First Industrial Realty Trust, Inc.

Good morning. My name is Sia, and I will be the conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the first industrial 4Q and full year 20 results conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during that time, simply press star and the number 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw the question, press the pound key. Thank you. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Art Harmon. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Tia. Hello, everybody, and welcome to our call. Before we discuss our fourth quarter and full year 2020 results, as well as 2021 guidance, let me remind everyone that our call may include forward-looking statements as defined by federal securities laws. These statements are based on management's expectations, plans, and estimates of our prospects. Today's statements may be time-sensitive and accurate only as of today's date, Thursday, February 11, 2021. We assume no obligation to update our statements or the other information we provide. Actual results may differ materially from our forward-looking statements, and factors which could cause this are described in our 10-K and other SEC filings. You can find a reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures discussed in today's call in our supplemental report and our earnings release. The supplemental report, earnings release, and our SEC filings are available at firstindustrial.com. under the Investor Stat. Our call will begin with remarks by Peter Basile, our President and Chief Executive Officer, and Scott Musil, our Chief Financial Officer, after which we'll open it up for your questions. Also on the call today are Jojo Yap, our Chief Investment Officer, Peter Schultz, Executive Vice President, Chris Schneider, Senior Vice President of Operations, and Bob Walter, Senior Vice President of Capital Markets and Asset Management. Now let me turn the call over to Peter.

Thanks, Art, and thank you all for joining us. We hope you're doing well and staying healthy. 2020 was a year unlike any other and one which we would each like to put in our very distant memory. Notwithstanding the turmoil, fear, and uncertain operating environment, the FMR team remained focused, executed the plan, and performed admirably, generating outstanding results for shareholders. Our portfolio performance was strong. We maintained high occupancy levels, grew cash rents, and collected over 99% of billed rents. More on that in a moment. We capped off 2020 with an excellent fourth quarter. We delivered year-end occupancy of 95.7%, up 70 basis points from the guidance midpoint provided on our third quarter call. This was driven primarily by leasing at our developments and one of our replacement tenants in Southern California taking occupancy earlier than anticipated. For the full year, we grew cash rental rates 13.5%, which is the second highest in our company's history, just behind the 13.9% growth we achieved in 2019. These metrics reflect consistently strong tenant demand for high-quality logistics space. In our markets, we're seeing well-located and highly functional space being absorbed by e-commerce and other traditional users in their efforts to optimize supply chains. The positive fourth quarter leasing statistics nationally are consistent with our own experience, as CBRE's preliminary figure for net absorption is 104 million square feet, the highest quarterly result in the last four years, and exceeding the 69 million square feet of 4Q completions. For the full year, net absorption was 224 million square feet, 15% higher than 2019. Completions were 265 million square feet, an increase of 10%, over 2019. In 2021, we expect to capitalize on our current land holdings as well as new acquisitions to generate more growth and value creation. We're also focused on making progress in realizing the three-year cash flow growth opportunity we laid out for you at our investor day this past November. I'm pleased to say we're off to a strong start as we've signed leases for approximately 54% of our 2021 rollovers and a cash rental rate increase of approximately 13%. This early performance is consistent with the 10 to 14% increase we expect on our new and renewal leasing for the full year 2021. Our expirations for the balance of 2021 are fairly granular, with our largest remaining rollover now a 400,000 square footer where the tenant is expected to vacate in May. I'd like to highlight several big leasing wins on some of our developments. As evidence of the strength of the South Florida market, we're pleased to announce we have signed a long-term lease for 100% of the three-building First Cypress Creek Commerce Center with a single e-commerce tenant. This project totals 377,000 square feet, and the lease commenced right at completion, on February 1st. Our total investment is $37.1 million, and our first year's stabilized cash yield is 6.6%. In the Inland Empire, at our first Redwood project, we signed and commenced leases for both the 358,000 and the 72,000 square foot facilities in the fourth quarter. And just this week, we fully leased the remaining 44,000 square foot building. Given our own experience and the strong market dynamics reflected in CBRE's fourth quarter update report, which shows the Inland Empire vacancy rate at 1.9%, we're excited to be readying our next start in that market, which I will discuss shortly. Also in the fourth quarter, in Dallas, we signed two leases at First Park 121 to bring a pair of buildings there to 100% occupancy. The first was for the remaining 101,000 square feet at the 434,000 square foot Building E, and the second was a 25,000 square foot expansion at Building B. Each of these leases is a reflection of the continued strong demand for high quality logistics space and the effort and talents of our leasing teams across the country. Turning to new development starts, we've broken ground on PD303 Building C in Phoenix on our wholly owned site. This 548,000 square foot cross dock facility is our fourth speculative development in this highly sought after size range since 2017. Each of our prior projects in this market was fully leased at or near completion. Total investment for this new development is approximately $42.6 million, with a targeted cash yield of 6.6%. Turning now to the new project in the Inland Empire I referenced. We are planning to break ground in the coming weeks on 1st Wilson I, a 303,000 square foot facility in the I-215 corridor of the Inland Empire. This is a $30.2 million development with a targeted completion at the end of December and a projected cash yield of 6.3%. Lastly, we will be starting a 500,000 square foot development in Nashville known as First Rockdale 4. The site is located within a park where we have successfully developed buildings over the years. Tennessee was among the fastest-growing states in the U.S. during 2020, and Nashville is its largest city. We've seen increased absorption and leafing activity for large distribution centers in this sub-market and are excited about this opportunity. Total investment is approximately $26.8 million, with a targeted cash yield of 7.2%. Summing up our development activity in 2020, we placed in service 10 buildings totaling 2.5 million square feet with an estimated investment of $222 million. These assets are 79% leased at an estimated cash yield of 7.2% upon full lease-up. This represents an expected overall margin of 58% to 68%, which is about $1 per share of NAV. One additional item of note regarding our highly successful JV in Phoenix. As we discussed on our third quarter call, we successfully leased the 644,000 square foot spec building at PV 303 to a single tenant. Upon completion in the fourth quarter, we negotiated the acquisition of our partner's interest in the building, reflecting a total purchase price of $42.6 million, which is net of our $5.2 million share of the joint venture's gain-on-sale and incentive fee. Moving now to dispositions, during the quarter we sold 15 properties for $97.1 million at an in-place cap rate of approximately 6.4%. In 2020, excluding the previously reported purchase option-related sale in Phoenix, we sold 1.9 million square feet for a total of 153.4 million, essentially at the midpoint of our target sales guidance range for the year. For 2021, our guidance for sales is 100 to 150 million. In the coming weeks, we anticipate selling a 664,000 square foot building in Houston, at a sales price of approximately $42 million. Given its very high probability of closing, we are including the impact of this sale in 2021 guidance. Aside from the first quarter sale I just mentioned, we expect the majority of the remaining 2021 sales to be back-end loaded. Based upon our strong 2020 performance and 2021 outlook, which Scott will discuss shortly. Our Board of Directors has declared a dividend of $0.27 per share for the first quarter of 2021. This is $1.08 per share annualized, which equates to an 8% increase from 2020. This dividend level represents a payout ratio of approximately 69% of our anticipated AFFO for 2021, as defined in our supplementals. To wrap it up, we had an excellent quarter to end the year on a high note. We're very excited about the strength of our platform and our future development pipeline, both of which position us well to benefit from continued strong fundamentals in the industrial market and to take advantage of the growth opportunities that are to come in 2021. With that, let me turn it over to Scott.

