Timothy P. Mihalick
Analyst
Thank you, Lindsey, and good morning, everyone. First of all, I want to thank all of you for taking the time to listen to our call this morning. And I hope you will find the information provided to be beneficial to you. As most of you may have seen in our a recent press release, IRET suffered another devastating loss last week. The Chateau Apartments located in Minot, North Dakota were burned to the ground last Thursday morning, December 5. I'm happy to state that there are no injuries reported from the fire. The fire was confined to the 15-unit and 57-unit buildings on the East side of the complex, both buildings were currently under construction and were not occupied. The 15-unit building was anticipated to open in February of 2014, and the 57-unit building was anticipated to open in the summer of 2014. As many of you may have remembered, this building was vacated during the flood that Minot suffered. In a year ago last February, the same building burned to the ground. They say things happen in threes. So from my perspective, I say, enough already. I would like to publicly acknowledge a quick response and the actions that Minot fire department to extinguish the fire, and to protect the surrounding neighborhood in bitterly cold conditions. The Minot fire department, along with local law enforcement, will work to identify the cause of the fire as soon as it's deemed safe to do so. Now onto the business at hand. As I noted in our 8-K release yesterday, I am pleased to report that we are continuing to make progress on our planned disposition of non-core properties. Sustaining the momentum we achieved in the first quarter of the current fiscal year by closing in the second quarter on the sale of 5 industrial and 3 office properties. IRET added 120 apartment units in our multi-family portfolio, following our purchase of apartment properties in Sartell, Minnesota and Grand Forks, North Dakota, and acquired during the quarter an interest in a joint venture entity, currently constructing 130-unit multi-family residential property with 10,000 square feet of commercial space in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Our River Ridge and Cypress Court apartment developments, in Bismarck, North Dakota and St. Cloud, Minnesota, respectively, are scheduled for completion in the third quarter of our current fiscal year, and we continue to expect strong lease-up at these projects at completion. Additionally, results improved at our stabilized properties in the second quarter, driven by some improvement in occupancy in our commercial office segment. I believe we have made progress in the second quarter on maximizing the opportunities available to us in our Great Plains region. As I stated last quarter, much more work remains to be done. Thanks. And I will now turn the call over to Diane, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.