11/8/2023

speaker
Operator

And welcome to the Global Net Lease third quarter 2023 earning conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on a touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question if needed, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Jordan Schoenfeld, associate at GlobalNet Lease. Please go ahead.

speaker
Jordan Schoenfeld

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us for GNL's third quarter 2023 earnings call. Joining me today on the call are Mike Weil and Jim Nelson, GNL's co-chief executive officers, and Chris Masterson, GNL's chief financial officer. The following information contains forward-looking statements which are subject to risk and uncertainties. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. We refer all of you to our SEC filings, including the Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2022, filed on February 23, 2023, and all other filings with the SEC after that date for a more detailed discussion of the risk factors that could cause these differences. Any forward-looking statements provided during this conference call are only made as of the date of this call. As stated in our SEC filings, G&L disclaims any intent or obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements except as required by law. Any statements referring to the future value of an investment in G&L, including any adjustments giving effect to the recently completed merger with the necessity retail reincorporated defined as RTL and the subsequent internalization of both G&L and RTL's advisory and property management functions as well as any projections about any potential success following the merger and internalization are also forward-looking statements. There are a number of risks associated with the merger and internalization including, but not limited to, our ability to integrate the operations of RTL and the other entities acquired in the merger and internalization. We may not realize the anticipated synergies and other benefits of the merger or the internalization or do so within our anticipated timeframe. Also, during today's call, we will discuss non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe can be useful in evaluating the company's financial performance. These measures should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for our financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP. A reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measure is available in our earnings release and supplement, which are posted to our website. Please also refer to our earnings release for more information about what we consider to be implied investment-grade tenants, a term we will use throughout today's call. I'll now turn the call over to our co-CEO, Mike Weil. Mike?