Thanks, Peter. Let me recap our results. NARIC funds from operations were $0.44 for fully diluted share compared to $0.45 per share in 4Q 2019. For the full year, NARIC FFO per share was $1.84 versus $1.74 in 2019. I remind you that our full year 2020 includes income related to the final settlement of two insurance claims for damaged properties recognized in prior quarters. This was partially offset by a restructuring charge and costs related to the accelerated vesting of equity awards for retirement eligible employees. Excluding the impact of approximately $0.04 per share related to these items, 2020 FFO per share was $1.80. Now a quick update on our collection experience. We have collected 99% of the 2020 monthly rental billings every month since April, and effectively it would be 100% if we factored in reserves. We are also pleased to announce all tenants with deferral agreements have paid back those obligations in full, and we currently have no other agreements outstanding. In another bit of good news, we have closure on one of our last tenants on the watch list that we discussed on our last call. This tenant occupied a 137,000 square foot building in the Chino Submarket of the Inland Empire West and vacated on December 31st. Due to the great work of our Southern California team, we were able to lease 100% of the building on a long-term basis with only one month of downtime and a cash rental rate increase of 28%. In the fourth quarter, we also wrote off the $1.1 million cash and straight-line rent receivable related to this tenant. In doing so, we have taken care of the last material accounts receivable exposure related to our COVID-related watch list. Summarizing our outstanding leasing volume during the quarter, we commenced approximately 4.4 million square feet of leases. Of these, 700,000 were new, 1.6 were renewals, and $2.1 million were for developments and acquisitions with Leesa. Tenant retention by square footage was 80.6%. For the quarter, same-store NOI growth on a cash basis, excluding termination fees, was 1.3%, helped by an increase in rental rates on new and renewal leasing and rental rate bumps embedded in our leases, partially offset by lower average occupancy and an increase in free rents. For the full year of 2020, cashed same-store NOI growth before lease termination fees was 4.4%. Cash rental rates for the quarter were up 10.4% overall, with renewals up 8.6% and new leasing 12.8%. On a straight-line basis, overall rental rates were up 25.5%, with renewals increasing 25.9%, and new leasing up 25.1%. For the year, cash rental rates were up 13.5%, which, as Peter mentioned, is the second highest in the company's history. On a straight-line basis, they were up 29.7%. Now on to a few balance sheet metrics. At December 31st, our net debt plus preferred stock to adjusted EBITDA is 4.8%, and the weighted average maturity of our unsecured notes, term loans, and secured financings was 6.3 years, with a weighted average interest rate of 3.7%. Moving on to our 2021 initial guidance for our earnings release last evening. Our guidance range for NAERI FFO is $1.85 to $1.95 per share, with a midpoint of $1.90. Key assumptions for guidance are as follows. Quarter-end average in-service occupancy for the year of 95.5% to 96.5%. Our cash bad debt expense assumption for 2021 is $2 million, consistent with last year's pre-pandemic assumption. Same store and a wide growth on a cash basis before termination fees of 3% to 4%. We expect our G&A expense to approximate $33 million to $34 million. Guidance includes the anticipated 2021 costs related to our completed and under construction developments at December 31st, plus the expected first quarter groundbreakings of 1st Park PV 303 Building C, 1st Rockdale 4, and 1st Wilson 1. In total, for the full year 2021, we expect to capitalize about $0.05 per share of interest related to these developments. Guidance reflects the impact from the $42 million sale in Houston, expected to close in the first quarter that Peter discussed, which could be as much as $0.02 per share of FFO impact in 2021, depending on redeployment of the anticipated proceeds. The guidance also reflects the expected payoff of $58 million of secure debt in the third quarter with an interest rate of 4.85%. Other than previously discussed, our guidance does not reflect the impact of any other future sales, acquisitions, or new development starts, the impact of any future debt issuances, debt repurchases, or repayments, and guidance also excludes the potential issuance of equity. Let me turn it back over to Peter.

