Independence Realty Trust, Inc. Price & Performance (IRT)

Please refer to IRT's press release supplemental information filed with the SEC for factors that could affect the accuracy of our expectations or cause our future results to differ materially. From those expectations. Participants may discuss non GAAP financial measures during this call. A copy of IRT's earnings press release and supplemental information containing financial information, other statistical information and a reconciliation of non GAAP financial measures to the most direct comparable GAAP financial measures attached to Airti's current report on the Form eight ks available at IRT's website under Investor Relations. IRT's other SEC filings are also available through this link. IRT does not undertake to update forward looking statements on this call with respect to matters described herein, except as may be required by law, With that, it's my pleasure to turn the call over to Scott Schafer.

Thanks, Maddie, and thank you all for joining us this morning. 2024 marked another strong year for IRT, in terms of operational performance and in achieving strategic milestones that position our company for growth. Regarding operations, core FFO per share for the year of $1.16 was at the high end of guidance. And was driven primarily by solid same store NOI growth of 3.2%. Our regional leaders and leasing teams adapted to the changing market dynamics including the impact of elevated supply to achieve our goal of attaining higher stabilized occupancy while also managing average rent growth. During the year, we increased same store average occupancy by 110 basis points to 95.2% and still achieved a 1.3% increase in average effective rental rates.

These gains were supported by a solid resident renewal rate, of 62.7%. Same store results were further supported by the notable In the fourth quarter, we completed three ninety five units achieving a weighted average return on investment of 15.1%. For the year, we completed sixteen seventy one renovations, that drove a $239 average increase in monthly rent per unit on renovated comps and equated to a 15.5% return on investment. In 2025, we look to capitalize on our solid occupancy levels and the improving rental rate environment by significantly accelerating value add renovation volumes. During 2024, we also strengthened our portfolio and future growth by investing $240,000,000 at a blended economic cap rate of 5.7% to acquire three properties in high growth markets. These properties contain nine zero eight units and expand our presence Charlotte, Tampa and Orlando. Additionally, we are under contract and expect to close this month on a two eighty unit community in Indianapolis, for $59,500,000 By expanding our footprint in these markets, our operating expenses should also benefit from enhanced scale and synergies. Regarding strategic milestones, in early twenty twenty four, we completed our portfolio optimization and deleveraging strategy. Which we launched in the fourth quarter of twenty twenty three with two objectives.

First, to sell 10 properties in order to reduce our presence in non core markets which would also improve our portfolio's overall quality. And second, to significantly deleverage our balance sheet, thereby broadening our access to capital. Executing on this initiative significantly proved our financial flexibility and enabled us to become an investment grade issuer. Proceeds from asset sales reduced our net debt to adjusted EBITDA on nearly a full turn to 5.9x at year end. As a result, we received a BBB flat rating with stable outlook Our investment grade ratings provides us with access to new forms of capital and as demonstrated by the terms of our new unsecured credit agreement, significantly improved our cost of debt capital. We entered 2025 with high sustainable occupancies strong leasing momentum and a balance sheet geared for growth. Our business stands for the year is very simple. Drive NOI and core FFO growth by delivering rental rate growth at our existing properties and deploying capital into new strategic investments. Supply and demand fundamentals have improved meaningfully compared to a year ago and support our expectation to capture higher rents without sacrificing occupancy. We expect a couple of our markets to continue working through the tail end of new supply These include Denver and Charlotte, which are forecasting supply to increase 5.4% on a combined basis this year.

On balance, however, we expect a steep decline in new deliveries across our markets in 2020 for the pace of new deliveries to decline even further in 2026. Looking at CoStar data, new supply in our same store markets increased 6.2% in 2024, 2025 not forecast to increase by only 2.1%, a 60% decrease in apartment unit deliveries. In 2026, the pace of new deliveries is forecasted to further decrease to 1.5% of existing units. Across our top 10 markets, which generate nearly 75% of total NOI, supply increased 5.8% during 2024. But is forecasted to increase by just 1.81.3% in 2025 and 2026 respectively. From a demand perspective, our markets continue to benefit from population growth due to lower cost of living and higher job growth than the national average. In addition, our portfolio of high quality largely Class B communities in the Sunbelt and Midwest markets represents strong value proposition for residents which further supports demand. In light of continuing strong demand and significant decline in supply, expect to enjoy greater pricing power without sacrificing occupancy in 2025. Dynamic that should accelerate during the year. As we advance into 2026. In terms of deploying capital in 2025, have nearly 3 quarters of a billion dollars of liquidity.

