Choice Properties Real Estate Investment Trust

Good morning. My name is Rob, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Choice Properties Real Estate Investment Trust fourth quarter 2025 earnings 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'd like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, again, press the star one. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Simone Cole, General Counsel and Secretary. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to Choice Properties Q4 2025 conference call. I'm joined this morning by Raelle Diamond, President and Chief Executive Officer, Aaron Johnson, Chief Financial Officer, David Mualem, Senior Vice President, Leasing and Operations, and Niall Collins, Executive Vice President, Development and Construction. Rael and Erin will provide a recap on our fourth quarter operational results and annual highlights before we open the lines for Q&A, where Niall and David will join to answer your questions. Before we begin today's call, I would like to remind you that by discussing our financial and operating performance and in responding to your questions, we may make forward-looking statements, including statements regarding choice properties, objectives, strategies to achieve those objectives, as well as statements with respect to management's beliefs, plans, estimates, intentions, outlooks, and similar statements concerning anticipated future events, results, circumstances, performance, or exceptions that are not historical facts. These statements are based on our current estimates and assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the conclusions in these forward-looking statements. Additional information on the material risks that can impact our financial results and and the assumptions that we are made in applying and making these statements can be found in the recently filed Q4 2025 financial statements and management discussion and analysis, which are available on our website and on CEDAR Plus. And with that, I turn the call over to Ram.

Thank you, Simone, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our Q4 conference call. Before I begin my comments, I want to provide an exciting update on our team. I'm pleased to share that David Muallem has returned to Choice Properties as SVP Leasing and Operations. David brings exceptional experience back to Choice from his time at Love Law overseeing their real estate leasing and new store development. Previous to that, David spent a decade with our organization, and we're very excited to welcome him back. With David's return, Niall Collins is transitioning back to his primary role of EVP development and construction, where he will be focused on delivering a robust development pipeline. I want to thank Niall for his leadership and the stability he provided leading both our operational and development teams over the past two years. This transition underscores the depth of our leadership team as we continue to execute on our strategy for unit holders. With that, are now focused on our results. We are pleased to deliver another strong year of operational and financial results as our team continues to execute on our strategic priorities. Our full year performance in 2025 demonstrated the strength of a necessity-based retail portfolio, a well-located industrial portfolio, and our ability to create value through development. Together, these factors enabled us to once again meet our earnings outlook, delivering same asset cash NIR growth of 2.2% and FFO per unit growth of 3.6%. We completed this while further strengthening our industry-leading balance sheet, ending the year with leverage at 7.0 times. During the year, we remained extremely active in our capital recycling, completing 801 million of real estate transactions. This included 460 million of acquisitions and $341 million of dispositions for net acquisition activity of 119 million. We also continued to create value through our development, transferring 17 new commercial projects totaling 836,000 square feet These projects were completed at an average yield of 7.4% and resulted in $47 million of value creation. Given the strength and stability of our business and our strong performance in 2025, our Board of Trustees has approved our fourth consecutive distribution increase, effective March 2026. This increase reflects our ongoing commitment to returning capital to unit holders. Turning now to our fourth quarter results. The momentum in our business continued, and we finished the year in a solid position. Our portfolio occupancy increased 20 basis points to 98.2% in the fourth quarter, primarily due to new leasing in our industrial portfolio. Combined with favorable renewal spreads of approximately 22%, this drove healthy same-asset NOI growth of 2.4%. Our leasing spreads in the quarter were completed on 1.6 million square feet, representing very strong retention rate of 92.4%. We also completed 233,000 square feet of new leasing, highlighted by positive absorption in Ontario retail and Alberta industrial portfolios. In retail, we continue to see robust demand for necessity-based sensors nationwide. In the quarter, we completed 596,000 square feet of renewals and 89,000 square feet of new leasing. This drove our retail occupancy of 20 basis points, ending the year at 98%. Renewal activity was particularly strong, with leasing spreads of 16.8%, led by Atlantic and Quebec regions and tenants in the dollar store, liquor, and office supplies categories. Looking ahead, our team views vacancies and potential backfalls as opportunities to release space at both higher rents and to higher covenant tenants. Beyond our existing portfolio, we remain active in advancing retail intensifications and new greenfield developments and attractive risk-adjusted yields. Erin will speak more about our development completion shortly. Our industrial portfolio has remained remarkably resilient, with occupancy increasing another 50 basis points in the quarter to end the year at 98.8%. The leasing progress is consistent with what we outlined at the beginning of the year. During the quarter, we had a very strong retention rate of 93.8%, completing over 1 million square feet of renewals at a spread of 26%. Included in our leasing activity was 514,000 square feet of renewals in the GTA where the tenant had a fixed rate option resulting in a spread of 17%. Excluding this renewal, our spread averaged 40%. Our team also completed 138,000 square feet of new leasing at rents 31% above our average in-place rents. This leasing activity highlights the significant market to market and embedded growth in our industrial portfolio. We continue to see a stabilizing industrial market broadly for high quality generic assets in the right markets and remain focused on advancing our industrial development pipeline at Choice Caledon Business Park. Lastly, in our mixed use and residential portfolio, we delivered stable performance in 2025, reflecting the high quality of our office assets, which are primarily leased to affiliate entities. While select residential properties have experienced some pressures from new supply, they remain supported by strong long-term fundamentals in urban markets, and we remain committed to a pipeline of high-quality, transit-orientated residential developments. Finally, touching on transaction activity in the quarter. We remained active on our capital recycling program, completing approximately $261 million of real estate transactions during the quarter. This included $67 million of acquisitions and $195 million of dispositions. Our most significant transaction in the quarter was a new 50-50 joint venture with Wellington across two office towers at Young and St. Clair in Midtown Toronto. This transaction included the third-party acquisition of 2 St. Clair Avenue East for $43 million at Choice's 50% share, excluding costs, while concurrently selling a 50% interest in the Western Center to Wellington for $76 million. Overall, the transaction represents a net $33 million office disposition for Choice. This was a strategic transaction as the two buildings are directly adjacent and operate as an integrated complex. with shared common areas, including a shared loading dock. Choice will manage both properties going forward. During the quarter, we also disposed of a non-strategic industrial asset for $18 million and $101 million of retail assets that we disclosed last quarter. All dispositions were completed above IFRS values. We also acquired a retail center for $23 million in Peterborough, and subsequent to the quarter, completed $28 million of additional retail acquisitions. Overall, 2025 marked an active year of capital recycling, as our team remained focused on maintaining the quality of our market-leading portfolio while leveraging our balance sheet to grow our business through net acquisitions. With that, I'll turn the call over to Erin to discuss our financial results and additional capital allocation activity. Erin?