speaker
Mike Weil

Thanks, Jordan, and good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to our first earnings call following the merger with the necessity retail REIT and corresponding internalization transaction. We recognize how vital our shareholders are to our continued success and we appreciate the great conviction our investors demonstrated in support of the merger and internalization. The success of the merger and internalization has created the third largest publicly traded net lease REIT with a global presence based on gross asset value as well as corporate governance in line with our internalized peers. The foundation of our global presence is a diversified portfolio of high-quality tenants, which gives us the flexibility to focus on attractive opportunities in multiple markets that will contribute to long-term shareholder value. Our recently completed merger and internalization creates the path for GNL to trade up to our net lease peer multiples. We believe we are clearly undervalued on an AFFO multiple basis compared to the other internalized REITs even though the quality of our rental income and investment-grade worthy tenants are substantially higher than the average in our industry. We closed the merger and the internalization transaction on September 12th. Accordingly, the third quarter financial results reflect 73 days of standalone pre-merger GNL and only 19 days of post-merger internalized GNL and RTL results. The company is currently on track to achieve the $75 million of annualized cost savings we anticipated in conjunction with the merger and internalization. To this point, based on 19 days of lower than expected G&A expenses, G&L has exceeded the projected synergies by $2 million, capturing $56 million of annualized synergies, and we remain on track to capture the $75 million worth of total synergies with a projected 6% G&A operating expense by Q3 2024. In addition, GNL reduced its quarterly dividend per share from 40 cents pre-merger to 35.4 cents as part of the merger, reducing the amount of cash needed to fund the dividends by approximately $42 million on an annualized per share basis as of September 30, 2023. Together, without the assumption of any incremental acquisitions or external growth, GNL expects to reduce its payout ratio and continue to execute on its current business plan, including leasing, renewals, and strategic disposition initiatives. Our leading portfolio of over 1,300 properties spans nearly 67 million square feet, and we had a gross asset value of $9.2 billion at quarter end. The diverse makeup of our net lease portfolio is unmatched whether measured by geography, asset type, tenant, or industry. which positions GNL well to navigate external macro challenges as we move ahead. The portfolio is over 96% leased, with a weighted average remaining lease term of 6.9 years. Geographically, 81% of our straight-line rent is earned in North America, while 19% comes from Europe. Additionally, the portfolio includes contractual rent increases with an average annual rental increase of 1.3%. The portfolio also features a stable tenant base with an industry leading 58% receiving an investment grade or implied investment grade credit rating. I also want to highlight the strong asset management capabilities we demonstrated while continuing to succeed with leasing and renewal activity. In particular, our third quarter leasing and renewal activity included 1.8 million square feet across the entire portfolio. Leasing spreads on renewals were 5% higher than the expiring rent. Our largest segment is industrial and distribution with 218 properties that span over 33.6 million square feet and contributed $229 million to annualized straight line rent. 93% of the leases in this portfolio include favorable rent escalations with an average annual rental increase of 1.6%. positioning the portfolio to benefit from annual rental income while having eight-year weighted average lease term. Our single-tenant retail segment is the largest by property count with 886 properties that span over 7.9 million square feet and contributed $153 million to annualized straight-line rent. The single-tenant retail segment comprises 69% investment-grade or implied investment-grade rated tenants, and features an 8.4-year weighted average lease term. The multi-tenant suburban retail segment includes 109 properties that span over 16.4 million square feet and contribute $199 million in annualized straight-line rent. The portfolio has a weighted average remaining lease term of 5.1 years and includes 21% of grocery anchored centers, which are 91.3% leased. This segment is predominantly comprised of triple net leases with incremental lease-up potential and attractive leasing spreads, with 61% of the straight-line rent in this portfolio coming from the Sunbelt markets, which continue to grow and have favorable demographic tailwinds. Our smallest segment, single-tenant office, includes 91 properties that span 8.9 million square feet, contributed $146 million to annualized straight-line rent, and has a 5.1-year weighted average lease term. One of the metrics that differentiates the single tenant office portfolio is that it consists of 71% mission-critical facilities, which we define as headquarters, lab, or R&D facilities, and features 70% investment-grade or implied investment-grade tenants, which we believe provides rent stability and low level of default risk. Given GNL's successful track record of lease renewals, The single tenant office segment also includes limited near-term lease maturities, minimizing the risk of vacancy. An additional hallmark of our total portfolio strategy is the mitigation of concentration risk. Our top 10 tenants collectively account for only 21% of annual straight line rent, with our largest tenant accounting for only 3.1% of our total portfolio. This high quality tenant roster provides a highly predictable base of rental income on which to build our future as our tenants provide stability and durability to our business. Our leasing results continue to illustrate the quality of our assets, driving leasing rates higher even in the current environment. The single-tenant segment completed eight new leases and renewals and showcased a positive 7% renewal leasing spread, demonstrating the strong renewal demand for our mission-critical assets while adding $5 million to net straight-line rent The multi-tenant segment completed 92 new leases and renewals, resulting in a positive 4.1% renewal spread, consistent with the high demand we're experiencing at our suburban shopping centers, which increased net straight-line rent by $11.8 million. Our executed leases at the end of the third quarter 2023, combined with our leasing pipeline as of November 1, 2023, will raise occupancy in our multi-tenant portfolio to 92.9%, up from 89.5% of actual occupancy at the end of June 30, 2023 at RTL. Turning to the balance sheet, although only 18% of our debt is variable, the volatile interest rate environment we're currently experiencing does temporarily impact the portion of our debt that is not fixed or swapped. Prior to the 100 basis point increase in the 10-year Treasury rate since September, we secured a $500 million increase to our credit facility through our accordion, bringing the facility to $1.95 billion. Additionally, prior to the completion of the merger, RTL completed a $260 million commercial mortgage-backed security loan encumbered by 29 multi-tenant properties that we assumed as part of the merger. The loan has a 10-year term and is interest-only at an attractive rate of 6.45%. We're pleased to be able to achieve this by utilizing a SOFR swap lock of 3.54% that RTL put in place prior to closing the loan before the merger. This CMBS loan contributes to our increased weighted average debt maturity while lowering our cost of capital and further increasing the percentage of fixed rate to over 82%. These transactions have further enhanced our balance sheet flexibility. We'll continue to focus on opportunities that will help us achieve our financial goals, which include reducing net debt to adjusted EBITDA and organically increasing NOI through lease up and contractual embedded rent growth. This will also be accomplished in the near term through strategic dispositions and the continued success of our asset management platforms, leasing and renewal activity. The strategic dispositions will be intended to de-lever our balance sheets as we intend to use the proceeds to pay down additional variable rate debt that currently has a blended average rate of 7.2%. GNL will continue to evaluate the market for accretive acquisitions, but we believe current risk-adjusted returns need to improve for the company to be more active. We'll continue reviewing and monitoring our portfolio for strategic dispositions that can create incremental proceeds to help us accomplish our near-term financial goals. Our global portfolio will continue to deliver value, allowing us to take advantage of opportunities in the US or Europe and transact on assets that are mispriced or that require expertise in more than one asset class. We believe our global and increased diversification will prove to be a competitive advantage as we move ahead And our successful lease renewals speak to the mission-critical nature of the properties that we own, where the weighted average remaining lease term is seven years. Now that G&L is an internally managed REIT, we expect to trade more in line with our internalized net lease peers on an AFFO multiple basis, given the diversification, quality of income, and superior investment-grade-worthy tenants in our portfolio. I'll turn the call over to Chris to walk through the financial results in more detail. Chris?