Including $156,000,000 available on our forward equity commitments. This liquidity will be used to fund strategic investments and drive growth. As Jim will discuss in further detail, we intend to increase the number of value add renovations that on average have generated ROIs in the mid to high teens and to pursue additional accretive acquisitions. Before handing the call over to Jim, I want to state how proud I am of the IRT team's hard work and dedication throughout 2024. Your efforts made it possible for us to achieve the strategic milestones are essential building blocks of our future growth. I'll now turn the call over to Jane. Scott, and good morning, everyone. Core FFO per share during the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four was $0.32 and grew 6.7% over the prior year period. For the full year, core FFO per share was $1.6 and came in at the top of our guidance range. Core portfolio growth in 2024 was driven by solid same store NOI which grew 3.2%. During the fourth quarter, IoT sales through NOI increased 5.3% driven by a revenue growth of 2.3% and a 3% decrease in same store operating expenses over the prior year quarter.

Revenue growth was led by an increase in average effective monthly rents of 80 basis points as well as a 100 basis point increase in occupancy. As compared to the prior year, the quarter over quarter decrease in operating expenses was primarily driven by continued success in real estate taxes, as well as lower property insurance and repairs and maintenance costs. For the full year 2024, IRT same store NOI increased 3.2% and was driven by a 3% increase in revenue. Average effective monthly rent increased 1.3% during the year and average same store occupancy rose 110 basis points. While several categories of operating expenses increased, we were able to secure lower property taxes on a year over year basis. Regarding recent leasing trends, while supply pressures are reducing, they continue to impact new lease rental rates in the fourth quarter as well as so far in early twenty twenty five. Going forward, while we may provide broad commentary on rental rate trends, we will no longer be providing monthly information and instead continue to focus on managing rental rates and occupancy to maximize rental revenue through time. With that said, on our light term leases for Q4 twenty twenty four, our blended resiliency growth was flat with new lease rates down 4.6% and renewal rents up 5.4%.

Regarding leasing activity so far in 2025, new lease rates in January continued as similar negative CECs trend that we saw in Q4 But these trends are improving with rents continuing to move higher in January and February. Our renewal rental rate growth in 2025 is also continuing to positive in Q4. In a moment, we will provide full year guidance information and specifically cover our expectations for blended rental rate growth for 2025. Turning to our balance sheet, during 2024, we reduced total debt by over $200,000,000 and improved our net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio to 5.9x down from 6.7x a year ago. This outperformed our goal to achieve six times at year end.

During 2025, we intend to further improve our net debt to EBITDA ratio to the mid-5s as NOI and EBITDA continues to grow. We're looking at debt maturities between now and the end of 2027 we have less than 18% of our total debt scheduled to mature. This low level of debt maturities is among the lowest of our public apartment peers.

As Scott mentioned and is worth repeating, during 2024, we achieved a significant milestone with respect to our balance sheet management. Today, we are an investment grade issuer with SICL B ratings for both SICCH and S and P. As previously noted, these ratings open up a new source of capital for IRT, the public debt markets, this achievement also resulted in immediate reduction of our interest rate on our unsecured bank borrowings of 34 basis points. Earlier this year, we further strengthened our liquidity and financial under our revolver from $500,000,000 to $750,000,000 and extending its maturity to 2029. As of today, we have nearly 3 quarters of a billion dollars of liquidity to $21,000,000 of unrestricted cash, dollars $494,000,000 available under our unsecured revolver and $156,000,000 of available proceeds under the As a result, we have ample dry powder invest accretively. During the fourth quarter, we classified a legacy set asset, which is our final property of Birmingham as held for sale and recognized an impairment of $21,000,000 We intend to recycle the equity from this asset into the purchase of the community we have under contract in Indianapolis later this month.