Thanks, Scott. Before we open it up to questions, let me congratulate our team for their outstanding performance in 2020. It was the kind of year that is impossible to prepare for. There's no training for how to manage a business through a pandemic, especially one accompanied by social and political unrest not seen in decades. The true leaders emerge during a crisis, and when they have managed well and the crisis has passed, to most, it may not have felt like a crisis at all. This is what we experienced within our company across every role in every region. So thank you, Team FR, for your commitment and dedication. I couldn't be more proud to work with such a talented group of people, nor more excited about the opportunities ahead. With that, we will now move to the question and answer portion of our call. We ask that you please limit your questions to one plus a follow-up, and then you're welcome to get back in the queue. So, operator, please open it up for questions.

Thank you, sir. At this time, I would like to remind everyone that if you would like to ask a question, please press star and the number one on your telephone keypad. Again, that's star one for any questions. We'll pause for just a moment. The first question will come from Craig Millman with KeyBain Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, guys. Nice job on the development leasing for Q and to date. And I'm just kind of curious, as you guys de-risk the pipeline here, I know you don't necessarily put numbers on starts, but as you're looking at, you know, the land bank and demand across your markets, You know, what do you think a decent bogey could be on where you could be from a development start level this year?

Hey, Craig, it's Peter. You know, as you pointed out, we don't give guidance on starts. But as you know, we can, with the land that we own, build about 13 million square feet. We can build a lot more also on our JV land. And there is no reason that you would – should think that our development volumes won't go back to pre pandemic levels. Obviously, last year, we had a had a downtime of about six months where we suspended new starts. We got delayed on another project located in Philadelphia. So we're excited about the markets right now. There's a lot of demand. It's broad based. We also think that 2021 you're going to see a lot more capital expenditure into the business environment. We're very pro. We're very positive on 2021 outlook.