Thank you, Raoul, and good morning, everyone. We are very pleased with our financial performance this year. As Rayl noted earlier, we closed the year from a position of strength, having achieved each of our financial objectives. When we set our 2025 outlook a year ago, the economic environment was highly uncertain. Our ability to meet each of our core financial targets underscores the quality and resilience of our portfolio and our team's ability to deliver consistent results for unit holders. Turning to our fourth quarter results, Our reported funds from operations was 189.9 million, or 26.2 cents, on a per unit diluted basis, representing an increase of 0.8% year over year. FFO in the quarter was driven by year over year total cash NOI growth of 4.4%, which included higher same asset NOIs and contributions from transactions and completed developments. This was partially offset by the timing of lease surrender revenue, higher interest expense from refinancing activities, and lower investment income. ASFO in the quarter was 20.1 cents per unit, an increase of 5 cents year over year. This increase was largely driven by the timing of maintenance capital projects, which commenced earlier in the current year compared to the prior period. On a full year basis, our ASFO payout ratio of 88% was in line with prior years. Turning to our property performance. Same asset cash NOI increased by $5.9 million or 2.4% compared to the prior year. By asset class, retail same asset cash NOI increased $3.1 million or 1.6%. This was driven by higher base rents and recovery revenue. And excluding bad debt expense, year-over-year growth was 2.1%. Industrial same asset cash NOI increased by $2.9 million or 6.2%. primarily due to higher rental rates on renewals, new leasing, and contractual rent steps. Mixed use and residential same-asset cash NOI decreased by approximately 0.1 million, or 1.8%, primarily as a result of lower rent at certain residential properties. Moving to our balance sheet. IFRS net asset value, or NAV, for the quarter was $14.43 per unit, a decrease of 72 million, or approximately 0.7%, compared to the third quarter. The decrease was primarily driven by an $87 million fair value loss on our investment in the units of allied properties and a net fair value loss on investment properties of $29 million. This was partially offset by a net contribution from operations of $45 million. As a reminder, we're required under IFRS to market our investment in allied to its trading price at each period end. The fair value changes on investment properties in the quarter were primarily driven by adjustments to select mixed use and residential developments, as well as certain existing residential assets to reflect current market conditions. This was partially offset by gains in the retail portfolio, which were supported by favorable leasing and cash flow assumptions related to backfilling certain sites with higher quality tenants and favorable cap rate adjustments, mainly in Ontario, reflecting continued demand for necessity-based retail centers. On a full year basis, we continue to generate stable value across the portfolio, resulting in year-over-year NAV growth of $263 million, or 2.6%, on a per-unit basis. We ended the year in solid financial position, with strong debt metrics and ample access to capital, including $1.6 billion of available liquidity through our corporate facility and cash on hand, and $13.8 billion of unencumbered properties. Our debt to EBITDA ratio went seven times and remained largely stable. We had no material financing or debt maturities in the quarter, and with our next material maturity not occurring until our $350 million debenture in November. Turning to our development activity. Our pipeline continues to be a reliable source of long-term cash flow growth and NAV creation for the REITs. In the quarter, development spend totaled approximately $40 million, and our team delivered three new commercial projects totaling 601,000 square feet at a blended yield of 7.8%. Our largest delivery in the quarter was the latest phase of Choice Caledon Business Park project totaling 530,000 square feet at our ownership share, which we completed at a yield of 7.9% and expect rents commencement to begin in April. We also completed two retail intensifications, including a 54,000 square foot Costco Gas Bar in Edmonton, completed to our 50% owned JV at a 6.1% yield, and a 17,000 square foot Shoppers Drug Mart in Ontario at a 6.9% yield, leaving eight additional Shoppers Drug Mart projects in our active pipeline and many more in various stages of planning. On a full year basis, our development spend totaled approximately 237 million, and we successfully transferred $222 million of assets to income producing, representing 836,000 square feet of new commercial GLA. These transfers resulted in approximately $47 million of value creation per choice. Looking ahead, we remain confident in our strategy and financial plan. Our focus remains the same. We will continue to prioritize operational excellence, supported by strong leasing execution. while enhancing portfolio quality through disciplined capital recycling and delivering on our development pipeline to create value for unit holders. For the full year 2026, we expect to maintain stable occupancy and deliver 2 to 3% year-over-year growth in same asset cash NOI. Our business is expected to deliver annual FFO per unit diluted between $1.08 and $1.10 in 2026. supported by the strength of our core business, including strong same-asset NOI growth and contributions from transactions and development. This strong performance will be partially offset by the impact of Allied's distribution cuts. We will continue to leverage our industry-leading balance sheet to support both our transaction and development activity while maintaining our debt to EBITDA below our long-term target of 7.5 times. Lastly, given the strength of our business and performance in 2025, as Raoul mentioned, we are increasing our distribution to $0.78 per unit effective March 2026, which represents a 1.3% increase from the prior year. With that, Rail, Dave, and Niall and I would be glad to answer your questions.