On the acquisition front, we acquired $158,000,000 of properties during Q4 using $112,000,000 of equity from our forward equity raises, and $46,000,000 in debt. The blended economic cap rate on these acquisitions was 5.7% and as Scott mentioned increases our exposure in Orlando and Charlotte. Turning to our outlook for 2025, we entered the year with strong occupancy momentum and operating fundamentals that support market Accordingly, we expect to drive value for IoT shareholders by optimizing leasing economics through capturing higher rates, diligently managing expense growth and investing capital in our value add program and new acquisitions. [indiscernible] are establishing full year EPS guidance of $0.19 to $0.22 per share and core FFO guidance in the range of $1.16 to 1.19 eSense. The bridge from a $1.15 starting point of core FFO in 2024 to the $1.175 midpoint of our 2025 guidance includes the following components. $0.03 of accretion from NOI growth from our existing same store portfolio, $0.5 of acquisitions completed in the fourth quarter twenty twenty four and the acquisitions we intend to complete in 2025, offset by $0.5 of increased overhead costs and $0.01 of dilution for 2024 asset sales and deleveraging.

Our 2025 same store portfolio consists of 108 properties reflecting the addition of one property in Huntsville, Our guidance assumes same store NOI increases 2.1% at the midpoint driven by 2.6% same store revenue growth that factors in the following component: 30 basis points from higher average occupancy, as we are assuming an overall occupancy of 95.5% for 2025 at the midpoint. 50 basis points from lower bid debt as we are assuming bad debt is 1.4% of revenue. 60 basis points of earnings from 2024 and lower concessions. 35 basis points of benefit from our value add renovations, 25 basis points from other income, And finally, our expectation for blended rental rate growth of 1.6%. For 2025. We expect the majority of the blended rental rate growth to be weighted in the second half of twenty twenty five, such that the actual benefit received in 2025 is closer to 60 basis points. [indiscernible] expect to renovate approximately 2,500 to 3,000 units during the year. As we've noted in the past, the number of units renovated will vary due to resident retention levels and the timing of new renovation starts. Looking at expense growth in 2025, at the midpoint of guidance, we expect same store operating expenses to increase 3.5%, based on a 3.8% increase in controllable expenses, and a 3.1% increase in non controllable expenses. [indiscernible] G and A and property management expense guidance for the full year is $56,000,000 reflecting standard inflationary growth.

We forecast slightly higher interest expense of $89,000,000 in the midpoint reflecting the additional interest expense from future acquisitions. During 2025, we plan to use the remaining $156,000,000 available under our Ford equity agreements along with low amounts of leverage to acquire approximately $240,000,000 in properties and an assumed economic cap rate in the mid-5s. These acquisitions are modeled using the mid year and are incremental to the acquisition we are making in Indianapolis as that is a recycling of capital from the sale of our last asset in Birmingham. Scott, back to you. Thanks, Jim. I'm proud of our 2024 accomplishments the portfolio we have created and our dedicated team who continue to deliver outstanding results. We believe the resiliency of our business model in the face of heavy supply headwinds as demonstrated by our solid same store NOI growth occupancy gains and rental rate growth. We delivered core FFO per share that was at the high end of guidance and we reduced our net debt to adjusted EBITDA to 5.9 times resulting in strong rated balance sheet. Looking into the future, we believe that we are at the beginning of a multiyear period of improving fundamentals and growth for the multifamily sector.

We expect our portfolio of high quality communities and non gateway markets to experience stronger rent growth and higher occupancies than the national average. We look forward to capitalizing on this growth for shareholders as we manage through 2025 and head into an even stronger growth opportunity in 2026. We thank you for joining us today and look forward to seeing many of you at Citi's Global Property CEO Conference next month.

Operator, you can now open the call for questions. Keypad Your first question is from the line of Austin Ruschmidt with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

Hey, good morning, everybody. Jim, you flagged new lease rate growth remains negative early this year. I think you said it's gradually improving. In early twenty twenty five. What does guidance assume for new lease rate growth this year And how does that sort of play out through the year? And then could you also share whether that includes the benefit as well from the value add redevelopment that you provided?

