D/B/A Centerspace

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Center Space Q4 2024 Earnings School. My name's Ezra, and I will be your coordinator today. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind, please press star followed by two. I will now hand you over to Josh Plait from Center Space to begin. Josh, please go ahead.

Good morning. Center Spaces Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, was filed with the SEC yesterday after the market closed. Additionally, our earnings release and supplemental disclosure package have been posted to our website at centerspacehomes.com and filed on Form 8-K. It's important to note that today's remarks will include statements about our business outlook and other forward-looking statements that are based on management's current views and assumptions. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties discussed in our filing under the section titled Risk Factors and in other filings with the SEC. We cannot guarantee that any forward-looking statements will materialize, and you're cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Please refer to our earnings release for reconciliations of any non-GAAP information, which may be discussed on today's call. I'll now turn it over to CenterSpace's President and CEO Ann Olson for the company's prepared remarks.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining CenterSpace's fourth quarter earnings call. With me this morning are Bharat Patel, our Chief Financial Officer, and Graham Campbell, SVP of Investments and Capital Markets. Before taking your questions, we will briefly cover our 2024 results and discuss our outlook for 2025. 2024 was a year of positive platform executions that produced opportunities for strong advancement of our company's financial and market position. Our teams did the work to drive stable revenue growth, strong occupancy, and were diligent on expense control while facing the headwinds of supply and market uncertainty. During the year, we delivered $4.88 of core FFO per share, driven by sector-leading same-store NOI growth. We were able to expand our portfolio in Denver, where we purchased Validian, We continue to simplify our balance sheet with the redemption of our series C preferred shares while also improving our leverage profile and float via issuance on the ATM. The strong fundamentals of our community were proven, giving us positive blended leasing spreads in every quarter while also ending the year at one of our highest Q4 occupancies. We did all this while advancing our mantra of better every day. Our team members set a company record, volunteering over 2,700 hours in the communities we serve. We increased our aggregate online review scores by 3.5% over the past year, had a 16% increase in five-star reviews online, and showed improvement in every key metric of our resident satisfaction survey, including a 5.3% increase in overall satisfaction, which contributed to our outstanding same-store resident retention rate of 56.6% for the year. We also brought home six industry awards for individual and company performance, And we're named the Minneapolis Star Tribune Great Workplace for the fifth consecutive year. I'm incredibly grateful to our wonderful team for their commitment, passion, and consistently high standard of performance. These excellent results have led to an increase in our distributable cash flow, and I'm proud to share that our Board of Trustees has recognized what we've achieved on this front by announcing an increase to our quarterly dividend to 77 cents per share. As we think about our strategic direction for 2025, we will remain vigilant about our cost of capital while leveraging the strong position of our current portfolio. Depending on where capital markets move, this could take different forms. And with that in mind, I'll highlight different paths we've taken and are ready to pursue again as opportunities arise. In late 2023, we purchased Lake Vista in Fort Collins. Funding the purchase with the disposition of several communities in North Dakota and Minneapolis, which improved our portfolio's operational efficiency and margins while maintaining after CapEx cash flow. After buying back nearly $10 million in shares, we later issued stock under our ATM, raising $114 million and using the proceeds to both simplify and strengthen our balance sheet. We also successfully executed on the acquisition of the Lydian in Denver in an off-market transaction using both OP units issued at a premium to our current stock price and the assumption of attractive debt. The toolbox we have to improve the position of the company and pursue growth is full and varied, and our team has demonstrated execution when opportunities arise. As we sit today, we feel these recent moves leave us well-positioned to advance our vision, to be a premier provider of apartment homes in vibrant communities across the Mid and Mountain West, and to drive consistent earnings growth for our investors. Graham will give some insight into the transaction market, and Brad will discuss our quarterly results and details of 2025 guidance. But I want to provide an overview of leasing trends. For the fourth quarter, same-store revenues increased 3.1% over the same period in 2023, bringing full-year 2024 same-store growth to 3.3%. During the quarter, same-store new lease tradeouts were down 3.3%, while renewals were up 3.2%, leading to positive blended leasing spreads of 45 basis points. Importantly, we achieved these results while also increasing occupancy to 95.5%, which is a 70 basis point improvement over the same period last year. Our footprint, differentiated from other offerings in the public multifamily space, is worthy of attention. Our 2024 results demonstrate the consistency and appeal of the Midwest market. The majority of our markets experience lower supply, leading to more stable fundamentals. We have excellent resident health, evidenced by lower than national average rent-to-income ratios and low bad debt, and our markets both healthy regional economies. North Dakota communities continue to lead the portfolio with blended spreads of 4.4%, while our Nebraska and Rochester communities also saw strong blended growth at 2.5% and 2.3%, respectively. I'll also highlight our markets where we have experienced supply pressure. In Minneapolis, blended spreads were up marginally, while in Denver, they were down 140 basis points. Continued strong absorption in these markets is expected to be a tailwind to our portfolio results And we believe that this portfolio will produce strong results again in 2025. Grant will now share an overview of the state of the market and how it plays into our continued growth. Grant?