speaker
Jordan

Thanks, Mike. Before getting into the details, a reminder that the third quarter results reflect only 19 days of the combined GNL and RTL portfolios. Our cost savings, internalized management structure, and many non-recurring expenses related to the merger. Outside of the last couple weeks prior to the completion of the merger and internalization transaction, results for the three and nine month period ended September 30th, 2023, reflect the legacy G&L results and the external management structure. That said, for the third quarter of 2023, we recorded revenue of $118.2 million and a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $142.5 million. Core FFO was $31.5 million, or $0.24 per share, and AFFO was $46.9 million, or $0.36 per share. Typically we provide a year over year comparison. However, that would not be meaningful this quarter given only 19 days of the quarter reflects combined results of GNL and RTL as an internalized company. We intend to provide formal 2024 guidance around the time of our upcoming 10 K, which will provide investors with increased transparency regarding our financial goals and projections. As expected, FFO in the third quarters was impacted by many one-time items related to the merger and internalization transaction, including $14.6 million of settlement costs, $10.4 million of equity-based compensation, and $43.8 million of transaction costs that are added back to IFFL. As always, a reconciliation of GAAP net income to the non-GAAP measures can be found in our earnings release, which is posted on our website. Given the timing of the transaction, Some balance sheet metrics also do not fully reflect the benefit of the merger. Specifically, our net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio this quarter does not reflect the full quarter benefit of adjusted EBITDA from RTL and the internalization, but our total debt reflects the full impact of the transaction, making this ratio not meaningful for the quarter. Moving forward, this net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio will be part of the fourth quarter disclosure, and we anticipate it to be approximately 7.6 times. We ended the quarter with net debt of $5.2 billion at a weighted average interest rate of 4.7% and had liquidity of $319.4 million, including $133.4 million of cash and cash equivalents and $186 million of availability under the company's revolving credit facility. The weighted average debt maturity at the end of the third quarter of 2023 was 3.4 years, with minimal debt maturity due in 2024. Our debt comprises $1 billion in senior notes, $1.6 billion on the multi-currency revolving credit facility, and $2.7 billion of outstanding gross mortgage debt. Our debt was 82% fixed rate, which includes floating rate debt with in-place interest rate swaps. And our interest coverage ratio was 2.5 times. As of September 30th, 2023, we had approximately 230.8 million common shares outstanding. On a weighted average basis, there are approximately 130.8 million shares outstanding, which is calculated based on the 73 days of standalone pre-merger G&L and 19 days of post-merger G&L. As always, I'm available to answer any questions you may have on this call or after the call. I'll now turn the call back to Mike for some closing remarks.

