James M. DeCosmo
Analyst · Buckingham Research
Thanks, Chris. I'll start with the real estate segment results. Even though there's recently been some mixed signals in housing, we're just as confident today as we were this time last year, particularly given our locations and the inventory levels. I'll touch more on the markets on the next slide. For the quarter, real estate segment earnings were $27.3 million. That's up roughly 200% compared with the second quarter of last year. As the chart illustrates, one of the drivers was the $10.5 million gain associated with our Ironstob exchange or conversion. And other main drivers are healthy and stable demand for residential lot and tract sales. We sold 537 lots in the second quarter. That's almost up 50% compared with the second quarter of last year. Average lot prices and margins were 11% higher, and that's the highest we've seen in several years. In addition, we sold 79 acres of residential tracts in 2 communities, which represents about 260 potential future residential lots. And last, we sold just over 3,200 acres of undeveloped land for about $2,500 an acre. Now looking more closely at our lot sales trends. I think it's important to understand that our investment decisions are based on fundamentals, home buyer demand and inventories throughout the housing supply chain. As the charts illustrate, Texas fundamentals remain solid. Finished vacant new home inventories are well below equilibrium levels, and job growth continues to be among the nation's strongest. We've continued to evaluate acquisition prospects to add to our pipeline. However, as I've mentioned on a number of occasions, we have and will continue to maintain investment discipline. It's a key and a requirement for us to meet our ROA target of 10% by 2016. Relative to lot sales, given that approximately 70% of our real estate investment is located in the major markets of Texas, we're maintaining our lean toward the optimistic side. For the year, we anticipate residential lot sales to be in the 2,200 to 2,300 range, and that's up about 20% compared with the previous year. And based on existing contracts, we'd expect the second half sales to be slightly back-end-loaded. I mentioned the Ironstob conversion in the highlights, so let me give you just a little bit more color. Converting a long-term timber lease into fee ownership is a solid example of value creation. The timber lease originated back into the mid-1960s. Then in 2007, we formed a joint venture with the landowners that gave Forestar a 58% retained interest and about 17,000 acres of undeveloped land, primarily in Paulding County, Georgia. In the second quarter, we converted over 10,000 acres of timber leases into ownership of approximately 5,400 acres of undeveloped land. And we left about 2,000 acres in the venture, which is earmarked for future conservation land sales. The 5,400 acres of fee ownership will either be sold through our retail land sales program, or we'll develop it primarily for residential uses. Although the conversion was a nonmonetary exchange, GAAP-required a booking of a $10.5 million gain, which is reflective of the difference between our book value of the timber lease and the market value of the fee ownership. Now let's turn to multifamily. We're continuing to grow and create value in our multifamily pipeline. As you can see, at the end of the quarter, we had 5 multifamily projects under construction, accounting for over 1,600 units at various stages of completion. Eleven, our 257-unit community here in Downtown Austin, is substantially complete and about 85% leased. The sale of Eleven is expected to close in September or October. The process is taking a little bit longer than expected, given the level of interest and the number of offers that required evaluation. Based on what we can see today, we should exceed pro forma on this project. Also in the second quarter, we broke ground at our project called Littleton Commons, located in Littleton, Colorado, a Denver suburb, where 25% of the equity with our venture partner, AIG. We sourced and purchased this 18-acre tract during the latter half of 2012 for about $14 million. It's in a good location and growing submarket, with easy access to Downtown Denver and major job centers. The garden-style project will consist of 385 class A units with mountain views, and as always, a best-of-class lifestyle amenity package. Following quarter end, we acquired a new site in Nashville for $7.1 million. The project, which will be 230 units, is located in the storied Music Row section in Nashville, and once again, has very good access to major midtown employment and entertainment centers, a key of our site selections. In summary, our multifamily development projects are progressing well. And as the chart illustrates, we expect those investments to yield a 2 to 3 cash