If you read the article the person who is buying them is "An emergency room doctor and addiction specialist" who is trying to keep the rural hospitals open and functional, in order to help people and communities.

I don't doubt what you say maybe happening, though I imagine that would be a lot of larger rural center hospitals.

It still baffles me that only ~20% of your hospitals are government owned, and equally as many for-profit.

Buying a rural hospital is like buying a money pit, if the money pit had another money pit inside it that was constantly generating new money pits. Judging from this guy's state filings, he's pretty much getting the right to lease an empty building for $100/year, as long as he refurbishes it and runs it as a 49-bed hospital; their pro formas are, I think, somewhat optimistic, and I'm worried about the number of physicians per beds they imply, but if they're very, very good and their pro formas hold they could get back in the black in about six years. There are definitely better ways to make money than this out there.