speaker
Mike Weil

Thanks, Chris. We remain excited about the future of the internalized global net lease. We're on a strong growth trajectory with nearly 100% retention rate of GNL's newly hired employees, combined with our competitive advantage of owning one of the largest, most diversified global net lease portfolios in the country, and the fact that almost one-third of the portfolio's NOI is derived from industrial and distribution properties leased to credit-worthy tenants with long-term leases. Now that GNL is an internally managed REIT, we believe we'll close the trading gap relative to our peers, given the quality of our portfolio and the attractiveness of our creditworthy tenants. This will allow us to unlock significant value in the coming quarters for all shareholders as we continue our work to become the preeminent net lease company in the future. Lastly, I want to mention that there's a lot of valuable data in the publicly filed investor deck, and we want to ensure that the deck is being utilized to gain a better understanding of GNL's exciting growth prospects And of course, management is available for any follow-ups. Operator, please open the line for questions.

speaker
Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your touchtone phone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star then two. At this time, we'll pause momentarily to assemble our roster. And our first question comes from Brian Mayer from B Reilly. Brian, please go ahead.

speaker
Brian Mayer

Thank you and good afternoon, everyone. Hi, Brian. A couple of quick questions for me. I don't know, maybe not so quick. The historical data that you guys provide is annualized stuff on slide 14, broken out by segment. That's pretty helpful from a modeling standpoint, but maybe for Chris, do you suspect we'll be able to get that breakout as we see it there on a historical basis to kind of fine tune our models a little bit?

speaker
Brian

We'll have to get back to you on that one.

speaker
Jordan

We don't have anything in that regard other than the pro formas that we've put out, but we'll have to get back to you.

speaker
Mike Weil

Brian, what would be easiest for you?

speaker
Brian Mayer

Yeah, it would be interesting to see, and I know this is annualized data, but if we were to take the SLR for each of these segments, and divide by the square feet outstanding to kind of see what it is per, it would be interesting to see, unless you guys tell us it's useless, what the trends have been kind of up to this point in time. When we build our models, we look back at history and see the ups and downs and what impacted those. It would be helpful to see that if it's not too much trouble.

speaker
Mike Weil

Well, Chris and Ori and I will get together and see what we can come up with.

speaker
Brian Mayer

Okay. And then when we think about those four different sectors, is there meaningful differences in the rent escalators for each?

speaker
Mike Weil

When you think of it in terms of the 1.3% annualized that the portfolio averages, no, there's not. They're slightly different, but all in that vicinity.

speaker
Brian Mayer

Okay. And then when we think about asset sales going forward, are there particular sectors or geographies that you're leaning into more than others?

speaker
Mike Weil

It won't be geography-driven. It will be a number of other analysis areas. that we will be looking at including where we see the deepest buyer pools and um where we see the the biggest benefit to the overall impact to the go forward portfolio so it could be if there's an upcoming debt maturity and it's an asset that we think is valuable for um redevelopment or repositioning. There are a lot of factors that will go into it to maximize the result.

speaker
Brian Mayer

Okay. And then when I look at slide 18, how you break out the multi-tenant retail between power, anchored, and grocery, can you maybe rank, Michael, where you're seeing the most and least

speaker
Mike Weil

in each of those segments so all three of those segments Brian have equal strength in the new leasing and renewal they all are critical to the suburban communities where they're based and we just wanted to really highlight the fact that our multi-tenant retail fits clearly in these three very similar So it's really what we don't have. We wanted to make sure that everybody was clear. There are no strip centers along the side of the highway. These power centers, anchor centers, and grocery centers, the anchors tend to be investment grade. They tend to be national tenants. Many of them have the investment grade or implied investment grade rating. And most importantly, they tend to have net lease leases on these large anchors. So this is where we have found the greatest value. This is where the communities shop on a regular basis. And we just wanted to clear up any questions that people might have of how this portfolio looks on a deeper dive.