At this time, I would like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, press star, then the number one in your telephone keypad. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. And your first question today comes from the line of Mark Rothschild from Kennecourt Genuity. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning. It sounds like that industrial is doing pretty well for the types of properties you own. You're advancing on the development projects. Is this an area that you think you can expand on, grow with this year, and do you feel confident enough to maybe start additional development projects?

Hey, Mark. Good morning. So look, we said throughout the year that things were starting to stabilize, and we've definitely seen that on the leasing front. We commenced the spec development last quarter, and it's a function of us having confidence in the market. We've seen lots of RFP activity. I think we need to see a little more traction on the RFP activity before we consider commencing another spec development. I think from a growth point of view, we'll continue to capture that mark-to-market that we spoke about. And, you know, our team is always looking for new investment opportunities, and we hope we can grow in that avenue too, but nothing yet that we are underwriting actively. I don't know, Nala, if you want to add anything else.

Yeah, maybe just to add, we're delivering our spec building in early 2027 for really focusing on deliveries for that year or tenant inquiries for that year. we're starting to hear inquiries around 2028, and as we feel that they're getting some traction, we'll be able to pursue those opportunities as well.

Okay, great. And maybe just one more from me. Yeah. Mark, sorry, just one thing quickly. Erin's.

Mark, just wanted to call out the, you know, prospect activity at Caledon has increased to Niall and Rayl's point, and then just if we think about industrial for 2026, we would think about same asset growth being closer to that 4% range.