Yes, great question also and good morning everybody. So Independence, we've assumed a blended lease rate growth of 1.6% for the year that excludes any benefit from the value add and other obviously other income benefits Of the 1.6%, that assumes a renewal growth of 3%, a 55% retention rate and effectively a 0% new lease growth over the year. Obviously, we're starting the year at slightly negative and it will continue to move north to zero by kind of early leasing season. In April. This is new leases obviously, in early April and then obviously end the year positive. That's helpful. And then just a question on investments I had Can you just talk about sort of the investment pipeline Has that started to pick up, I guess, in terms of the transactions out there today? [indiscernible] how are you thinking about the markets that are most appealing as well as the types of assets? Are these Class A, A recently developed assets that may still be in lease up? Or are they more of a Class B that you can continue to backfill the value add redevelopment pool? Hi, Austin. It's Scott Schaeffer.

When we raised the capital last fall, we really were intent on building a pipeline then to put it to work. And we've accomplished that. We have a very fulsome pipeline of both new construction communities that are in lease up and also some existing Class B. So We're actually starting to see a little bit of distress and the effects of the higher interest rates So many of the communities that we have in the pipeline are we think are becoming available because of financing that's coming to maturity and needs to be replaced. And can't be replaced at existing rates. And also new construction that the construction loans are just much higher cost than what was underwritten And people are looking to move those assets more quickly than they might otherwise do. So we have a very wholesome pipeline. We're very confident at putting that capital to work very accretively.

Your next question is from the line of Eric Wolf with Citi.

Hey, thanks. Can you talk about why you're increasing the value add spend in 2025? And I think your guidance is based around 30 bps of occupancy growth, if I got that right. So just how you're going to achieve that even with the sort of increase value add spend that I think typically brings sort of a longer term time more downtime. Because I think in the past one of the things you've been hesitant about doing increasing the buyout spend is that sort of lower occupancy that you get with it. So just talk about how comfortable you are predicting sort of occupancy growth with the increase in diopter. In past years, we've always targeted the 2,500 to 3,000 units.

In 2024, we ended up doing less than that just because of the pressure from new supply. And we didn't want to spend the capital to renovate a unit and have it be competing with all the new supply that was offering concessions.

So we purposely dialed back the number of value add units that we completed sorted and completed. But as we see supply pressure waning going into 2025 and now and clearly in 2026 and 2027, and rents going up we intend on doing more value add units and take advantage of of those dynamics.

And just a follow-up, Eric.

We are planning to start 15 new communities in 2025. So the potential pressure on occupancy from the downtime will be dispersed amongst a greater volume of property, then it won't be as significant. But where we can still hit the 2,500 to 3,000 volume metric. Got it. That's helpful. And then as far as the bad debt, looks like it was up sequentially in the fourth quarter. Can you just talk about what caused that and what gives you the confidence to predict call it around 50 bps of average bad debt improvement throughout 2025?

Sure, Eric. This is Janice. For bad debt, it's really more of a timing situation. Moving into the fourth quarter with seasonality. We worked through the markets Atlanta and Memphis were were hit with that timing situation. I see that it's going to normalize and we're going to hit that 1.4 through the year.

And I think this is a follow-up. I think a lot of the things that we put in place over the past, call, year, year and a half to really kind of identify the fraud that's occurring in some of these markets. Are really beginning to kind of hold their teeth. Obviously, it takes a little time from when a resident gets in to get them out And then obviously, let the tools work to get the new resident in. And we're seeing the volume of residents kind of moving into the eviction queue lowering such that we're pretty confident on our ability to hit the 1.4% this Your next question is from the line of Brad Heffern with RBC Capital Markets.

Hey, Everbig. I know you said you didn't want to talk about spreads, but I'm curious if you can just qualitatively talk about how the start of this year compares to last year and maybe a normal year on the Sunbelt just trying to gauge how much the supply impact is fading? Brad, sure. Great question. I would say that certainly the new lease spreads are certainly lower this year than they started last year at. But I would say the trends that we're seeing in the fourth quarter are certainly continuing into January and February. But as I mentioned in all the prepared remarks, rents are rising into February here. So we're seeing that improvements in the negative new lease trade out. On the renewal side, renewals are slightly lower, I'm sorry, slightly higher in earlier this year as compared to last year simply because we've got concessions burning off and we're benefiting from that. But we're quite excited about kind of what we're seeing in the in the trajectory here and we're looking forward to kind of delivering on our guidance Okay.

Got it. And then on the blends guide, 1.6%, I think that's just right in the middle of our Camden and MAR.

I guess I would have thought you might have been higher than them just given the Midwest exposure.

