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Text: Actual results may differ materially from these statements.
For more information about the factors that can adversely affect the company's results, please see our SEC filings, including our most recent 10-K.
Today's remarks also include certain non-GAAP financial measures.
We closed on the transaction in late October, and since then have been working tirelessly to complete the integration and implement KRG's culture and operating philosophy across the combined organization.
The timing of the merger was impeccable and KRG was positioned perfectly to take advantage of the opportunity.
It's now become clear that the merger is even better than we anticipated.
Today, I'm going to speak about three horizons of opportunity for KRG.
Those opportunities that are immediately in front of us, those that will cultivate over the next 18 to 24 months, and those that will materialize over the long term.
The most immediate benefit of the merger, of course, is the significant earnings accretion.
Heath will give additional color as to the underlying assumptions.
While we've only owned the legacy RPA assets since October 22, we quickly jumped headfirst into attacking operational efficiencies with an intense focus, as always, on our leasing efforts.
Against the backdrop of strong demand from a deep and diverse set of retailers, KRG is experiencing significant leasing momentum across all of our open-air product types.
In fact, we're noticing that national retailers are now looking more intently for space across the open-air spectrum, which dovetails nicely with our high-quality and well-located properties.
These positive trends are readily evidenced in our fourth quarter and full year leasing results.
During the fourth quarter, KRG leased over 900,000 square feet at a very strong 12.9% blended cash spread on comparable new and renewal leases.
The blended spread on our fourth quarter comparable non-option renewals was 10.2%.
This is a strong indicator of where market rents are headed for the KRG portfolio.
For the full year, KRG leased over 2.6 million square feet at blended cash spreads on a comparable deals of 10.7%.
As a reminder, those leasing statistics including the leasing activity from the legacy RPAI portfolio are since October 22nd.
If we include the active -- the activity from the legacy RPAI assets for all of 2021, we leased over 5.1 million square feet for the combined portfolio.
Based on this progress, our retail lease percentage stands at 93.4%, up 220 basis points over last year, and yet, we still have significant upside.
The portfolio has signed not-open NOI of approximately $33 million, which will primarily come online during the back half of 2022 and the first half of 2023.
This bodes extremely well for our growth trajectory going into 2023, as the rents from all these leases will be fully annualized.
The good news is that the $33 million of signed not-open NOI represents about half of the near-term leasing-related NOI opportunity.
Our increased scale and improved balance sheet represent a host of immediate opportunities, including the potential for lower debt costs, increased liquidity in our stock, and enhanced relevance with our tenants and vendors.
We are marching toward completing the active development projects detailed in our supplemental.
Based on KRG's underwritten incremental NOI related to the active developments, we are anticipating very solid returns.
We're meticulously reviewing the land bank, also disclosed in our investor deck, in addition to a multitude of other opportunities embedded within the KRG portfolio.
We have learned over the years that each project is unique and requires a customized approach in order to achieve the best risk-adjusted returns.
Sometimes that means bringing in an experienced JV partner or monetizing the land.
For example, during the quarter, we entered into an agreement with Republic Airways to develop a new $200 million corporate campus on an outdated retail location owned by KRG in Carmel, Indiana.
We knew the highest and best use of the land was no longer retail.
Therefore, we sold a portion of the land to Republic for approximately $7 million and will serve as the master developer of their campus.
KRG will not only receive a sizable development fee but also a profit component, all the while putting 0 KRG capital at risk.
The cash from this development will be recycled into an income-producing investment.
A big win for KRG on a site that was not generating any NOI.
I'm very optimistic about the long-term outlook.
It should come as no surprise that in the near term, we will be spending a significant amount of capital on leasing.
Looking beyond the next few years, we begin to generate substantial additional free cash flow, while also naturally deleveraging.
We are setting up to be in a very liquid and favorable position with a net debt to EBITDA in the low to mid-five times.
While I can't predict the macro environment, I'm confident we will be ready to respond aggressively regardless.
We did this deal because we love the real estate and saw significant upside potential period.
Having been in this business for over 30 years, having visited nearly every legacy RPAI asset, I can unequivocally tell you that the quality of our portfolio improved by virtue of the merger.
When I see what's happened in the private market valuations over the past six months, I couldn't be happier with respect to the timing of our transaction.
We doubled down on the amount of GLA that we have in our warmer cheaper markets.
These markets continue to benefit from household and employer migration, which is a trend we don't see changing anytime soon.