Okay, great. Thanks. And maybe just one more in regards to office. The transaction you did sounds like more strategic than anything else. There has been some signs of an office recovery. Obviously, Allied has not participated in that yet. Do you have any thoughts on office investment at this time? Is it an asset class that you would ever would the REIT get back into in a more material way? Would you do something if you were confident in improvement or is that an asset class that choice is just not looking to be heavily involved in going forward?

Yeah, look, Mark, if you go back a few years ago, we exited office because we felt we could never get real scale in the asset class. And, you know, it's unlikely for us to see that opportunity. So, you know, we are very focused on continuing to build out our retail, industrial, and then overtime and purpose-built rental. And there's enough investment opportunities in those three asset classes that we would not be pursuing office as an asset class.

Okay, great. Thanks so much.

Your next question comes from a line of Lauren Kelmar from Desjardins. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning. Um, just on the guidance side and Aaron, I'm sorry if I missed this. Um, you know, you guys are usually really tight and not that 3 cents isn't tight, but just wondering what has to happen to hit the low end versus the high end. Is it, is it more of that least term income you guys saw throughout, uh, 2025 or is there something else we should be thinking about?

Lauren, I would think about our plan is right down the middle now. I know we gave an extra bit of range on guidance, but I think last year we got the feedback that it was very tight. So I just thought we'd give ourselves the room in order to outperform a couple of things that we need to see is leasing coming in stronger than expected on retail, payment on industrial, maybe a little bit less downtime than is in plan. So there's definitely flex there. And then yes, if there was a little more lease termination income, that would help. But I think there's a bit of room for our team to outperform.

Okay, and then I think you talked to the SP&I growth range for industrial for retail. Would that kind of be in the 2% to 3% range?

That's right.

Okay, thank you. And then just lastly, on Building D at Caledon, notice the yield is quite a bit lower. Maybe just some color around that and why you guys decided to move forward with it, given the lower yield than what you guys were getting on the previous buildings.

Lauren, it's really a function of it being a spec building, and it needs to address a wide range of kind of tenant requirements. So we feel we've put in appropriate allowances to be able to capture those requirements. So as we continue to see costs moderate and hone in on a potential tenant, we feel we'll be able to improve those yields. Okay, fair enough. Thanks so much. I'll turn it back.

Your next question comes from the line of Brad Sturgis from Raymond James. Your line is open.

James Forrest, Norcal PTACC, A good morning. James Forrest, Norcal PTACC, Just to follow up on your commentary around the industrial segment and. James Forrest, Norcal PTACC, rfs. James Forrest, Norcal PTACC, Is is it I guess I guess i'm trying to understand that the common around need to see a little bit more activity on the rfp side is it a function of you're not have you seen a change in that market relative to last quarter or. It's a little bit too early to be thinking about 2028, yet given you're only starting to see that activity start to pick up now.

Well, it's more about supply coming into the market, which is falling off dramatically. And with Building D, it will be one of potentially two 1 million square feet buildings in the GTA, one actually being ready for occupancy now. We're the only spec building underway. The activity we've seen over the last couple of months is a function of I think people are getting used to a level of uncertainty and starting to make decisions around that. For 2028 deliveries, that's now going to be a function of how we see the current environment smoothing out, but we're encouraged by it.

Just following up on that, in terms of market rents for industrial, for the type of assets you own and across your markets, what do you expect there this year in terms of timeline to see a bit more stabilization, even maybe a positive inflection point on a market rent growth.

I think we see this year's 2026 spreads will be consistent with 25, which I think has been a very good year in itself. Okay. I'll turn it back. Thank you.

Your next question comes from a line of Himanshu Gupta from Scotiabank. Your line is open.

Thank you and good morning. On the same asset NOI outlook, and then I think you mentioned 4% for industrial. Just wondering, are you being conservative here, you know, given the occupancy uptake you have seen year to date, and then the mark to market opportunity as well?

Yeah, it'll be between three and four. And I'd say, as I was just answering the last question, there could be upside if our team sees stronger leasing on deals, you know, 50 cents or a dollar more or shorter downtime. But I'd say that every year is also dependent on the mix of what's renewing and what province it's renewing in. So to Niall's point, spreads will be relatively consistent with last year. And that 3 to 4% is very in line with how we view industrial long-term.

