UDR, Inc.

Greetings and welcome to UDR's second quarter 2023 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Vice President of Investor Relations, Trent Trujillo. Thank you, Mr. Trujillo. You may begin.

Welcome to UDR's quarterly financial results conference call. Our press release and supplemental disclosure package were distributed yesterday afternoon and posted to the Investor Relations section of our website, ir.udr.com. In the supplement, we have reconciled all non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measure in accordance with Reg G requirements. Statements made during this call which are not historical may constitute forward-looking statements. Although we believe the expectations reflected in any forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, we can give no assurance that our expectations will be met. A discussion of the risks and risk factors are detailed in our press release and included in our filings with the SEC. We do not undertake a duty to update any forward-looking statements. When we get to the question and answer portion, we ask that you be respectful of everyone's time and limit your questions to one plus a follow-up. Management will be available after the call for your questions that did not get answered during the Q&A session today. I will now turn the call over to UDR's Chairman and CEO, Tom Toomey.

Thank you, Trent, and welcome to UDR's second quarter 2023 conference call. Presenting on the call with me today are President and Chief Financial Officer Joe Fisher and Senior Vice President of Operations Mike Lacey, who will discuss our results. Senior Officers Andrew Cantor and Chris Van Enns will also be available during the Q&A portion of the call. To begin, the multifamily business continues to exhibit strength. In the second quarter, the industry experienced positive net absorption, demonstrating the health of the consumer and the attractiveness of the apartment's first alternative housing options, despite pockets of elevated supply deliveries. Our results reflect this strength. A few highlights. One, our second quarter year-over-year same-store NOI growth of almost 8%, led to year-over-year FFOA per share growth of 7%, both of which we expect to be near the top of our peer group. Two, early third quarter trends, including traffic, other income, and collections, have accelerated versus our June results. This supports our expectations of sequential same-store revenue growth above historic norms, and FFOA per share acceleration in the second half of 2023, as indicated in our guidance. Three, the joint venture partnership and portfolio acquisition of six communities we announced align with our strategic goals and demonstrates the strength of our operating platform by attracting capital from a sophisticated global institutional partner while finding a unique opportunity to deploy capital and grow the company. These transactions provide future cash flow accretion, enhanced ROE for investors, and offer additional scale and efficiency benefits for our operating teams. And four, our investment-grade balance sheet remains strong with over $1 billion of liquidity. This provides both safety and the ability to execute accretive transactions should our cost of capital improve. Looking ahead, we are encouraged by the continued job and wage growth combined with the prospects of additional clarity on the direction of interest rates. Regardless of the economic path forward, UDR is well equipped to succeed based upon our diversified portfolio, prudent capital allocation, and our leading operating and innovative platform, all of which should help us outperform versus peers. Collectively, the actions we are taking are poised to benefit our stakeholders, our associates, and the communities in which we operate. With a highly engaged group of associates and future utilization of innovative technologies I'm confident in UDR's ability to capitalize on the strength of the multifamily industry and expand our advantages amongst public and private peers. With that, I will turn the call over to Mike.