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Text: As always, we appreciate your interest.
Brent Wood, our CFO, is also participating on the call.
We refer to certain of these risk factors in our SEC filings.
We hope everyone and their families are well.
They continued performing at a high level amid a challenging unique work environment.
Our fourth quarter and full year results were strong and demonstrate the resiliency of our portfolio and of the industrial market.
Some of the results the team produced include Funds From Operation, came in above guidance up 8.7% compared to fourth quarter last year.
This marks 31 consecutive quarters of higher FFO per share as compared to the prior year quarter, truly a long-term trend.
And for the year, FFO rose 8% to a record $5.38.
This represents an $0.08 per share improvement over our original pre-COVID forecast.
Our quarterly occupancy averaged 96.9% and at quarter end, we were ahead of projections at 98% leased and 97.3% occupied.
Our occupancy is benefiting from a healthy market, with accelerating e-commerce and last mile delivery trends.
Also benefiting the occupancy was a high retention rate of 80% for the year.
Quarterly releasing spreads were strong at 15.4% GAAP, and 7.9% cash.
Our 2020 releasing spreads set an annual record at 21.7% GAAP and 12.3% cash.
This further marks six consecutive years of double-digit rent -- GAAP rent growth.
Finally, same-store NOI rose 2.2% for the quarter and 3.2% for the year.
In summary, during the prolonged, choppy environment, I'm proud of our team's results.
Today, we're responding to strengthen the market and demand for industrial product by both users and investors by focusing on value creation via development and value-add investments.
I'm grateful we ended the year at 98% leased, our highest quarter end on record.
Houston, our largest market at 97.2% leased, with a ten-month average rent collection of over 99%.
Further, Houston represents 13.1% of rents down 80 basis points from fourth quarter 2019 and is further projected to fall into the 12% as a percent of our NOI this year.
Companywide rent collections remain resilient.
For January thus far, we've collected approximately 99% of monthly rents.
There are still some unknowns about how fast and when the economy truly reopens and recovers.
Brent will speak to our budget assumptions, but I'm pleased that in spite of the uncertainty, we finished 2020 at $5.38 per share in FFO and forecast $5.68 for 2021.
As we've stated before, our development starts were pulled by market demand.
Thus, we halted starts for a few quarters last year, then [Indecipherable] again in fourth quarter.
Based on the market strength, we're seeing today, our forecast is for $205 million in development starts for 2021.
And to position us following the pandemic, we acquired several new sites during the fourth quarter with more on our pipeline along with value-added additions.
More details to follow as we close on each of these investments.
And to perhaps free [Phonetic] up the question, none of the development starts, value add investments or land purchases are in Houston.
Finally, our strategic dispositions during the quarter were to sell the last of our four buildings in Santa Barbara completing our market exit along with another Houston asset.
Brent will now review a variety of financial topics including our 2021 guidance.
Our fourth quarter results reflect the resiliency of our team and strong overall performance of our portfolio amid a very challenging year.
FFO per share for the fourth quarter exceeded our guidance range at $1.38 per share, and compared to fourth quarter 2019 of $1.27 represented an increase of 8.7%.
The outperformance continues to be driven by our operating portfolio performing better than anticipated, namely higher occupancy.
From a capital perspective, during the fourth quarter, we issued $17 million of equity at an average price just over $140 per share, and as previously disclosed, we closed on two senior unsecured private placement notes totaling $175 million with a weighted average interest rate of 2.65%.
That activity, combined with our already strong and conservative balance sheet has kept us in a position of financial strength and flexibility.
Our debt to total market capitalization is 19%, debt to EBITDA ratio is 5.2 times and our interest and fixed charge coverage ratio increased over 7.2 times.
Our rent collections have been equally strong.
We have collected 99.6% of our fourth quarter revenue and we have already collected half of the total rent deferred early in the year of $1.7 million.
Bad debt for the fourth quarter of $1.1 million included a single, straight-line rent charge of $677,000 as part of an ongoing process of replacing an existing tenant with a better credit tenant at a much higher rental rate at a California property.
Although the tenant was current on their cash rent, we were required to write off the remaining straight-line rent balance due to the probability of terminating their lease early to accommodate the new tenant.
As we have consistently stated, the depth and duration of the pandemic and its impact on the economy is indeterminable.
However, the degree of potential tenant financial stress and loss of occupancy we had budgeted throughout 2020 never materialized.
As a result, our actual FFO per share for the year of $5.38 exceeded our pre-pandemic guidance issued a year ago.
Looking forward, FFO guidance for the first quarter of 2021 is estimated to be in the range of $1.37 per share to $1.41 per share and $5.63 to $5.73 for the year.
The 2021 FFO per share midpoint represents a 5.6% increase over 2020.
The leasing assumptions that comprise 2021 guidance produced an average occupancy midpoint of 96.4% for the year and a cash [Phonetic] same property increase range of 3.5% to 4.5%.
Other notable assumptions for 2021 guidance include $65 million in acquisitions and $60 million in dispositions, $140 million in common stock issuances, $250 million of unsecured debt, which will be offset by $85 million in debt repayment and $1.8 million in bad debt, which represents a forecasted year-over-year bad debt decrease of 35%.
In summary, we were very pleased with our fourth quarter results.
We will continue to rely on our financial strength, the experience of our team, and the quality and location of our portfolio to carry our momentum into 2021.
Now, Marshall will make some final comments.
In closing, I'm proud of our 2020 results and excited to pursue our 2021 opportunities.
Our Company and our team are working well through the pandemic, as evidenced by a number of Company records set.
And as the economy stabilizes, it's the future that makes me most excited for EastGroup.
Our strategy has worked well in the past few years.
Coming out of this pandemic, we foresee an acceleration in a number of positive trends for our properties and within our markets.
Meanwhile, our bread and butter, traditional tenants remain and will continue needing last mile distribution space in fast growing sunbelt markets.
These, along with the mix of our team, our operating strategy and our markets has us optimistic about our future.
Leland recently passed away, and we will miss his eternal optimism.
And with that, we'll open up the floor for any questions.

user
compname reports q4 ffo per share $1.38.
q4 ffo per share $1.38.
estimated ffo per share attributable to common stockholders for 2021 is estimated to be in the range of $5.63 to $5.73.

assistant