multiple 36 to 48 months following the start of construction. Going forward, consistent with our strategic initiatives, we'll continue to capitalize on our real estate portfolio and drive sales across the board: Lots, residential and commercial tract. I also want to share with you that the Cibolo Canyons special improvement district is evaluating options to accelerate reimbursement to Forestar. The district is currently collecting $5 million to $6 million a year from heightened sales and use taxes from the resort. Based on current market interest rates, mining capacity and debt service requirements, the district may be in a position to generate net proceeds that are well in excess of our $25 million basis in the resort. In addition, based upon the increasing ad valorem tax basis within the Cibolo Canyons project, the district may also have the capacity to accelerate reimbursement of another $5 million to $7 million for our qualified investments in major tract. Assuming that the district is successful, proceeds could be distributed to Forestar prior to year end 2014. To summarize in real estate: We have a strong portfolio of communities in good locations, and most importantly, economies. It's these attributes, coupled with low housing inventories and stable demand, that has our real estate business in good position. Shifting to other natural resources. In the second quarter, our other natural resources segment earnings were approximately $2.1 million. That's up $1.1 million from the second quarter of last year. During the quarter, we finalized a 5-year groundwater reservation agreement with Hays County for $1 million, generating approximately $750,000 in earnings. Future payments will be based on an annual reservation rate of $22.22 for each permitted acre foot. We currently have permits for 12,000 of the 45,000 acre feet requested. And that's on an annualized basis. In addition, we had a gain of approximately $700,000 on the partial termination of the timber lease associated with Ironstob venture. And during the second quarter, we sold over 107,000 tons of fiber. That's down from 185,000 tons in the same quarter last year. For 2014, we anticipate fiber sales to be in the range of 350,000 tons. Moving to oil and gas. Oil and gas segment earnings were $9.5 million in the second quarter. That's up $5.3 million compared with the same quarter of last year. As the chart illustrates, second quarter earnings were driven principally by asset sales, higher working interest margin, and partially offset by dry hole and operating expense. Second quarter earnings from working interest investments was up $4 million, primarily due to 56% increase in working interest production versus legacy mineral royalty earnings, which were down due to a 28% decline in volume. Dry hole expense was up $3.5 million, principally due to $2.1 million exploratory well in East Texas. During the second quarter, we sold our non-core, nonoperating interest in 97 gross or 6 net wells located in Oklahoma. The $7.5 million sale generated a $4.5 million gain. In addition, during the second quarter, we sold our leasehold interest in 223 net mineral acres in the Bakken/Three Forks, generating a gain of $1.2 million. This acreage was located in the core of the play, but was beginning to approach near-term lease expiration. A private Bakken operator with an idle rig had an interest taking the majority of the position. So we made the decision to reduce our risk by selling down and taking a 10% working interest going forward. Below the segment earnings is an EBITDAX reconciliation that we've provided for you in the past. It's a non-GAAP measure, and we provide a reconciliation back to segment earnings in the appendix of the presentation. Second quarter EBITDAX of $22.1 million was up $11.1 million from the second quarter of last year, mostly due to higher DD&A and working interest margin from Bakken/Three Forks investments and asset sales. One of the challenges that we faced over the last several quarters has been the impact of declining high-margin royalty from our legacy minerals. This offset has kind of masked the growth in production earnings and EBITDAX from our working interest investments. The 2 charts provide you with both historical production and EBITDAX from working interest in minerals. Since acquiring Credo in the fourth quarter of 2012, working interest production has grown over 55%, while our legacy minerals has declined over 48%. The reduction is primarily due to lower natural gas prices, which in turn adversely impact exploration and drilling economics in the East Texas and the Gulf Coast basins. In light of the downturn for minerals, we've created value from our working interest investments, illustrated by EBITDAX, which has grown by nearly 100% over the same timeframe. The investments we made in working interest