State records show 89 hospice companies at one Los Angeles office plaza. We went to look for ourselves.

By Laura Geller of CBS News. Excerpts:

"The Merabi Professional Medical Plaza, a three-story, 32,000 square foot stucco and glass office building in Los Angeles, is home to a salon, a law office, a modeling agency, a realty corporation and, also, 89 licensed hospice companies."

"The building is among the most extreme cases of what's known as "clustering" to turn up in a sweeping CBS News investigation — a grouping of large numbers of hospice offices that state auditors consider a major red flag for potential fraud. 

The Van Nuys address for Merabi Plaza appears dozens of times in state records for licensed hospice companies. Inside the building's entry hall, a directory lists numerous  hospice agencies that line the long tiled hallways, although the building's owner claims many are no longer there."

"Auditors said the clustering of so many firms raised concerns because it suggests that "the number of agencies in these areas likely exceeds the number of patients who need services."

Concerns about clustering appear in a 2022 California State Auditor's report, which found that Los Angeles County had experienced a 1,500% increase in hospice companies countywide since 2010. That's six times more hospice providers than the national average, relative to the county's elderly population."

"other warning signs for potential fraud included multiple hospices in one building, geographic clustering, low patient counts, high rates of terminally ill patients later discharged alive, excessive billing and staff shared across multiple companies."

"72 of the 89 registered hospices in Merabi Plaza have at least three of those six potential warning signs."

"regulators visited multiple suites in Merabi Plaza between 2021 and 2025. They found nearly 400 violations at 75 companies"

"Many of the hospice companies in Marabi Plaza have been billing Medicare for years and collecting reimbursements that come from federal tax dollars."

[there are] ""ghost hospices." Those are paper companies that bill the government for patients, even if they don't actually provide any real care."