Does “Wellness” Actually Increase Property Value?

Wellness real estate is attracting serious attention from developers and investors, but the most useful question is not how quickly the sector is growing. It is whether adding wellness to a property actually makes that property more valuable. The answer appears to be yes in many cases, but certainly not automatically. A developer can spend heavily on a spa, cold plunge, meditation room, fitness center, and the latest recovery technology and still create a financially weak project. Another property may spend less on obvious wellness amenities but invest in natural light, air quality, landscaping, walking trails, quiet spaces and community areas that buyers use every day and are willing to pay more to have.

The Global Wellness Institute estimates that wellness real estate reached approximately $548 billion in 2024, following annual growth of about 19.5% between 2019 and 2024, and projects the sector could exceed $1.1 trillion by 2029. Those figures explain why capital is moving toward the sector. They do not tell a developer which wellness investments will actually improve the economics of an individual project.

Wellness Has to Add Value, Not Just Amenities

Wellness real estate is still sometimes presented as a list of amenities: gym, spa, sauna, yoga room, walking trail, and healthy restaurant. Those features can be useful, but putting them into a building does not automatically create a strong wellness property. GWI’s definition is broader, covering built environments intentionally designed and operated to support the wellbeing of the people who use them. That includes physical health as well as mental, social and environmental factors.

From a developer’s perspective, this distinction matters. If wellness means adding a larger spa, it appears primarily as another construction and operating expense. If wellness means creating a property that people prefer to live in, stay in or return to, it becomes part of the investment case.

GWI’s review of more than 300 studies found that wellness-focused residential properties in middle and upper market segments can achieve 10–25% price premiums over comparable conventional properties. Healthy commercial buildings have also demonstrated rental premiums of approximately 4.4–7.7% per square foot. These numbers are attractive, but they should be interpreted carefully. A developer cannot spend $30,000 adding wellness features to a $600,000 condominium and simply assume the buyer will pay $100,000 more. Buyers are paying for the overall experience and perceived quality of the property, not for the equipment itself.

That changes the investment calculation. The useful question is not how much money can be spent on wellness, but which improvements will matter enough to buyers or tenants to affect price, rent, occupancy or retention.

Expensive Wellness Does Not Always Mean Better Economics

The market is beginning to move beyond the race to install more amenities. One residential tower adds a sauna. The next adds a sauna and cold plunge. Another adds cryotherapy, infrared treatments, and recovery equipment. Eventually, developers can find themselves spending substantial amounts of money on features that competitors can reproduce and that residents may not use very often.

Some of the strongest wellness features are much harder to copy. A good location close to nature, attractive walking infrastructure, quiet interiors, clean air, natural light, privacy and well-designed social areas become part of the property itself. They also tend to age better. A recovery machine that looks innovative in 2026 may need replacing several years later. A well-designed trail system, mature landscaping or apartments designed around natural light do not become obsolete nearly as quickly.

Six Senses provides a good example of how different approaches can work. At Six Senses Residences Dubai Marina, the development includes more than 61,000 square feet of wellness amenities across four levels in a 122-story residential tower. Planned facilities include hydrotherapy, cryotherapy, and hyperbaric oxygen services. The scale makes sense because the development is selling a highly sophisticated luxury urban product.

Six Senses Comporta in Portugal takes a different approach. The project sits within a large coastal estate where much of the surrounding landscape stays protected. The development combines a hotel with branded residences and uses forests, dunes, lakes, natural light and biophilic design as important parts of the experience. One property uses advanced wellness infrastructure; the other relies heavily on the natural environment. Both can command a wellness position because the investment fits the location and customer.

The lesson for developers is clear: there is no standard wellness package that should be installed in all projects.

The Return Can Come From More Than the Selling Price

A sales premium is only one way wellness can affect property economics. GWI’s research also identifies possible benefits including faster sales, stronger asset values, longer leases, reduced turnover and higher resident satisfaction. For a condominium developer, a higher selling price may be the most important number. For a company planning to own a rental property for twenty years, tenant retention could be more valuable.