That's helpful. Scott, from a capital perspective, with the cadence of potential spend here in the development pipeline and disposition proceeds coming in, do you guys feel good about Where you are, I know you have no equity in the plan, but would you prefer to kind of use debt here in the near term to bridge any gap? Or, you know, would you guys, you know, with where the stock's trading, could equity be ultimately in the plan?

Yeah, Craig, it's got equity could be in the plan, but we're sitting on about $135 million of cash as we stand today. Our line of credit is undrawn, so we have a full $725 million, and our leverage is at about 4.8 times, so we're in pretty good shape. But as you know, we have issued equity in past. If we see future investments that we really like and we like the stock price, equity is on the table for something like that. And if you looked at the equity we've issued probably since 2015, which was more for growth, spec development, We're really happy about the development margins we earned on those investments. So even though we look in good shape as we stand today, equity is a possibility. It just depends on what our investment growth is.

And can I slip one more in there? Just on the loans you have come and due this year, kind of what's timing expected on, you know, potentially the $200 million? Kind of what would the plan be from a refinancing standpoint?

Yeah, the $200 million was a term loan that we refinanced last July during the pandemic. The spread popped up to 150 basis points. That comes due this July. The bank market has gotten a lot better since then. We probably could shave off about 50 basis points in total spread on that. So we are looking at the bank market to refinance that. And, Craig, we also have our line of credit coming due in October of this year, and if we did something with the term loan, we would package them together. On the $58 million of secure debt that we can pay off in July, we'll probably use excess cash for a line of credit borrowings to pay that off. Great. Thanks.

The next question will come from Rob Stevenson with Jenny.

Please go ahead. Good morning, guys. Can you talk a little bit about, to any extent, the issues surrounding the shipping container capacity issues of impacted your tenants and or the demand for increased expansion space in port markets like Southern Cal?

sir uh hi uh this is jojo uh yes there is congestion in the port of la for a long beach a lot of it has to do with the amount of goods coming in report but also because of the uh in uh efficiencies in the uh the port right now given labor issues and then covet related process i would put as number one because of the covet practices that's been extending slowing down the throughput from the container. Now, the actual amount that has come in the report has increased year over year, but not meaningful enough to really significantly affect uh the market the market in itself is already good positive absorption in socal and the marginal impact with that year over year if you look at the port uh container throughput it's about five percent now it lagged uh first of the year in the second quarter it was negative but then the second half of the year it caught up as much as uh 15 to 20 percent so net net year over year we're about five percent up so overall our view is that You know, when COVID, you know, reduces, I think the flow will come in quicker and, you know, it will be back to normal with slightly more than inflationary adjusted growth year over year in terms of container volume.

And how is that impacting your desire to develop in, you know, the Inland Empire land parcels, et cetera, in the near term?

Sure. It has actually increased because what's happening now is that the take-up that the tenants want is actually increasing because they cannot accurately estimate the amount of goods they're getting because of the delay. They're actually ordering more. So rather than just-in-time inventory, it's really a severe case of just-in-case. So that's why actually in the last six months, Spaces has been leasing a little bit quicker because of that just-in-case mentality of the tenants. They don't want to lose that sale. They're stocking up more.

Okay. And then the other one for me is – How significant is the land purchase machine today for you guys? I mean, you guys did a decent job at increasing your usable land position year over year and over the last couple of years. Assuming it's getting harder and harder to find developable land at prices, it makes sense for you guys. But, you know, how is that process going and what's that pipeline look like for you guys?

Yeah, the pipeline's actually pretty robust. We're making a great many unsolicited offers on a weekly basis across the country in the higher barrier markets, which is where we're focusing our new investments. It's definitely getting more difficult. Land values, as you know, have gone up significantly and continue to rise. The good news is in those markets where land is appreciating the most rapidly, the rents are growing the quickest as well. So It justifies. The timetable for getting entitlements is not shortening for sure. So basically what that means is we have to have a lot more balls in the air to keep that volume going because we're going to win a lower percentage of those opportunities. But right now the team is doing a great job fielding a lot of new opportunities.

Okay. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it.

The next question will come from Dave Rogers with Baird. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning, guys. Something in the press release, I think it was based in the same store, NOI comments for the fourth quarter talked about higher free rent. So maybe just expand upon the leasing economics that you were seeing that drove that comment and maybe whether you're seeing any of that in the development pipeline and driving some of this activity.

Yeah, Dave, just as Chris, in general on the lease free rent concessions, we're not seeing really any changes there. We're still usually giving about a half a month free rent for a year of term in the lease. So the changes in the free rent from quarter to quarter have to do just really with the free rent burning off on some deals, development deals. But as far as overall concessions, we're not seeing much change in that.

