In 1998, Vencor was split into two companies. One company, Ventas became a real estate investment trust (REIT) which owned all of the real-estate property, and leased space to the second company, Vencor, which operated the facilities. At the time, Vencor was expanding rapidly, and it considered that using a REIT provided a better financing structure to allow the companies to grow. At the time of the split, all shareholders in Vencor were issued one share of Ventas for every share of Vencor that they held.