Know you can't speak to exactly what they're guiding what they're guiding to, but do you think that's a more conservative figure than your peers? Maybe is it partial partially the occupancy growth that you're targeting or any other color you can provide around that?

Yes, I think that's a fair assessment. We're always trying to manage rents and occupancy to maximize revenue through time. Okay. And obviously, we'll continue to manage it for to maximize revenue through time.

Your next question is from the line of Rich Hightower with Barclays. [indiscernible] good morning, guys. I just want to go back to the same store buildup really [indiscernible] assumption for the year and obviously that's down materially from where you ended 2024. And so is that related to the value add displacement? Is that something else driving that statistic in particular? Yes, no, I think we always target 55% in terms of retention each quarter. Would say that some quarters bounce around. I think the fourth quarter was 51%, third quarter was 57%. But I think largely for 2024, we are in that 55% zone. Okay. Maybe I missed it earlier. Okay. And then just on the expense guide, maybe just help us understand on the especially on the controllable side of things, why that is in particular elevated relative to non controllables this year?

In terms of 2025 guidance?

Yes, that's right.

Yes. I think it's more yes, no, I think it's more in our non controllable, we're assuming 0% property tax increase which is causing the call it the pace of growth to be slightly lower on the non controllable side than the controllable side.

Your next question is from the line of Ann Chan The Green Street. Hey, good morning. Can you give us a rough sense of the NOI margin benefit to your existing properties in your subscale markets when you acquire an additional property. And meaningfully expand that unit count in those markets. On a percentage basis.

Yes.

I mean, I think, obviously, from the standpoint of the acquisition, as we bring something in house that was previously owned, maybe not managed well, Once we get it on our platform and then kind of be able to benefit from the scale of better contracts, certainly is improving. I don't have the exact NOI benefit in front of me. But we've been able to see our ability to either keep increases of [indiscernible] kind of muted throughout from year to year, when we start adding significant scale. Or even try to make them go down. But I can get back to you specifically with what we see as an NOI margin increase. Great.

Thanks. One more from me. Can you you help me break out the 2.6% expected revenue growth for 2025 between Sunbelt markets and Sunbelt and Midwest regions?

Sure. The other 2.6% the Midwest is 3.4%.

The Sunbelt is 2.2% and what we call West or Denver is 2.2%.

Your next question is from the line of Barry Oxford with Colliers.

Great guys. Thanks for taking the call. On the acquisitions, just to kind of drill down a little more on that on the distressed properties that you're seeing. Are cap rates rising? And if so, by about how much maybe versus six months ago that you might have seen? Good morning. The cap rates what we're seeing have been pretty stable in the the mid-5s. The that we're buying in Indianapolis is about a 5.7 cap. The ones that we purchased in Charlotte and Orlando are similar. Obviously, the cap rates follow the ten year up and down with a little bit of a lag. And while we might have seen cap rates drop at the end of last year and then increase this year with the ten year, What we're seeing is just more properties and more opportunities come to market but that cap rates are really pretty static in the mid-5s. Great.

Thanks guys. Appreciate it. Thank you. Think about the cap rates you're talking about on new investments. You talked about acquiring some of the properties in lease up. I just wanted to make sure I clarified, is that Is that a stabilized number or is that a going in number? And then how do you think about value add potential in the future when you think about those investment yields on a going in basis? So, when we typically buy and lease up, we're really buying late in the lease up process. So it's close to a stabilization, but but we do look to have some benefit as we take occupancy from 80 or 85% up to that 95% level. So the 5.56, 5.7 is really going in then we're looking to get it a little higher than that food once the property is stable. And as far as the value add, the value add has always been our best use of capital and we've been able to generate those high mid to high teens returns on ROI. And that's what we're seeing continuing. And that's again on an unlevered base. So We're excited about the supply pressure of 2024 and 2023.

Being largely behind us. But we really can ramp that value add back. The value add the number of value add renovations back to where we want it to be in that high $2,000 to $3,000 $3,000 unit number. That's great. And then maybe just one more on the value add. Are you seeing more competition for those assets in the market? Just with the challenges in getting new development going? Are you seeing any traditional development players looking more at some of the value adds since they can't get financing or approvals for new ground up development? Is there more competition in that acquisition pool? No. If anything, I would say there's less. It's funny, I always look back and think the world got a little upside down a few years ago. When cap rates really compressed and interest rates were very low. Everybody was looking at doing the value add because money was free and you could generate these high yields. And cap rates actually on B class units then went lower than what a new construction A Class unit was trading for. But now we're seeing it more in line But I don't think there's any more competition to purchase value add community today than there has been in the past.