Okay, fair enough. On those development deals, how much of that or when did those all commence? I mean, did those all commence essentially with signing or do you have some delayed starts on that activity? Okay. Which development? Dave, are you asking the $100 million that we've announced? Yeah, the $1.2 million square feet or so that you paid in the press release last night, most of which I think was fourth quarter signings. I guess I was just trying to make sure that those were signings for were they immediate starts or how do those stagger? Oh, yes, yeah. They're immediate starts, you know, because there's not a significant amount of 3Is, and some of them were taken as is. Okay, that's helpful. Most of them are in 2020, and then First Cypress Creek Commerce Center, that's February of this year. Okay, thanks for that. Scott, since you spoke up on the bad debt side, I think you gave guidance and maybe it was part of the same score of $2 million for bad debt, which was, I think, consistent with the expectation for $20 or what you delivered in 2020. Why did you not expect that number to come down? Is that just kind of an overly cautious number, or is there something more specific in that? Nothing more specific or assumption on bad debt, Dave, is basically we look at the 26-year history of the company, which is about 50 basis points of total revenues, and that's how we get the $2 million. Last year, we incurred about $1.8 million of cash bad debt expense. So we're hoping we can, you know, beat that $2 million number that's in our guidance. That's helpful. Lastly, are you guys seeing more short-term lease activities? I heard a little bit about that early in the earnings season, but curious on kind of what your experience has been with that.

Yeah, Dave, this is Chris again. Yeah, not really. If you look at, you know, what was in place at 1231 between our month-to-month tenants and our short-term tenants, it's about $200,000 a square feet, so pretty low.

Okay, great. Thank you.

And once again, ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1. Again, that's star 1 for any questions. Your next response will come from Keith and Kim with Truist. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Don. Can you talk about how some of your conversations with your tenants have evolved over time and what are their biggest pain points today and things being asked for?

Keith, I couldn't hear the last part of your question.

So, their biggest pain points and things that they're asking for today, if that's changed at all over the past couple quarters?

I wouldn't say substantially. We continue to see an increased level of confidence from our tenants. A lot of the deals that we're seeing continue to be expansions. And as Jodrio remarked a couple of minutes ago, you know, the shift from just in time to just in case in terms of inventory. We're seeing lease terms lengthen. as you saw in some of our information in the sub. So I would say in general continues to be positive. Jojo?

Not much change. You know, again, you know, over, it's been happening already even for a year or two. You know, the food-related companies are more active, medical-related are more active. Home-related also are more active. You know, the CPS and e-commerce have always been active. So I guess, you know, if there's a change, it's a little bit more of, you know, broader type. More industries are actually coming into because of the change in the supply chain. But in terms of their ask, in terms of leasing and, you know, functionality building, no change.

Got it. And can you just talk about the R&D flex segment of your business? There was a little bit of an occupancy decline. I'm not sure if that's just transitory and some of the pockets of vacancy that there's not much, thankfully, but some pockets of vacancy like in markets like Seattle or Baltimore.

Kevin, I'll take the first part of this. Chris, you know, the R&D flex is a pretty small part of our portfolio. I think it's about 2% on the net rents. The one, the drop in occupancy is really just one space. So it's obviously we're marketing that space, but that's really what that's from.

Kevin, it's Peter. Relatives of Baltimore, the occupancy level there is really a function of our vacancy at the former Pier 1 space. Leasing that space will take occupancy in that market to 98.4%, and we're seeing some activity on that space now, but nothing to report. And then JoJo can touch on Seattle.

Well, in Seattle, currently there is only one space, about 64,000 square feet, and our portfolio is slightly over 4,000. So it's really only one vacancy, and it kind of skews the numbers in terms of occupancy. It's a good space. You know, we just haven't found the right tenant for it yet.

Got it. Thank you, guys.

The next question will come from Michael Carroll with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Yeah, thanks. I guess, Peter, in your comments, I think you're making a comment that there's a large lease expiration in May, about 400,000 square feet, where you expect the tenant will move out. Can you provide some details on that, maybe what their current rental rate is and where that asset's located?

Yeah. So it's in Kansas City, very good quality property. The tenant has... They told us that they will leave. And, you know, properties, again, you know, good comparable to competition. But, you know, in terms of income, we've factored our downtime of 12 months, so it doesn't affect the numbers for this year.

Okay. And then where is rent on that asset relative to market?