Mixed-use wellness communities offer another possibility. Fitness members consider a 250-unit rental community. If residents enjoy the property, know their neighbors and use the surrounding amenities, fewer may leave each year. Even without a dramatic rent premium, lower turnover can reduce vacancy, leasing commissions, advertising, cleaning and preparation costs. Wellness can therefore improve profitability without appearing as a separate charge on a tenant’s monthly bill. Partnerships, wellness programs, hospitality, food and beverage, healthcare partnerships and events can create recurring revenue after the first real estate transaction. At that point, however, the developer is no longer dealing only with real estate. Part of the project becomes an operating business, which creates additional revenue and also adds staffing, management and financial risk.

The Expensive Empty Wellness Center

One of the biggest investment mistakes is building wellness facilities because they look impressive in the sales presentation rather than because customers will use them. A 150-unit residential development might spend $2 million on a complex recovery center. The facility photographs beautifully and helps sell the project when it opens. Six months later, usage is limited, while equipment maintenance, staffing, insurance and replacement costs continue.

The same investment could have been divided among landscaping, walking infrastructure, outdoor gathering areas, acoustic improvements, natural lighting and better indoor air systems. Those investments may be less exciting in a brochure but could affect residents every day.

Developers therefore need to study usage as carefully as construction cost. Before approving a wellness feature, management should estimate how many residents will realistically use it, how frequently they will use it, what it will cost annually to operate, and whether customers will pay more because it exists. It is also worth asking whether the space can be adapted if wellness preferences change. A flexible room can become something else. A highly specialized facility filled with expensive equipment may be much harder to repurpose.

Community Could Become a Valuable Wellness Asset

One of the more interesting areas of wellness real estate has little to do with treatments or technology. It is the design of communities where people actually interact. GWI’s recent work on wellness communities points toward walkable layouts, shared spaces, gathering areas, and programming as increasingly important parts of the sector.

There is a business case behind this. A resident who knows neighbors, participates in activities and feels connected to a community may have less reason to move. A buyer visiting a development where people are using the outdoor areas and interacting with each other may also perceive more value than someone touring an impressive but empty amenity floor.

Community is difficult to put into a financial spreadsheet, but it can influence retention and reputation. It is also difficult for a competitor to copy quickly. A developer can install the same fitness equipment next year; creating a genuine community takes considerably longer. For a rental property, wellness can also pay off by helping keep good tenants longer. If residents like the environment, use the facilities and feel connected to the community, they may be less interested in moving somewhere else. That saves the owner money on empty units, marketing, leasing costs, and preparing apartments for new tenants. In this case, the financial benefit may come from lower turnover rather than charging higher rent.

MG Idea: Measure Wellness Like an Investment

Before approving a major wellness feature, developers could use a simple Wellness Value-per-Dollar Test. The idea is to evaluate each proposed investment against five business factors: customer demand, expected usage, impact on price or rent, annual operating cost, and how easily competitors can copy it.

Suppose a developer has $500,000 available. One option is a collection of advanced wellness technologies requiring specialists, maintenance and periodic replacement. Another is improved landscaping, connected walking paths, shaded gathering areas, acoustic improvements and better indoor air systems. The technology may create more attention when the property launches. The second investment may influence how residents experience the property every day for many years.

There is no automatic winner. A luxury development aimed at wealthy longevity-focused buyers may easily justify sophisticated technology. A middle-market residential community may get a much better return from improvements residents use every day. The point is to require the wellness investment to pass the same financial test as any other part of the development.

The Investment Question

Wellness real estate is becoming large enough that developers can no longer dismiss it as a small luxury niche. At the same time, rapid growth makes poor investment decisions more likely. As more projects describe themselves as wellness communities, simply using the word “wellness” will become less meaningful.

The stronger projects will be those where buyers and residents can feel the difference in everyday life. Sometimes that may come from an advanced longevity center. In another project, the best investment could be clean air, quiet bedrooms, access to nature, good walking infrastructure and spaces where neighbors actually meet.

For investors, the distinction is important. Wellness should not be treated as an additional construction category. It should be evaluated by whether it improves the economics and long-term appeal of the property. If buyers will not pay more, tenants will not stay longer, residents will not use the facilities and the property gains no competitive advantage, then even an impressive wellness investment may be a poor investment.

The real opportunity is not to put more wellness into real estate. It is to identify the wellness features that make the real estate itself more valuable.

Research Sources