Charles Merdian
Analyst · Wedbush. Your line is open
Thanks, Eric. Home sales revenues for the quarter were $425.2 million based on 1,852 homes closed, which represents a 5% increase over the fourth quarter of 2017. Home sales revenues for the year totaled $1.5 billion, a 19.6% increase over the prior year. Our average sales price was $229,568 for the fourth quarter, a 4.5% year-over-year increase and a 3.4% decrease from the third quarter. During the fourth quarter our Central divisions which includes Texas, Oklahoma, and Minnesota closed 865 homes, a 9% increase over the 792 homes closed during the fourth quarter of 2017 at an average sales price of approximately $211,000. The 865 closings represented approximately 47% of overall closings for the quarter. Our Southeast division closed 445 homes this quarter at an average sales price of approximately $207,000 across 21 communities. Average communities were up 4 over the prior year quarter primarily due to the Wynn acquisition. Absorptions increased to 7.1 closings per community per month, up from 5.2 in the fourth quarter of 2017. Also during the fourth quarter, we closed 228 wholesale units, 12.3% of overall closings in 13 of our markets generating $49 million in revenue at an average price of approximately $213,000. And this past year, we closed a total of 466 wholesale units generating $110 million in revenues in our communities compared to 201 units and $41 million in revenue in the prior year. For the quarter, wholesale units impacted our overall gross margins by approximately 120 basis points and for the year by 80 basis points. We believe that our wholesale business is accretive to the overall business as operating margins are similar. Our expectation is that wholesale will be approximately 5% of our overall business in 2019. For the year, we closed 118 homes in our Terrata communities representing less than 2% of our overall closings. And as mentioned on prior calls, we expect closings from our Terrata communities to be a limited part of our overall business continuing into 2019. Gross margin was 24.4% this quarter, similar to the same quarter last year. Our adjusted gross margin was 26.2% this quarter compared to 25.8% for the fourth quarter of 2017, a 40 basis point increase and for the year, gross margin was 25.3% compared to 25.5% for the full year of 2017 and adjusted gross margin was 27% compared to 26.9% last year. Adjusted gross margin excludes for the fourth quarter approximately $7.2 million of capitalized interest charged to cost of sales during the quarter representing 170 basis points and we expect this will remain in this range for the upcoming year. Additionally, approximately $560,000 of purchase accounting adjustments related to the Wynn acquisition is excluded for the quarter. Combined selling, general, and administrative expenses for the fourth quarter were 11.3% of revenues and 12% for the full year similar to 2017. And as a percentage of revenues, we believe that for the full year 2019 we will continue to achieve operating leverage in our existing markets offset by initial operating costs in new markets. Overall, we expect SG&A as a percentage of revenue to be similar in 2019 compared to both 2018 and 2017. SG&A will vary quarter-to-quarter based on home sales revenue and we typically expect the first quarter to have the highest SG&A ratio as our first quarter generally results in the lowest closings on a per community basis during the year. Selling expenses were $29.3 million or 6.9% of home sales revenue compared to $28.6 million or 7.1% of home sales revenue for the fourth quarter of ‘17, a 20 basis point improvement. General and administrative expenses were 4.4% of home sales revenue compared to 3.8% of home sales revenue for the fourth quarter of ‘17, a 60 basis point increase primarily due to expenses related to the Wynn acquisition and additional overhead related to our geographic expansion. Pre-tax income for the quarter was $56.2 million or 13.2% of home sales revenue, a decrease of 40 basis points over the same quarter in ‘17. For the year, we generated $199.1 million in pre-tax net income or 13.2% of home sales revenue. Our effective tax rate for the fourth quarter was slightly higher than the previous quarter at approximately 24.1%. We believe our annual effective tax rate for 2019 will range between 23% and 24%. We generated net income of $42.7 million or 10% of home sales revenue for the fourth quarter of ‘18, which represents earnings per share of $1.89 per basic share and $1.72 per diluted share. For the year, we generated net income of $155.3 million or $6.89 basic earnings per share and $6.24 diluted earnings per share. Weighted shares outstanding for calculating diluted earnings are impacted by our outstanding convertible notes. In the fourth quarter of 2018, our average stock price was $42.23, exceeding the conversion price and therefore the convertible notes were determined to be dilutive. This resulted in an approximate 1.6 million share increase to the weighted average shares outstanding for the diluted EPS calculation for the quarter. Our convertible notes will mature in November this year and therefore our 2019 basic EPS will be impacted by the conversion. Our intent is to settle the principal in cash and the premium into stock. And once the conversion occurs, we would expect that diluted EPS will only be impacted by stock compensation. Fourth quarter gross orders were 1,756 and net orders were 1,264. Ending backlog for the year was 624 homes and the cancellation rate for the fourth quarter was 28% and for the year, our cancellation rate was 24.2%. We ended the fourth quarter with a portfolio of approximately 51,400 owned and controlled lots. And as of December 31, approximately 28,600 or roughly 56% were owned and of this amount, roughly 8,300 were finished vacant lots, 17,400 were either raw or under development, 1,940 were completed homes including our information centers and 990 were homes in process. At December 31, we had approximately $46.6 million in cash, $1.2 billion of real estate inventory and total assets of $1.4 billion. At year end, we had approximately $664 million outstanding under our revolving credit facility, senior notes and convertible notes and net debt to capitalization was 48.1%. In November of 2018, we initiated a $50 million share repurchase program and during the quarter we purchased 39,000 shares at an average price of $38.58 per share for a total of $1.5 million. We ended the year with 22.7 million shares outstanding. At this point, I would like to turn it back over to Eric.