Real Matters Inc.

Standing by, welcome to the Real Matters second quarter 2021 conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would then like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Ms. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead.

Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. Lynne Beauregard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead. This morning before market opened, we issued a news release announcing our results for the three and six months ended March 31st, 2021. The release, accompanying slide presentation, as well as the financial statements and MD&A are posted in the investors section of our website at realmatters.com. During the call, we may make certain forward-looking statements which reflect the current expectations of management with respect to our business and the industry in which we operate. However, there are a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause our results to differ materially from our expectations. Please see the slide entitled Caution Note Regarding Forward Looking Information in the company slide presentation for more detail. You can also find additional information about these risks in the risk factors section of the company's annual information form for the year ended September 30th, 2020, which is available on CR and in the Investor Relations section of our website. As a reminder, we refer to non-GAAP measures in our slide presentation, including net revenue, net revenue margins, adjusted EBITDA, and adjusted EBITDA margins. Non-GAAP measures are described in our NDNA for the three and six months ended March 31, 2021, where you will also find reconciliation to the nearest IFRS measures. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Brian. Brian?

Thank you, Lynn, and good morning, everyone. And thank you for joining us on the call. I will kick things off today by discussing some of the highlights of our second quarter. Bill will then take a deeper dive into our segment financials, and I'll wrap up the call with some brief remarks prior to taking questions. We were very pleased with how the business performed in the second quarter. We delivered strong financial results, and I'm also delighted to report that we went live with our first Tier 1 lender in U.S. title. marking the achievement of a significant milestone in the execution of our long-term growth strategy. We've crossed that chasm into the largest market segment in title with the launch of this client, and we are now live in title with one of the largest banks by asset size in the U.S. I want to take this opportunity to thank the team for their hard work in getting us here. As you know, it's been a multi-year journey to get to this point. The tier one lenders represent a focal point of our long-term strategy, giving their size and strength. Continuing to grow our title client base and market share within the segment will be key to achieving our fiscal 2025 objectives. Turning to slide three, consolidated net revenue increased 29.8% year over year to $46.7 million. And adjusted EBITDA was up 30.2% to $19 million, driven by very strong growth in our U.S. title segment. In the second quarter, the 10-year Treasury yield rose roughly 80 basis points, while 30-year fixed mortgage rates climbed approximately 50 basis points as spreads tightened. Despite this move in interest rates, we continued to see a robust mortgage origination market in the second quarter, And both of our business segments in the U.S. outperformed the market as a result of year-over-year market share gains and new client additions. U.S. appraisal segment revenues increased 7% year-over-year to $76.3 million driven by higher market volumes, market share gains, and new client additions, which together drove higher origination revenues. The increase in origination revenues was offset in part by a 34.3% decline in other revenues, which represent home equity and default transactions. Origination-only revenues were up 12% year-over-year compared with an estimated 10.7% increase in the addressable market, which takes into account the impact of veteran affairs volumes as well as waivers. In the quarter, we launched two new lenders in U.S. appraisal. We also continue to rank at the top of our lender scorecards, which drove market share gains in the main origination channel year over year. Operational excellence continues to be our principal focus as we drive toward achieving our fiscal 2025 objectives of doubling our U.S. appraisal purchase and refinance market share at the midpoint of the range. In our U.S. title segment, second quarter revenues rose 30% year over year. growth in our centralized title operations continued to outpace the market, with revenues increasing 78.4% compared to an estimated 71% increase in refinance market volumes. The significant increase in centralized title revenues was partially offset by a $5.1 million decline in diversified title revenues and a $1.7 million decline in other title revenues, which represent home equity and real estate-owned transactions. As we've noted in previous quarters, we've been focusing our workforce and attention in our centralized title operations due to its significant growth and have reallocated a portion of our diversified employee base to service this growth. As we outlined in our Investor Day last fall, we intend to more than triple our U.S. title refinance market share to 6% to 8% by the end of fiscal 2025 from 2% today. In line with our strategy in the second quarter, we went live with our first tier one lender in U.S. title and launched three other new lenders. Our sales pipeline continues to be strong and we remain confident in our ability to launch new clients in title. In our Canadian segment, second quarter revenues were up 65.6% year over year and adjusted EBITDA increased to $1.3 million from $0.8 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2020. Higher appraisal volumes from increasing market share with certain Canadian clients, a stronger mortgage origination market in Canada, and foreign exchange were partially offset by modestly lower revenues from insurance inspection services due to COVID-19. With that, I'll hand it over to Bill. Bill?