speaker
Brian Mayer

Thanks. And just one last quick one for me. I think, Chris, you said that the net debt to EBITDA, you know, we know it's useless for the third quarter, but for the fourth quarter, I want to make sure I got this right, did you say 7.6 times?

speaker
Jordan

Yeah, 7.6 times is what we've been disclosing as the projected amount.

speaker
Brian Mayer

And how does that compare to the pre-merger estimate? And, Michael, where would you like to see that go over the next 12 to 18 months?

speaker
Jordan

Well, just in terms of the pre-merger, that is improvement. So it would lower the net debt to adjusted EBITDA. Yeah.

speaker
Mike Weil

So as Chris says, the merger was deleveraging in Target at 7.6 times net debt to EBITDA. So we think that's a good start. It's a little bit hard right now, Brian, without being in a position to give the guidance that we intend to give. when we file the K, but I have continued to say that we are focused and, you know, it's a kind of a midterm goal. I don't know that it can happen in just a couple of quarters, but we will continue to drive net debt to EBITDA down. We think that we need to be under six and a half times to really have a conversation about what an investment grade balance sheet would look like. And that is where we continue to focus.

speaker
Chris

Thank you. That's all for me. All right. Thanks, Brian.

speaker
Operator

And our next question comes from Mitch Germain from JMP Securities. Mitch, you may proceed.

speaker
Mitch

Thank you. And I really appreciated the enhanced disclosures. It was really helpful. There were two acquisitions or deals that were highlighted in a prior filing. I think it was dated September, right around the closing of the transaction. It seems like both have fallen out. Is that a safe assumption that they're no longer under contract? Or I'd love to just gain some insight. I think one was title car wash and one was a bigger retail portfolio. Yeah.

speaker
Mike Weil

Hi, Mitch. Thank you for the question. Yes, we made the decision as we were in due diligence that we didn't want to move forward with those acquisitions. As we said in the commentary before the Q&A, we don't think that the markets are quite matched up yet with the risk-adjusted returns, the cost of debt, etc. And we didn't see... meaningful benefit in moving forward. So we notified the sellers that we would be terminating.

speaker
Mitch

Great. Okay. That's super helpful. Um, on the asset sales side, um, obviously 185 million was done year to date. I know there was a $50 million deal done in the quarter. Can you guys just remind me how much of that activity stems to the third quarter, please?

speaker
Brian

I'll give you, yes, eight, nine, roughly $15 million in the third quarter.

speaker
Mitch

Okay, so the third quarter dispositions were just that one

speaker
Jordan

asset in uh on the west coast is that the way to think about it mitch i think you're referring to the the vacant property for the 50 million that one we expect to close in in 2024 okay that one is under press release the press release just says that it was under contract is that okay that is that is correct that one is under contract and we expect to close in 2024.

speaker
Mitch

Okay, so then I just – I think Michael answered, but it was a little bit – it broke it up. How much of the 185 stems to the third quarter, please?

speaker
Mike Weil

It's about – a little less than $15 million.

speaker
Mitch

Fifteen. Okay. Fifteen and fifteen. I apologize. One and five.

speaker
Mike Weil

And a very active fourth quarter. that we don't want to get into right now as far as the details of it, but we're very confident in the $383 million for 2023.

speaker
Mitch

So that includes the other $198 or so that's under contract. Is that the way to think about it?

speaker
Mike Weil

That is correct.

speaker
Mitch

One follow-up on that, though, Michael, does that include The under contract includes a $50 million office building that's going to be sold in 2024. Yeah, I'm sorry. $198 million.

speaker
Mike Weil

Yeah, I think I'm confusing things, so let me just break it down.

speaker
Mitch

I think we're all confusing. It sounds like around $200 million total, $150 million hopefully by year-end, and that other asset on the West Coast probably sometime in 2024. Is that the way to think about it?

