Bruce Duncan
Analyst · Keybanc Capital Markets
Thanks Peter. And as Chairman and as shareholder, I very much look forward to your stewardship. Now back to business. We had a solid third quarter. Our metrics are flat, our team’s strong performance and the continuing favorable fundamentals within our sector. Cash rental rate growth for the quarter was robust at 11% and cash rents have now been up 11 consecutive quarters. GAAP rents were up 20.4%, which marks the 19th positive quarter in a row. Cash same-store NOI growth before lease terminations fees was 3.5% and occupancy was 95.4% which was a dip from last quarter. Scott will walk you through the details in a bit. The industrial market continues to see broad-based demand across industries and markets, while supply remains measured. Through the third quarter CBRE Econometric Advisors is reporting net absorption of 203 million square feet against completion of a 132 million. Against this favorable backdrop, our team is focused on pushing rents and driving cash flow given this opportunity, our track record and the opportunities we continue to see in the marketplace to create value through development. We started three new projects in the third quarter that we touched on in our second quarter call. At First Park 94 in Chicago, we started our second building, a 602,000 square footer that is expandable to 700,000 square feet. This follows a successful lease up of our initial 601,000 square footer at this multi-building park. Estimated investment is $29.9 million with a targeted GAAP yield of 8%. As a reminder, we defined GAAP yield as first year’s cash NOI divided by the GAAP basis at the property at completion. In Phoenix, we started a 618,000 square foot facility at First Park at PV 303 with an expected investment of $32.8 million and an estimated GAAP yield of 7.7%. We are also adding to our portfolio in Southern California, our largest market with the start of the First Sycamore 215 Logistics Center in Riverside. This 243,000 square foot distribution center has an estimated investment of $17.8 million and an estimated GAAP yield of 6%. At the end of the third quarter, we had six projects under construction totaling 2.5 million square feet with a total estimated investment of $157.8 million. They are currently 90% leased with a weighted average estimated GAAP yield of 7.2%. We also had two projects completed, but not placed in service. First Park Tolleson in Phoenix and First Arlington Commerce Center II in Dallas, these two 620,000 square feet were 50% leased at quarter end. They have a combined estimated investment of $35.9 million with an estimated GAAP yield of 7.7%. Here in the fourth quarter, we recently signed a full building lease for 234,000 square feet at First Arlington II. So today with First Park Tolleson at 81% leased, we have just 74,000 square feet available at these completed development. I refer you to Page 20 of our supplemental for details on our developments. Up next in our pipeline is The Ranch by First Industrial, which we planned to start by the first quarter of 2017. Recall that this $86.5 million six-building 936,000 square foot park is located in the Chino Eastvale submarket of the Inland Empire. We love this submarket of Southern California due to strong demand and a vacancy rate of just 1% at the end of the third quarter. Moving to acquisitions, the heavy competition for quality assets continues. However, we were successful in acquiring two buildings in the third quarter and another in the fourth quarter to date. As discussed last time, we acquired a 99,000 square foot building in San Diego that is a 100% leased for $11.9 million. Our initial GAAP yield is 6.1%. We also acquired a recently completed 121,000 square foot vacant development in the I-55 submarket of Chicago for $9 million. Our team’s job there is to add value through lease up and our expected GAAP yield is 6.5%. In the fourth quarter to date, we acquired a 63,000 square foot building in the Doral submarket of Miami in close proximity to the Miami International Airport. We like this asset due to it’s interring location in a very tight market. We paid $8.4 million for this building and our GAAP yield is 7.4%. We also added a development site in Dallas during the third quarter for $3 million. This site can accommodate a 420,000 square foot single or multi-tenant building. On the disposition side of our portfolio management efforts, we had a very active quarter. We sold 19 building totaling 653,000 square feet for $38.5 million leased at a weighted average in place cap rate of 6.3% and a stabilized cap rate of 7.5%. This brings our year-to-date sales total to $139 million on our way to our $150 million to $200 million goal for the year. So we are working hard toward a strong finish to 2016 as we continue our focus on capturing opportunities to drive long-term cash flow. With that, let me turn it over to Scott to walk you through some more details on the quarter and our guidance. Scott?