We don't disclose for competitive reasons. We will report to you what happens there when we lease it.

Okay, great. And then I guess last question, I know that last call there were two challenge tenants that were highlighted, and I believe that you announced the resolution to one of those. Did I miss the resolution to the second tenant? I guess what was going on there?

Hey, Mike, it's Scott. Yeah, the one tenant is, I think, 45,000 square feet in the South Bay market of Southern California. That tenant is paid up in current at this point in time, so we're in good shape.

Okay, great. Thanks, Scott.

The next question will come from Vince Toboni with Green Street. Please go ahead.

Hi. Good morning. As you think about potential dispositions for the year, could you see an opportunity for a portfolio deal as a way to accelerate your target market mix given the desire of many institutions to increase their industrial exposure and scale?

Hey, Vince. Yeah, we've looked at that and what you've What we've seen in the marketplace is we're able to maximize value by selling literally one-off assets. The buyers of these assets tend to be about 30% go to users. And as you know, users are a little less price sensitive, so we're able to maximize value there. Another group of buyers would be the 1031 buyers who are also more focused on time than maybe paying that extra buck a foot. So we like those buyers. They're also being acquired by local and semi-regional money managers and high net worth families. And given that that buyer group is really focused on the smaller transaction, they're not really going to be interested in a few hundred million dollar portfolio. And they're really the ones that are going to pay the highest values in what we've experienced so far. So that's why we really haven't gone out with portfolios.

Makes sense. No, thank you for that. And one more for me. In 2020, I'm curious, how much did leasing spread and market rent growth differ between bulk, light industrial, and flex properties in your portfolio?

Yeah, this is Chris. If you look across, it's pretty broad-based across all the different types. I would say that actually R&D flex was a little bit higher as far as the spreads. but it was pretty broad-based across all the property types. Okay. Thank you.

The next question will come from Caitlin Burroughs with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. Tenant retention on renewals was about 81% in the fourth quarter, which is similar to the full-year levels. So I was wondering if you could just talk about how you think about what the right level is, and then also when tenants choose not to renew, what are some of the reasons? Does it come down to rent, or is it just expanding or decreasing the amount of space that they need?

Hey, Caitlin, well, typically when we have a tenant that doesn't renew, it's because they need additional space. And given our high occupancy levels, we don't have any more space to give them. So clearly, it's in our interest to retain tenants. It costs about four times as much to release the space as it does to roll the space. And obviously, that factors into our desire to push rents as much as we can. You know, I would say this. In a really good market like we have now, Retention is almost more of an outcome than a target. Obviously, in a very weak market, you want to retain, and so retention is more of your target than you want that to happen. You want that to be the outcome. So we're really working all the spaces as vigorously as we can to maximize value, and that's a combination of a lot of factors, as I've said, including rent growth and the cost to release.

Got it. And then maybe on the dividend, you guys talked about how you raised it 8% in the quarter, which is higher than both the FFO growth in 2020 and the guidance for 2021. And I know that you've also talked about there was some acceleration of CapEx in 2020 to pull forward some expected spend. So I guess what drove the decision to increase the payout ratio rather than retain more cash to reinvest?

Hey, Caitlin, it's Scott. We grew the dividend by 8%, as we said in the press release. We grow our dividend as we grow our cash flow. As we laid out at the Investor Day in November, we think we have an opportunity to grow cash flow 9% a year for the next three years. So that's in line with that. As far as the payout ratio is concerned, it went up a couple percentage points, so nothing material. And then we're still at the 60% level, which we're very happy with.

Okay, thanks.

And once again, if you would like to ask any question, please press star 1. Again, that's star 1 for any questions. Your next response is from Mike Mueller with JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Thanks. How does the 54% of the 2021 leases that you've addressed compare to the progress that you had last year?

Yeah, this is Chris. Actually, last year, I think we were right about 59%. Historically, the last two or three years, we've been right around that 50% to 60% as far as the ones taken over by the earnings call. So pretty consistent.

Got it. Okay. And then looking at the developments that were placed in the service, there were a couple of assets in Texas that had fairly low leasing levels. I was just curious in terms of can you give us some color on progress there?