speaker
Mike Weil

Chris, would you say it any differently? The $50 million is scheduled to close in 2024, and the majority of everything else will be closed in year end.

speaker
Brian

Yes, that is correct.

speaker
Mitch

Okay, that's super helpful. And last one from me. I want to just get a clarification about the additional synergies that you talked about so you originally said 54 million with another 21 million to be realized over a 12 or 18 month period and I apologize if I'm a little off on that time frame no that's exactly right okay great so now you're talking about 56 million we achieved 56 million yes okay but, and you're still saying 21 over time. So is it 75 million or 77 million? I'm just trying to understand, you know, kind of how much is left to be realized. Was 2 million just accelerated from the backend or, and there's really only 90 million left, or is there really 21 million left, which would mean that your synergies are in excess of the 75 million that you guys originally stated?

speaker
Chris

So, yeah, go ahead, Chris.

speaker
Jordan

Sure. So I was going to say, Mitch, the way that you should look at it is the $56 million that we referenced, that is comparable to the $54 million. So that is effectively from day one, we took our actual results for those 19 days and we were able to annualize them. And our expenses ended up coming in a little bit lower than we had estimated, so that That's where you're seeing the 54 project to the 56. Now the separate 21, um, that is something that we will be, um, over, as we mentioned the next 12 months, realizing that that relates to some other. Deplicative costs, whether it's legal audit, things like that. And that is not impacted, um, at this point. So you look at the 56 and the 21. So that was the 77.

speaker
Mitch

Correct. Correct. Okay.

speaker
Brian

Now 75. Okay. Great. Thank you, guys. Thank you, Mitch.

speaker
Operator

And now we are going to take a question from Todd Thomas from KeyBank Capital Markets. Todd, please go ahead.

speaker
Todd Thomas

Hi, Todd. Hi, thanks. Just following up on the synergies from the merger, the $21 million of synergies on that side, you know, is that to be achieved on sort of a ratable basis over the next 12 months, or will that be a little bit more lumpy? Maybe you can just talk about, you know, the expected timeline to actually realize those cost savings.

speaker
Brian

Sure.

speaker
Jordan

So, I would say that would be something we would realize over time. And as we get towards the third quarter of 24, Effectively, we should have all of those synergies in place where if you were able to annualize the numbers, it would be reflected in there.

speaker
Mike Weil

And, Todd, it's not going to be ratable over the next few quarters. Some of it will be, and some of it's lumpy by event.

speaker
Chris

So that's... Okay.

speaker
Todd Thomas

And then, you know, appreciate the color on the synergies and some of the updates here. When you initially announced the merger, you talked about 9% accretion on an AFFO basis. And I was just wondering if you could comment on, you know, whether, you know, you're on track to achieve that in the fourth quarter on an annualized basis. I think it was relative to the first quarter. and if there are any additional considerations for us as we look ahead.

speaker
Mike Weil

Yeah, that is what the merger anticipated results are, 9% accretion. And that is going to be further addressed in our guidance that we're going to be giving. We've been executing. The synergies have gone very well. So the thing that is slightly different from the time of the merger is the increase in interest cost with the change in markets. We're starting to see that come back down. So I'm not sure that that changed impact will be significant. But that is what we're looking at right now. And with the end of the third quarter and the 19 days of the merger, as you can imagine, there was a lot of very important work that needed to be done right up until the close of the quarter and through this period. so that Chris and the accounting team could get everything together for the 10Q. And one of the things that we were also very pleased with was, as you saw, all of the debt from RTL was able to transfer. It came over at par, no penalties, it didn't have to be paid off and reissued. So that was a very important part of what was accomplished in this period.

speaker
Todd Thomas

Okay. And then lastly, you mentioned that the long-term target for leverage, you know, still in sort of the six and a half, you know, maybe sub six and a half times range on a debt to EBITDA basis. You know, it's a little ways to go from the 7.6 you've outlined that you expect to be at in the fourth quarter what's the timeline to ratchet down leverage further and what sort of the roadmap look like to get there? How should we think about that?

