Cousins Properties Incorporated (NYSE:CUZ) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

As Colin pointed out earlier, trophy lifestyle office buildings in the Sun Belt continue to perform well, which is often lost in the negative headlines around the office industry in general. Moving to our same-property performance. Cash NOI increased 4.6% during the third quarter compared to last year. Cash revenues increased 60 basis points, while expenses decreased 6%, driven by lower property taxes. In addition to our recurring appeals of tax assessments, our portfolio also benefited this quarter from the well-publicized tax cuts in Texas that are expected to be approved by voters next month and reflected in 2023 tax bills. The majority of our savings was recognized in Austin, which is largely a triple net market and, therefore, lower property taxes reduced both our revenues and our expenses during the quarter.

Turning to our development efforts. The current development pipeline is comprised of a 50% interest in Neuhoff in Nashville and 100% of Domain 9 in Austin. Our share of the remaining development costs is $90 million, $55 million of which will be funded by our Neuhoff construction loan, leaving only $35 million to be funded by our operating cash flow. Before moving to our balance sheet, I wanted to take a moment to point out a change we made to the development pipeline report on page 25 in our earnings supplement. Specifically, we’ve adjusted the definition of stabilization dates. To reflect the actual estimated stabilization for each development project. Previously, the stabilization dates reflected the earlier of one year after completion or estimated stabilization.

This is a GAAP concept that dictates capitalization policy. In practice, it proved to be confusing for many investors since the one-year deadline typically came before actual stabilization. Hopefully, this new disclosure is helpful. To be clear, we’ve not changed the estimated stabilization dates on our developments in progress. We have simply improved the disclosure around these states. Looking at our balance sheet, net debt to EBITDA is an industry-leading five times. Our liquidity position remains strong with only $144.5 million outstanding on our $1 billion unsecured credit facility. And our debt maturity schedule is well laddered with no remaining maturities in 2023. Looking at 2024 and beyond, our debt maturity schedule has three pieces of debt with extension options.

First, we have a $350 million term loan with an initial maturity in August of 2024 that is four to six month extensions. Second, we have a $400 million term loan with an initial maturity at March 25, that has four months extensions as well – four, six-month extensions as well. And third, our Neuhoff construction loan has an initial maturity in September 2025 and has a single one-year extension option. When taking these three extensions into account, our next significant debt maturity is not until July of 2025. Our debt maturity schedule is laid out, including all extension options on Page 28 of our financial segment. I’ll close by updating our 23 earnings guidance. We currently anticipate full year 2023 FFO between $2.60 and $2.64 per share with a midpoint of $2.62 per share.

This is up from our previous midpoint of $2.61 and represents the third quarter in a row that we’ve increased the midpoint of our FFO guidance. No property acquisitions, property dispositions or development starts are included in this guidance. The increase is primarily driven by two items. First, as I outlined earlier in the call, we have reduced our property tax assumptions for the year. Second, we’ve included the gain on land recorded during the third quarter in our annual numbers. Guidance does not include any impact from our four WeWork places. As Richard outlined earlier, we have assumed two leases will be rejected in a potential bankruptcy and two leases will survive. We have letters of credit for the two rejected leases that cover all balance sheet exposure and lost revenue for the remainder of the year.

As with any potential bankruptcy, things are fluid and they can change quickly. If our assumptions concerning WeWork materially change, we will provide a timely update. Guidance also does not include any payment of our unsecured claim in the SVB bankruptcy case, which we currently estimate to be approximately $10 million. The exact amount and timing of recovery gets this claim is not yet known, but unsecured SVB bonds are currently trading between $0.55 and $0.60 on the dollar. So we do anticipate there will eventually be significant value in this claim. Bottom line, our third quarter results were solid. Our strong leverage and liquidity position remains intact, and we are raising FFO guidance. With that, let me turn the call back over to the operator for your questions.

Q – Blaine Heck: Great. Thanks. Good morning. Richard, your detail on each of the markets is very helpful. But I guess just taking a step back, can you talk a little bit more generally about which markets in your portfolio you’d say are showing kind of the most ability from an occupancy and rent standpoint and which might be weaker or weakening and maybe some of the reasons for the relative strength or weakness?