All right. Okay. Thank you. Sticking to industrial here, your industrial occupancy is obviously outperforming the broader Canadian market.

uh what is causing that uh for that outperformance i think it's a combination of our quality of uh building and the age as well as the generic kind of properties of the building as well it's it's they're not we're not we don't we're not factoring into some of the other issues that our portfolios are seeing and i know you know there's a section of loblaw uh portfolio e on the third party portfolio

Are you more small to mid-bay, larger bay? How would you, you know, classify in terms of demand for this size of product?

I think when Niall's speaking about the market to Manchu, and he'll chime in after this, he's referring to the third-party portfolio, because the law represents roughly just, you know, for 30% of our income, and it's very stable. And I think we're seeing, you know, demand across the board in the small bay, mid bay, and then obviously on RFP activity, you know, on the large distribution-type buildings. But maybe, Niall, is there anything else you want to add?

I think it's the large activities that we're seeing the most interest. There's a lot of competition in the smaller bay, and we're not really focused on that.

Got it. Okay. That's very helpful, Carlos. Last question is on capital recycling. Obviously, you have been very active on that front over the years. What more non-core disposition targets do you have for the year? And do you become more active on net acquisitions here, given the good balance sheet?

Look, I would say for us, we always focus on quality. And every year we start the year and we say there's not a lot of product to buy and we have to obviously source their product and depends what comes to market. And, you know, if you think of 2025, we did roughly $800 million of total transactions and we bought more than we sold. And we're entering 26. We've done a few small retail acquisitions. And we're hopeful that we can find more assets to buy and use the strength of the balance sheet. We just don't have great visibility right now. As far as what we can still sell, I would say our portfolio is in phenomenal shape. And it's not that we're selling things that in our mind is bad quality. It's just on the lower end of spectrum, maybe from a growth point of view, and we can use that capital and recycle it into new acquisitions. I'll say the other area we're very focused on is, you know, the greenfield and just on the commercial development. You know, Aaron made reference to, you know, eight shoppers drug moths that are currently on construction. You know, there's a significant pipeline behind that. We're also building, I think, five, you know, neighborhood shopping centers, and our team is underwriting another asset. So I think just that benefit of working with Love Law, you know, to find those growth opportunities, you know, you know, we believe we'll be able to deploy capital in that area as well, which is very encouraging.

Awesome. This is very helpful, and thank you, guys. I'll turn it back.

Your next question comes from the line of Guiliano Thornhill from National Bank. Your line is open.

Hey, guys. Good morning, everyone. Just one question back on the greenfield that you mentioned there. How big are these kind of retail sites, and where are they kind of working for Loblaws?

moment we've got four that total about 350 000 square feet and they range from about 40 to 160 000 square feet um they're largely loblaws anchored um with either a no frills brand or some shoppers brand so they're very they're a large part of how we're anchoring our centers and going out and getting additional cre leasing and kind of with the industrial i guess i don't want to say on pause but now is the increasing

focus going to be more of that retail nodes and larger sites going forward to 2027?

Yeah, we don't see industrial on pause because we're building the large 1 million foot facility. It's just from our point of view, it's just managing risk that you don't want to be doing too many of them at once. But as we said earlier, as we get leasing traction on the building, and we'll consider other spec industrial buildings to keep the momentum.

Yeah. And just to add, like, Tullamore has a range of building types, typologies as well. So if there is a demand for a smaller size, we can also go forward with that too.

I see. Okay. And just one last question. With the Bank of Canada, you know, potentially done cutting, there's, you know, rates may be going down.

higher for longer are you seeing the narrowing of bid-ask spreads beginning to happen uh in in you know transactions and potentially for the market to pick up yet look for the for the product that we've been buying and selling um you know there seems to be in strong um demand and and i i think the the better the wider bid-ask spread is when a certain seller or seller needs you know, certain price to clear or cover their debt. I think as time has gone by, they've become more realistic. But we think the transaction market has generally stabilized for the assets that we are investing in. Thanks. I'll turn it back.

Your next question comes from a line of Sam Damiani from TD Cowan. Your line is open.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. And congrats, David, on your return to choice. Just one by one, my questions have been addressed here, but maybe just to drill a little bit deeper on the retail development. The active pipeline is down around 200,000 square feet. Now, that doesn't include the Nepean site, which I assume you're going to move forward with. I wonder if you could just confirm that. But just given how tight retail leasing is today, do you see that sort of 200,000 to 300,000 square foot sort of activity annually? meaningfully increasing potentially for choice in the coming years?