Anything maybe a little less. Your next question is from the line of Linda Tsai with Jefferies. Yes.

Hi. Could you remind us what bad debt was last year and how much it contributed to your same store? For 24?

I'm going to have to double check this, but I believe it was 2.2% in 2023.

So it contributed roughly 30 basis points of growth. In 2024.

Thanks. And then where do you expect to end the year in terms of leverage?

So I apologize, the phone broke up there. Where do we expect to end the year in terms of leverage? Yes.

Yes. We said mid-5s, so that could be five, six ish probably five, seven ish It could be 5.5.

Your next question is from the line of Amoto Zakaya with Deutsche Bank. [indiscernible] Yes. Hey, Theo. Good morning.

Good morning, everyone. How are you, Scott? How are you doing? So the same store OpEx guidance for the year, again, it kind of seems like the normalization. Of same store OpEx growth. You guys did a fantastic job last year of controlling the controllables. I'm curious what kind of initiatives are in place for '25 to control the controllables and what are the factors that will determine whether you end up on the high end, the low end of that same store OpEx growth guidance?

Absolutely. So we had the fundamentals in place as we did in '24 and '25 to ensure that we are spending smart and we are basing the dollars to really enhance the resident experience and ensure that we can maintain that retention level at a high place Independence upon how that goes and if there's any inflationary costs that we have to come in to come into play, we may or may not see that that comes in at the high level, but we anticipate it to come in the middle based on our guidance and we will march forward as we did in '24 with a very controlled approach.

Yes. And Tay just as a follow-up, we obviously use we have an internal procurement team that is constantly renegotiating things for us. So we have a lot of really good policies and I shouldn't say policies processes in place to really kind of fine tune and manage the expenses as best as possible. But of as Janice mentioned, trying to keep the resident experience at the forefront of our perspective.

Thank you. Your next question is from the line of John Kim with BMO Capital Markets.

Good morning. Jim, you mentioned on your guidance that you're expecting renewals of 3%. And you signed 5.4% in the fourth quarter. You got over 4% for the year. So why are you expecting us to moderate so much And maybe if you could tell us where you're sending out renewals today? Yes. We sent renewals out for the month of April in the kind of 3%, 3.5% range The May has also gone out in that same range. And it's just John, we're just kind of we just exited a period of time that was never really seen in history before. We're kind of entering into a period of time where we've never necessarily seen the low supply. And we're just trying to be thoughtful in terms of our guidance So we deliver on the guidance that we promise.

To the extent that we can deliver the extent that we can deliver above it, we will. And then when you look at your value add versus your same store performance, the spread on blended is about 100 basis points. It's positive 70 basis points versus negative 30 for your same store. Historically, that spread has been wider and I know you're still getting high returns on your invested capital. Is that low spread due to fewer renovated units per community Or is there something some other factor that's driving that lower? And do you expect that to the value add unit communities to drive the blended stronger in 2025?

Yes. Generally, when you look at that, the new lease rate growth that we disclosed in our supplement for the value added community, that obviously includes all leases in the properties as they're in the renovation program. When you kind of break that new lease growth out into that which is call it first turn generation or what we call first generation renovation leases, versus second term meaning it's a unit that was renovated two or three years ago and it's just [indiscernible] The new lease spread on the first generation in the fourth quarter was flat at 0%. And I think what you would see is if we weren't spending the money, on the renovation that rents would actually be more negative, right? And I think what we've kind of tried to show over the years is even though we would do that would happen, we try to remove the market ups and the markets downs from the calculation of the premium that we disclosed in the value add. So we're looking at, okay, if we spend those dollars how would our rent fair versus an unrenovated comp?

That does concludes the Q and A portion of today's call.

Will now hand today's event back over to Scott Schafer for his closing remarks.

Thank you all for joining us this morning. We look forward speaking with you again in three months' time.

Have a good day, everyone.