speaker
Mike Weil

I am going to ask that you let us address that next quarter with guidance, Todd. It has not yet been disclosed on a timeline basis. And as you know, Todd, It is an important step for the company and one that we continue to be focused on and taking steps to achieve. And we will lay that out.

speaker
Chris

Okay. All right. Thank you. Thanks.

speaker
Operator

And I just would like to remind you, if you would like to enter the question queue, just press star 1. And our next question comes from Barry Oxford from Colliers. Barry, you may proceed. Hi, Barry.

speaker
Barry Oxford

Great, guys. Thanks so much. When I'm looking at the dispositions, I'm assuming that that's going to go towards debt. And you mentioned that your variable rate debt was around 7.2. When you look at the cap rates that you might achieve, is that going to be a little bit dilutive or negative? Or do you think you can come in below the 7.2 with your dispositions and have it be a little bit accretive?

speaker
Mike Weil

We expect it to be accretive.

speaker
Barry Oxford

Okay. Okay. Perfect. And then, Mike, on the 92.9 on the multi-tenant, when you look out into 24, how much do you think you could push that? Do you think you can push that another percentage, another 100 basis points? or do you feel like maybe we're at the top end of the range that you feel you can get out of that portfolio?

speaker
Mike Weil

So I've always thought that we should be optimizing this portfolio to between 94% and 96% occupancy on the multi-tenant, which will drive the overall GNL higher than the 96% that it is today already. There are always moving pieces in a real estate portfolio like this. So it's obviously challenging to get much above 96%, 97% on a max basis for this type of multi-tenant portfolio. But yeah, the markets have been very strong lately. interest in the centers. We have a number of national brands that continue to expand their presence in our overall portfolio, enjoying the results of being in our centers. So I'm very optimistic. I'm really pleased with the work the asset management team continues to do as they've driven this portfolio up. We're getting close to 10% increase in occupancy in the multi-tenant in a very short time since we acquired that portfolio.

speaker
Barry Oxford

Right. No, no, you guys have done a great job. I was just trying to kind of figure out how much more juice there was left. And you're saying, look, there's probably a little bit more to go here.

speaker
Mike Weil

Yes, I am. I am.

speaker
Barry Oxford

And then lastly for me, what did you guys like about the CMBS market when you were looking at doing a debt deal?

speaker
Mike Weil

Well, it's a very thoughtful question, so thanks. We, first of all, 10-year money is a very nice profile. IO, CMBS on this portfolio. And frankly, when we look at where the market has gone since, it's pretty attractive on the debt side. I think this is you know, close to where we're going to see some debt for a while. So we were very pleased to come in there. We thought the timing worked out very much in our favor. But it was also very strategic for us at the time, Barry, because we wanted to make sure that we had capacity on the line after the closing of the merger. So it accomplished a couple of things. It was another piece of fixed-rate debt. It extended our remaining term on the debt, and it gave us flexibility for the upcoming year as we take different steps.

speaker
Barry Oxford

That makes sense. Thanks so much, guys.

speaker
Chris

Thanks, Barry.

speaker
Operator

And this concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks, please.

speaker
Mike Weil

Great. Well, as always, we thank you for spending the time and listening to the earnings call. I have an echo on my line. I'm sorry. Jim wanted me to pass along. He's under the weather, so that's why you didn't hear from him today. But, of course, he will be available to join us. on future calls and if you have any questions. We look forward to any follow-ups that there are. And of course, most importantly, we look forward to continuing to execute and seeing the benefits of what we're very excited about, this internalized structure. We're already starting to see the benefits from a savings on the operational side. The team came over with 100% retention. And, you know, we're looking forward to talking to you again with end-of-year results and some guidance. And in the meantime, we'll take any follow-ups that you have, and thank you again for your time.

speaker
Operator

And this concludes the conference. Thank you very much for attending today's presentation. And you may now disconnect.

Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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