I'm just going to get some color, and then I'll hand it over to Niall. What we include in our MD&A is active. Our sites really are further along with our permits and zoning. But you'll see in our investor presentation as well, if we think about kind of the next three or four years, we've identified over a million square feet plus in our portfolio that we are able to build out. and probably over 60 projects plus in the next three to four years. So very healthy pipeline there, and those will start to funnel into our NDNA as they become more real, but I'll let Niall comment on the detailed color.

Yes, so as I mentioned earlier, it's about 350,000 square feet, but there's also an additional four that we're bringing in as well as we kind of work through it. So what's interactive development is what's zoned and we can move forward with in the next six to 12 months. We will see additional projects coming into the pipeline, the active pipeline, over the course of the year. So we're encouraged by what's going to happen over the next three years in our plan.

That's great. That's helpful. And maybe just shifting over to the rental residential segment, you know, it's obviously seen a little bit of pressure. The occupancy is down, which you commented on in your opening remarks. Really to drill down a little bit more deeper, which sort of, I guess, clusters or markets are performing best for choice right now? Is it between Toronto, North York, Brampton, Ottawa, Edmonton? Look,

Ontario, generally, we've been seeing in Ottawa and Toronto a similar pattern. However, that pattern we think has leveled off. And as we saw the majority of the supply that was going to come off for shadow rental occur in 2025, we think we're going to see the same type of growth pattern for a little bit longer and potentially see it improve over the next 12, 18 months.

And do you still feel confident you'll move forward with a new project potentially this year?

We do. We do. Because that will bridge the cycle in our view. Yeah. Perfect. Thank you. I'll turn it back.

Again, if you'd like to ask a question, press star one in your telephone keypad. Your next question comes from a line of Pammy Burr from RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning. Just coming back to the, I guess, the new joint venture with Whittington. Can you maybe just, you know, expand on that and what was said, maybe the motivation behind those transactions and any call you can share just in terms of the longer term play there.

Yeah, Pamir, I think if you think of Yonge and St. Clair, you know, essentially the block is owned by either Choice or Wellington. So Choice owning the office asset, Wellington owning all the development land. And the last piece of the block that wasn't owned was the corner you know, which is, you know, 2 St. Clair, which is a small office asset, but call it more than 30% of the income comes from the ground floor retail. If you stand in the buildings, you actually don't know which one is 2 St. Clair and which one is 22 St. Clair. So from our point of view, it just made logical sense to own them, obviously, to own the office together. Office is obviously not completely strategic to choice. We've said we do it when it's primarily through, you know, related entities. And what it did is it allowed us to reduce overall exposure, you know, control operations, and then from a group point of view allowed full control of the block. You know, 22 St. Clair is fully occupied, and 2 St. Clair has a bit of leasing upside, which we're quite confident we will pick up that just given the pickup in office momentum at the moment.

Okay actually that was actually one of my next questions just in terms of the occupancy there so that's good to hear and it all makes sense. Maybe just as a follow-up are there other opportunities where you know a similar situation may arise that you might be looking at for you know in terms of 2026 where there's an opportunity to maybe consolidate some ownership that might be held by third parties or?

If you think of 2025, we actually consolidated ownership, you know, through some of our joint ventures where we, our partner, wanted out. So I can think of an asset in Edmonton that we purchased our partner, two assets in Edmonton, actually, we purchased one of our partners out. One of them, we, you know, took back a chapters box and we split and we leased it to a no-falls-in-a-shop as drug mart. So I think we're always looking for opportunities where, you know, one of our partners wants liquidity where we can consolidate ownership And then I think back a few years ago, if assets were not, you know, core or strategic to us, we always offered to our partner first. So we'll continue to look for those opportunities on high-quality assets.

Okay. And then just, was there any, like, what range of sort of transaction activity was, I guess, incorporated into your guidance, if any?

So probably in 2025, we bought more than we sold by about $120 million. I'd say in 2026, our plan would be to be kind of around $100 million, buying more than we're selling.

Okay, got it.

Thanks so much. I'll turn it back. And with no further questions, I will now turn the call back over to Rail Diamond, CEO, for closing remarks.

Thank you, Rob. Once again, our portfolio and balance sheet remain in excellent position, and our teams are focused on executing on our strategic objectives in the year ahead. Thank you for your interest in choice and for joining us this morning. We look forward to providing you another update on the business in the spring.

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.