Sure. Hi, this is Jojo. Let's start with Dallas. First park, 121. So we built three buildings there. We almost pre-leased the largest building, and then we completely leased the second building. So we're left with one. Rough occupancy of the park is about 70, a little bit over 70%. And so that's a multi-tenant building. We're getting inquiries. That's in the northwest part of Dallas, one of the best pieces of real estate there in terms of that size range. So, you know, we're getting increased and, you know, we're pretty optimistic we get at least the rest. But overall, we're very pleased with the performance of the park. Now, moving on to Houston, that's Grand Parkway. Now, that's been a slower project. You know, in Houston, last year, Houston had, you know, very good absorption of about 11, net absorption of 11 million square feet. But it also had about 16 plus million of, you know, you know, new deliveries. If you look at Houston, the most delivered part or market, sub-market with the most supply was the north part. And northwest was second. Now, our project is, in Katy, is part of the northwest sub-market, a little bit west. So, you know, there's a little bit more spaces there that tenants can choose from. So, you know, we're competing with some space. But again, you know, that project has freeway frontage. just off State Highway 99, really nice project. So over time, we'll lease it slowly but surely.

Got it. Okay. Thank you.

The next question is from Sumit Sharma with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, guys. Great quarter. I had a follow-up actually on a bad debt question that was asked a few minutes ago. I think Rob had asked this around – the level of bad debts. I think it calculates around 40 basis points or 45 basis points based on 2020 REVs. And I'm wondering, and I understand the point, your point about the 26-year average, but I'm trying to understand whether your higher-end or lower-end contemplate different levels of bad debt, or is it consistent across both the SSNY ranges?

I'm sorry, could you repeat the last half of this to me? I didn't get that You kind of broke up a little bit.

Oh, I'm so sorry. What I was asking was the bad debt. Is that the same level that's contemplated in both your higher end and lower end of the ranges? So does that 40 to 50 basis points of bad debt, does that change between, you know, go up to like 30 basis points or is it just consistent across your SSNOI range?

that will impact the same store OI range. So to the extent that our bad debt expense comes in lower, and I'll give you as an example, if you look from 2015 to 2019, our bad debt expense on average was $500,000 a year. That was pre-pandemic. So if we were able to achieve that same level of bad debt expense in 2021, we would pick up another 50 basis points on our same store, all other things being equal. So that would increase our midpoint from 3.5% up to 4%. I think that's what you were asking.

Yeah, that's what I was asking. I was wondering whether the 4% range includes that, implicitly calls out that assumption or not. And I think the bottom line bias was that, does that 4% become 4.5% because of the bad debt or not? or is that already reflected in your assumptions? I think you addressed that.

Yeah. If we do better than the $2 million, we should do better than the midpoint of our same-store guide, so all things being equal, correct?

Got it. Thank you so much. I appreciate the response to the wonky question, I know. Let me ask you something more fun. One of your peers has mentioned that they're able to drive rent growth 100 to 200 basis points in markets – above the market in some markets where they have density, which is defined as 20 or more assets in a five-mile radius. I'm not saying this. They said this. So I thought it would be worth asking you, given your density. I think you guys are pretty concentrated in the Riverside sub-market in the Inland Empire and then in the southwest or Arlington area in Dallas. Those are the two spots that my work had sort of showed me. So just trying to understand whether you've seen the ability to push rents higher than the market in areas of high density of your own assets.

I'll start out with this and then pass it over to Jojo for his thoughts. But first of all, remember there's 17 billion or so square feet of industrial in the United States. If you look at what each sponsor, owner, entity owns, nobody owns an overwhelming percentage of that. So it's not like the major mall business where if you own the two best malls in each town, you can effectively dictate to tenants. Our markets aren't really like that. So we think that the overall demand is so strong, whether it's from e-commerce or more traditional users, that we're going to be able to continue to grow rents at a very high rate. And it's the offering, too, that matters significantly. The functionality, the quality of the functionality, of the asset, the location of the asset, more so than who might own how many assets within a 5- or 10-mile radius.

Not much more to add to what Peter said, except that that's why as a company we prioritize more infill product, because when you have more infill properties, you have less supply, and then you can raise rents. higher than the average market, if you may, in certain markets. And I can assume that Arlington, you know, which is in a general degree Southwest market, is a good market. And we like Arlington. In fact, we have product in Arlington. And the reason we invested there, too, is because it's quite infill. And we feel that overall in Arlington, maybe this is your question, that you can raise rents higher than if you're in South Dallas. And the reason it's out there is it's not infill and you get more product there. So confirming your thesis.

Well, it's not a thesis. It's a hypothesis. But thanks for that data. I think it's more – I think your points about market control and not being like malls is actually, you know, more – adds more clarity to it. But your infill point I get and appreciate. I guess one last one really quick. Contractual escalators on your leases, what are they averaging at, and are you seeing any creep above the 3% range?

