UDR, Inc.

Hello and welcome to UDR's second quarter 2024 earnings call. If anyone should require operator assistance, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. You may be placed into question queue at any time by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It's now my pleasure to turn the call over to Trent Trujillo, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead, Trent.

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 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 2024 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. Senior Officers Andrew Cantor and Chris Van Enns will also be available during the Q&A portion of the call. First half results exceeded our initial expectations provided back in February. Due to ongoing solid fundamentals, and the core operating strategies we continue to utilize to drive strong same-store and earnings growth. Positive fundamental drivers for our industry include, first, year-to-date employment growth of approximately 1.3 million jobs has well outpaced initial full-year consensus expectations. Additionally, year-to-date household income growth has remained robust at approximately 5%. Taken together, this has driven strong demand for housing while also reinforcing healthy affordability metrics. Second, more than 250,000 newly delivered apartment homes were absorbed nationally during the first half of the year, a near two-decade record. Adding to that, total housing deliveries appear stable through the end of the year, and development starts continue to decline to levels below historical norms. This dynamic bodes well for rent growth in the years ahead. And third, renting an apartment is on average 60% more affordable than owning a single family home in the markets where we operate, the best level of relative affordability in two decades. These fundamental trends, combined with our operating tactics, that have improved resident retention led to revenue and expense growth outperformance in the first half of 2024. Drivers include more robust pricing power, higher occupancy, improved in the month rent collections, higher ancillary income growth, lower resident turnover, and lower turnover related expenses than originally expected. In all, This led us to raise our full-year FFOA per share guidance for the second time this year, while also increasing our same-store growth expectations in yesterday's release. Mike will provide additional details in his remarks. We feel good about the year-to-date results and the opportunities ahead of us in the second half of the year. However, we also remain cognizant of the slowing growth rate in the recent employment data, and the effect that may have on pricing in the face of still elevated new supply through the rest of 2024. Moving on, we continue to build on our position as a recognized ESG leader, with UDR recently being named a 2024 Top Workplace Winner in the real estate industry. This achievement reflects the engaging employee experience we have built and solidifies our stature as an employer of choice. Key to our success is an innovative and adaptive culture, and this recognition is one that all our stakeholders should be proud of. Big picture, I remain optimistic about the long-term growth prospects of the multifamily industry and UDR's unique competitive advantages that should enhance our relative results. We have a strong culture that empowers our associates to deliver best in class service to our residents and create outsized value. With that, I'll turn call over to Mike.