Independence Realty Trust, Inc.

Hello, and thank you for standing by. My name is Bella, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Independence Realty Trust Q4 and full year 2025 earnings 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. We do request for today's session that you please limit to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question during this time, Simply press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I would now like to turn the conference over to Stephanie Kruzan-Talley, Head of Investor Relations. You may begin.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us to review Independence Realty Trust's fourth quarter and full year 2025 financial results. On the call with me today are Scott Schaefer, Chief Executive Officer, Jim Sibra, President and Chief Financial Officer, Janice Richards, Executive Vice President of Operations, and Jason Lynch, Senior Vice President of Investments. Today's call is being recorded and webcast through the Investors section of our website at irtliving.com, and a replay will be available shortly after this call ends. Before we begin our prepared remarks, I'll remind everyone we may make forward-looking statements based on current expectations and beliefs as to future events and financial performance. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties, that could cause actual results to differ materially. Such statements are made in good faith pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, and IRT does not undertake to update them, except as may be required by law. Please refer to IRT's press release, supplemental information, and filings with the SEC for further information about these risks. A copy of IRT's earnings press release and supplemental information is attached to IRT's current report on the Form 8K that is available in the Investors section of our website. They contain reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures referenced on this call to the most direct, comparable GAAP financial measure. With that, it's my pleasure to turn the call over to Scott Schaefer.

Thanks, Stephanie, and thank you all for joining us this morning. 2025 was a solid year for IRT. During another year of challenging market fundamentals, we delivered same-store NOI growth that exceeded our initial guidance. We also adopted new technologies that will drive operating efficiencies and cost savings for years to come. Some of the most impactful initiatives included implementing our AI leasing agent to support the time and talents of our property teams, fine-tuning how we manage band debt, and reducing the turn time on our value-add renovations to an average of just 25 days. We also successfully rolled out our Wi-Fi initiative and will be expanding it to 63 communities covering 19,000 units as part of our 2026 plan. On the capital front, last year we sold two older communities and redeployed the proceeds into three newer communities with higher rental rates and lower CapEx profiles. We profitably exited two joint ventures and invested into new joint ventures. Lastly, we purchased 1.9 million of our shares, taking advantage of market dislocation. Because of these and other initiatives, our company is stronger than ever and ready to capitalize on the growth opportunities ahead. So before I say anything else, I want to thank the entire IRT team for last year's extraordinary efforts and successes. Regarding capital allocation, we continue to view investments in our value-add program as our best use of capital. During 2025, we renovated 2,003 units, achieving an average unlevered return on investment of 15.3%. In 2026, we expect to renovate between 2,000 and 2,500 units that are consistent with our historical results and have added six new communities to the value-add program. We expect market fundamentals to continue to improve across our portfolio of well-located communities in desirable submarkets. In 2026, COSTAR forecasts inventory will increase by 2.1% across their markets, weighted by our NOI exposure. This increase is significantly lower than the 3.7% increase in 2025, the 5.9% increase in 2024, and the 3.2% long-term average prior to 2024. Drivers of apartment demand in our markets remain solid. Job growth, population growth, and household formation rates within our markets are expected to outpace the national average for 2026. For example, according to CoStar, job growth across our markets is forecasted to average 60 basis points, double the national average of 30 basis points. Our major markets like Atlanta, Dallas, Indianapolis, and Raleigh are forecasted to achieve 50 to 80 basis points of job growth. This shows that people will continue migrating to our markets for employment opportunities and a better quality of life. As evidenced in the 2025 U-Haul Growth Index, nearly 70% of our NOI is generated from communities located in seven of the 10 highest in-migration states, and the high cost of home ownership will continue to support department fundamentals. Against this backdrop of improving supply and demand, we see the majority of our markets recovering this year. With that, I will now turn the call over to Jim.