D.R. Horton, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to the second quarter 2024 earnings conference call for D.R. Horton, America's builder, the largest builder in the United States. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If you wish to enter the queue, you may press star 1 on your phone at any time. Should you wish to remove yourself from queue, you may press star 2. I will now turn the call over to Jessica Hansen, Senior Vice President of Communications for D.R. Horton.

Thank you, Tom, and good morning. Welcome to our call to discuss our financial results for the second quarter of fiscal 2024. Before we get started, today's call includes forward-looking statements as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although D.R. Horton believes any such statements are based on reasonable assumptions, there is no assurance that actual outcomes will not be materially different. All forward-looking statements are based upon information available to D.L. Horton on the date of this conference call, and D.L. Horton does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. Additional information about factors that could lead to material changes in performance is contained in D.L. Horton's annual report on Form 10-K and its most recent quarterly report on Form 10-Q, both of which are filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. This morning's earnings release can be found on our website at investor.dlhorton.com and we plan to file our 10-Q early next week. After this call, we will post updated investor and supplementary data presentations to our investor relations site on the presentation section under news and events for your reference. Now, I will turn the call over to Paul Romanowski, our president and CEO.

Thank you, Jessica, and good morning. I'm pleased to also be joined on this call by Mike Murray, our executive vice president and chief operating officer, and Bill Wheat, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. For the second quarter, the D.R. Horton team delivered solid results, highlighted by earnings of $3.52 per diluted share. Our consolidated pre-tax income increased 23% to $1.5 billion, on a 14% increase in revenues to $9.1 billion, with a pre-tax profit margin of 16.8%. Our home building return on inventory for the trailing 12 months ended March 31st was 29.9%, and our return on equity for the same period was 22.2%. Although inflation and mortgage interest rates remain elevated, our net sales orders increased 46% for the first quarter and 14% from the prior year quarter, as the supply of both new and existing homes at affordable price points is still limited. and the demographics supporting housing demand remain favorable. Homebuyer demand during the spring selling season thus far has been good despite continued affordability challenges. With 45,000 homes in inventory, we are well positioned to continue consolidating market share. Our average construction cycle times are back to normal, and our housing inventory returns are improving. We continue to focus on capital efficiency to produce consistent, strong home building operating cash flows and returns.