We have a sector-leading presence with over 60% of our ABR in these markets, 40% alone being in Texas and Florida.
The merger also provided KRG with a new or enhanced scale in key gateway markets such as Washington, D.C., New York, and Seattle.
These world-class cultural, educational, health, and lifestyle hubs have endured the test of time and are home to many of the opportunities that we discussed.
In summary, there's nothing better than owning high-quality assets in high-quality places.
As the world opens back up, I encourage each one of you to join us on a property tour and see the quality firsthand.
KRG is nothing without our tremendous people.
I can't emphasize enough how excited I am about what we've accomplished as a team, but more importantly, what we'll accomplish together in the future.
I want to echo John's excitement and confidence in the path that lies ahead.
The opportunity in front of us is absolutely energizing.
On the integration front, our substantial efforts to date have enabled the combined organization to operate at a high level, and truly embrace our internal model of one team, one focus.
Before I discuss KRG's fourth quarter results, please keep in mind that they're a bit clunky by virtue of the fact that we closed the merger on October 22.
While the results are from the combined portfolios, we only have two months and nine days of contribution from the legacy RPAI assets.
For the fourth quarter, KRG generated $0.43 of FFO per share.
As compared to NAREIT, our as adjusted FFO results add back in the $76 million of merger-related costs and deduct the $400,000 of net prior period activity.
For the full year, KRG generated $1.50 of FFO per share, as compared to NAREIT, or as adjusted FFO adds back in the $87 million of merger-related costs and deducts the $3.7 million of prior period activities.
Our same-property growth for the fourth quarter and full year is 7.2% and 6.1%, respectively.
These results were primarily driven by a reduction in bad debt as compared to the prior-year periods.
Absent the net contribution from prior-period activities, the fourth quarter and the full year same-property NOI growth is 6.8% and 4.3%, respectively.
These metrics and a host of others are set forth on the news summary page in a revised supplemental.
We hope you like the changes.
Our balance sheet and liquidity profile not only remains solid but continue to improve.
Our net debt to EBITDA was 6x, down from 6.1 times last quarter.
Adding in $33 million of signed, but not-open, NOI from the combined portfolio, our net debt to EBITDA would be 5.6 times.
We are in a great position to not only weather any storm but to also take advantage of any opportunities that present themselves.
As John alluded to earlier, we are providing FFO as adjusted guidance of $1.69 to $1.75 per share.
The variance from NAREIT FFO is approximately $0.02, which represents our estimate of $4 million of nonrecurring merger-related costs.
Furthermore, the accounting adjustments related to the legacy RPAI below-market leases and above-market debt, contribute an incremental $0.06 of FFO per share to our 2022 guidance.
This is a good indicator of our future ability to drive rents and reduce borrowing costs.
Additional assumptions at the midpoint include neutral impact from any transactional activity and bad debt of 1.5% of total revenues.
As you all know, providing same-property NOI growth is a SKU proposition for the sector, given all the noise over the past few years.
It is especially tricky right after a merger of two companies that approach the potential pandemic credit loss from different perspectives.
In order to avoid any confusion, we are assuming same-property NOI growth of 2% at the midpoint, excluding the net impact of prior period adjustments.
This estimated 2% same-property growth is primarily driven by occupancy gains and contractual rent bumps.
Last week, KRG declared a dividend of $0.20 per share for the first quarter.
This represents a 5% sequential increase and an 18% year-over-year increase.
The dividend will be paid on or about April 15th to shareholders of record as of April 8.
One last thought before turning the call over for Q&A.
I think another compelling comparison is to look at our original 2020 FFO guidance of $1.50 per share at the midpoint.
Like our peers, we gave this guidance before the pandemic set in and reflected KRG's run rate after selling over $0.5 billion of assets in connection with Project Focus.
Our 2022 per share guidance represents a 15% increase over our original 2020 per share guidance at the midpoint.
During the course of 2021, many of you asked, when will your earnings return to pre-pandemic levels.
On a per-share basis, not only we return to pre-pandemic levels, but we tacked on another 15%.
Just another testament to the compelling accretion and synergies associated with our well-timed merger.

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kite realty group trust q4 adjusted ffo per share $0.43.
q4 adjusted ffo per share $0.43.
generated ffo, as adjusted, of operating partnership of $82.4 million, or $0.43 per diluted share in q4.
expects to generate ffo, as adjusted, of $1.69 to $1.75 per diluted share in 2022.

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