are primarily improving locations like our position in the Bakken/Three Forks, your next slide. As the impact from weather subsided and operations returned to a more normal level, we've seen the rate of drilling completion back to a pace similar to 2013. In the second quarter, 17 Bakken/Three Forks wells came online, 7 of which were Halcon wells, with working interest ranging from 12% to 19%. Of the 7, 4 were Bakken and 3 were Three Forks wells that IPd at rates ranging from 1,800 to 2,000 BOEs per day and expected to generate EURs well above our base case of 500,000 BOEs. With respect to well results over the last few years, the data suggests a positive trend of optimizing drilling completion that not only drives EURs, but ultimately returns. One other observation and takeaway: As operators continue to transition to pad drilling, we'll likely see wells come online in multiples rather than singles, which is reflective of drilling the whole leases. So I'd expect there to be a little more lumpiness to the Bakken/Three Forks production growth. Nonetheless, I remain confident in our positions, as well as the value we've created from these investments. Case in point: 17 Bakken/Three Forks wells came online in the second quarter. That's up from just 3 in the first. Clearly, a function of improved weather conditions and pads coming online. At the end of the second quarter, we had 12 wells either drilling or waiting on completion, and we anticipate about 26 wells to come online in the second half of this year. This is down modestly from our previous expectations, primarily due to completion delays. The table on the bottom right shows our estimated returns for the Bakken/Three Forks at 500,000, 600,000 and 700,000 BOE EURs. For the first time, we're adding a 700,000 BOE case, given the improved well results over the last 6 to 12 months. The average type curve of our producing wells continues to show EURs above 500,000 BOEs, with many approaching 600,000 and even greater. With the recent trend of longer completion times due to pad drilling, we expect the third quarter segment earnings to be in the $5 million to $6 million range. Based on our current estimate, we'd expect 2014 working interest production to be up about 300,000 BOEs, or 45%, and royalty interest volume to be down 130,000 BOEs or 33%. In total, production should come in at around 1.2 million BOEs, and that's up about 15% year-over-year. Chart on the bottom right illustrates, barring unusual events, second half 2014 segment earnings should be roughly 50% above the first half, a little bit more weighted toward the fourth quarter and driven by our production from working interest. Consistent with our initiatives, our focus is: first, to invest primarily in development of derisked locations expected to drive earnings, cash flow and returns; second, opportunistically sell non-core assets; and third, prudently manage capital, and for that matter, all expenses. I'd like to end where I started. After 2 quarters, we're making good progress and are on track to deliver our Growing FORward strategic initiatives. Our second quarter results are a positive step in the right direction. Our focus, number one, generating $200 million in segment EBITDA by 2016. On a fully diluted basis, EBITDA per share would be about 4.5x higher than the annual average from 2008 through 2011. Through the first half of 2014, we generated segment EBITDA of nearly $77 million. That's up over 50% from the first half of 2013, and I'd expect 2014 segment EBITDA to be up in the 20%, 25% range year-over-year. Number two, monetizing $100 million of non-core assets by 2016. Once again, we've divested about $28 million in non-core assets. That's almost 30% of the way to our target in just 2 quarters. Number three, growing through strategic, and let me underline, disciplined investment. The first 6 months, we've invested about $136 million of capital in our 2 core businesses, roughly $47 million in oil and gas and $89 million in real estate, with the majority of the capital being invested in existing communities and basins. With 2 quarters behind us, we anticipate total 2014 capital to be in the $275 million to $300 million range, with oil and gas accounting for about $125 million of the investment. Relative to financial strength, just let me be very clear, we fully expect our cash flows and available liquidity to adequately fund our Growing FORward initiatives. We ended the quarter with liquidity being up $121 million, as compared to year end 2013. So as I look at where Forestar is today, I see a very strong portfolio of assets in the right locations, with a team dedicated to delivering results. That's our DNA. Once again, I want to thank you for joining us on the call this morning, as well as your interest in Forestar. And now I'd like to open up the call for questions.