Extra Space Storage Inc

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the third quarter 2019 Extra Space Storage Incorporated Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants' lines are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker, Mr. Jeff Norman. Please begin, sir.

Thank you, Norma. Welcome to Extra Space Storage's third quarter 2019 earnings call. In addition to our press release, we have furnished unaudited supplemental financial information on our website. Please remember that management's prepared remarks and answers to your questions may contain forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act. Actual results could differ materially from those stated or implied by our forward-looking statements due to risks and uncertainties associated with the company's business. These forward-looking statements are qualified by the cautionary statements contained in the company's latest filings with the SEC, which we encourage our listeners to review. Forward-looking statements represent management's estimates as of today, October 30, 2019. The company assumes no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements because of changing market conditions or other circumstances after the date of this conference call. I would now like to turn the call over to Joe Margolis, Chief Executive Officer.

Thanks, Jeff. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us for our third quarter call and for your interest in extra space storage. We completed another busy and competitive leasing season. The sector headlines coming out of the summer are the same themes we have been hearing for much of the year. Many markets are feeling the headwind of new supply, and digital advertising is as expensive as we have ever seen it. External growth through traditional acquisitions is challenging due to capital flows into the sector. We also continue to see pressure on multiple expense line items, including property taxes. And despite these headwinds, we had another solid quarter, allowing us to increase our annual guidance. As expected, we have started to experience the increased moderation in the second half of the year, which was projected in our guidance. However, our diversified portfolio, sophisticated platform, and strong operations team continue to be resilient. We continue to have pricing power with in-place customers and have maintained very strong occupancies at our properties. We also continue to actively explore external growth opportunities that present attractive risk-adjusted returns. In addition to our acquisitions, We added five new stores to the platform in New York City through a previously announced net lease transaction with WP Carey. We also closed several bridge loans and expect to complete over $100 million in total originations in our first year, with approximately $45 million of the balances held by Extra Space. Yesterday, we closed $150 million preferred equity investment with SmartStop with an additional $50 million committed for investment in the next 12 months. The investment has a dividend of 6.25%, which begins to escalate after year five. This investment is senior to a significant amount of common equity and strengthens our ongoing relationship with SmartStop. Our third-party management platform continues to see exceptional growth. In the quarter, we added 42 managed stores, bringing our year-to-date total to 136. Between our third-party program and our JV stores, we have 877 managed stores, with a strong remaining pipeline for Q4 and for 2020. I would now like to turn the time over to Scott Stubbs, our CFO.