Edward Fritsch
Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead
Thank you, Brendan, and good morning, everyone. Since our last earnings call, the biggest news in the office business this side of the Atlantic has been Amazon's post of HQ2. While several of our cities have been mentioned by numerous pundits as contenders to land HQ2, we're not going to speculate on which metro area Jeff Bezos and his Amazon team may pick. However, we find their list of desired criteria a validation of our BBD strategy. We're thrilled to see Amazon's HQ2 grocery list upon intended of desired attributes so closely align with the characteristics of our BBD markets, which include access to a well-educated workforce; growing population centers; a stable, business friendly climate; high quality of life; and attractive cost of living among others. The unique manner and epic proportion of this posting is something all of us will pay close attention to as it unfolds. Regardless of what Amazon ultimately decides to do, the confidence they are showing in their long-term growth outlook with HQ2 can be viewed as a good story for the economy. Shifting to Highwoods, fundamentals on the ground remain steady. We continue to see positive net absorption across our markets. New supply is highly pre-leased and less than 2% of total market, which mitigates the risk to office fundamentals. The backdrop of continued positive net absorption and modest supply has driven a steady increase in net effective rents. Turning to the third quarter, we delivered $0.86 of FFO per share, about 4% higher than last year. The quarter included a little over $0.01 of land impairment charges related to a parcel that we no longer expect to develop, but this charge was mostly offset by a term fee. Our strong financial performance was driven by continued growth in same property NOI, accretion from recently delivered development projects; and lower interest expense. Given our positive results, we have increased our 2017 FFO outlook to $3.36 to $3.38 per share, which implies a penny and a half increase at the mid-point. On the operational front, same-property cash NOI growth was positive 3.4% in Q3. We signed 1.1 million square feet of second gen office leases with a GAAP rent spreads of positive 11.3%, while cash rent spreads were slightly negative at minus 0.9%. Strong fundamentals across our markets and the beneficial impact of annual escalators has led to our sixth consecutive quarter of positive double-digit GAAP rent spreads. Our occupancy was 92.1% at the end of Q3, a dip from the end of the second quarter driven by previously disclosed known move-outs in Atlanta and Richmond. At the 211,000 square foot former HCA space in Nashville, we're 46% re-let and now have strong prospects for another 30%. In Richmond, we're already 77% re-let on the 163,000 square feet that SCI vacated in the third quarter, and we have prospects for the balance of the space. In Buckhead, the two blocks encompassing 137,000 square feet returned to us in the third quarter by Morgan Stanley and Towers Watson have already been white-boxed and are well-positioned to capture large user demand in a submarket where the availability of large contiguous blocks is limited. Disposition activity was heavy during the quarter, as we closed $93 million of sales, including our share of a joint venture sale. Most of these sales closed late in the third quarter, and we expect an additional $44 million of building sales to close in Q4. As we've previously disclosed, our Q3 and Q4 disposition activity will be about $0.02 per share dilutive to 2017 FFO, and virtually all of that will affect the fourth quarter. As a reminder, in keeping with our strategic plan, we routinely evaluate our portfolio for non-core properties and expect to continue to be regular recyclers of assets. At a weighted average disposition cap rate of approximately 7.5%, pricing for these non-core properties was reasonable. Following the JV sale we closed in Q3, we now receive only 1.5% of our revenues from joint ventures. Regarding acquisitions, we continue to evaluate on and off-market opportunities with a focus on prudent investing. The acquisition market has been relatively quiet thus far in the year, and while modestly improved of late, the preponderance of recent for-sale assets has been lower quality than what we're seeking. There are a few opportunities we're monitoring, but at this point in the year, the likelihood of closing any acquisitions before the calendar flips is low. As a result, in our revised outlook table, we are assuming no building acquisitions will close before year-end. Our development program continues to be a meaningful driver of earnings, cash flow and NAV growth for our Company. At $225 million of 82% pre-leased development starts encompassing 769,000 square feet announced so far this year, we have already exceeded the high-end of our original outlook of $220 million for 2017. We continue to see opportunities for highly pre-leased development projects. While it's always difficult to forecast if and when a sizable user will commit to a development, we're encouraged by the conversations and level of activity. Our overall development pipeline spreading across five markets encompassing 1.5 million square feet represents a total expected investment of $440 million, and is 78% pre-leased on a dollar-weighted basis. At our $41 million, 167,000 square foot 5000 Centre Green development project in Raleigh, shell construction is complete and our first customers have begun to move in. We're now 46% pre-leased, up from 26% last quarter, and we have strong prospects for another 30% of the building, while we're still two years from pro forma stabilization. With nearly $400 million of development delivered in 2017 that are, on average, 85% leased, we expect a meaningful increase in cash flow as these projects stabilize and cash rents commence over the next several quarters. Again, development is a core competency for us and an ongoing engine of strengthening cash flow and earnings growth. The combination of strong operating fundamentals, a solid balance sheet, and stabilization of well pre-leased development projects sets the table for solid growth in cash flow for the next several years. Ted?