Yeah, overall, this is Chris. Our overall portfolio is about 2.8%. That's on an annualized basis, and that's about 98% of all of our long-term leases. Certainly, some of the actual... You know, increases, we're seeing 3% plus. We are seeing that. Peter and Joe, just comment a little bit more on what we're seeing here.

Yeah, we are seeing the opportunity to push those rental increases on leases that are generally in the three-year plus or minus range, whereas five or seven or ten, you know, three is probably the upper limit.

All right.

Thank you, gentlemen, for indulging me.

Thank you.

The next question is from Jay Cornwich with SMBC. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks for taking the question. As you guys consider the risk that major cities may take a long time to return to pre-pandemic levels, does this inform you from a geographic perspective to consider future investments more in Sunbelt and less gateway markets?

We certainly track movements of people. That's one of the reasons we're very intrigued by Nashville right now. and Tennessee being the sixth fastest growing state in the country. When you look around and see how certain municipalities are being managed, you know, we pay attention to that. That will matter over the long term. And, you know, people talk about California losing population. I think you have to remember that not only do people move up, but they move in. So looking at the net numbers, you'd find that the population reduction isn't huge relative to their nearly 40 million person population. So really what we're focused on is consumption zones and movements that might change or alter or move those consumption zones, and you're really not seeing any big trends that would cause us to shift our focus away from the markets that we're focused on today.

Okay, I appreciate that. That's it for me.

The next question is a follow-up from Kevin Kim with Truist. Please go ahead.

Thanks. Going back to the balance sheet, I think I missed some of the color you gave, Scott. But what would the kind of all-in rate and duration be for the debt you're looking to raise this year?

So let me go over the expirations. We have a $200 million term loan that comes due in July. We have an option to extend it, but the spread on that loan is pretty high. It's 150 basis points. because we entered into that loan during COVID. We think in today's market, we can refinance it in 50 basis points inside of that rate. So 50 bips inside of that $200 million. And then the line of credit, we currently pay 110 basis points on that. We think we can knock another 10 bips off the line of credit. So those are basically the two expirations we had this year. Then again, we've got the $58 million mortgage loan we're paying off, but we've got plenty of excess cash. We have a line of credit we can use to pay that off, and that's at a rate of 4.85%.

Okay, got it. Now, is there something that the debt investors are looking for or asking for you guys to perhaps move into a different bracket of debt? you know, credit spreads, whether that be issuing more unsecured bonds or, I mean, you're already growing your portfolio over time. So I'm not sure if size is a factor or not, but is there a couple, is there things that you can do or that investors are asking for that can, you know, maybe help you save it on interest costs going forward?

So, Kevin, I would say a couple of things. One is, you know, if we get a rating upgrade at BBB plus or BAA1, That definitely impacts our spread. And our credit statistics are off the charts good. I think when you read the rating agency reports, they want to see a larger scale size of the company. They don't give us exactly what that number is, but it's probably over a billion dollars or more of growth in the total value of the company. So that would definitely help. I would say, you know, from an unsecured bond issuance point of view, We've historically been private placement issuers because the spreads in that market were inside the public market. That flopped in the middle of this year in July. So we think we can get even more competitive spreads in the bond market than we were able to get in the private placement market. So all things being equal, if we did a bond deal today, that spread would definitely be inside of what we executed back earlier in 2020.

Is the debt refinancing cost savings in your 2021 guidance?

The term loan one is not. So that assumes it's 150 basis points for the rest of the year. So if we do, let's just give a hypothetical. If we're able to renew that on July 1st, that would save us about a half million bucks for that half of the year. On an annualized basis, that would be a million bucks. Okay. The payoff of the mortgage debt, the $58 million, we're getting six months of the benefit of interest savings there. And I'd like to pivot back to the investor day where we said we'd get $7 million of savings from refinancing higher cost debt in the next couple of years. We're not seeing that's going to come more in 2020, after 2021. So we're really not seeing a lot of that $7 million savings flowing through 2021.

Okay. Thank you.

And at this time, if there are no further questions, I would like to turn the conference over to Peter Basile for any closing comments.

Thank you, Operator, and thanks to everyone for participating on the call today. As always, feel free to reach out to me, Scott, or Art with any follow-up questions. We look forward to connecting with many of you virtually and hopefully in person in 2021. Thank you, and have a great day.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating in today's conference. You may all disconnect.