You are given a text that consists of multiple sentences. Your task is to perform abstractive summarization on this text. Use your understanding of the content to express the main ideas and crucial details in a shorter, coherent, and natural sounding text. 
Text: This information is available on our website at piedmontreit.com under the Investor Relations section.
At this time, our president and chief executive officer, Brent Smith will provide some opening comments and discuss our first-quarter results and accomplishments.
First and foremost, I hope that everyone is and continues to be healthy and safe.
This quarter, we reached a dubious milestone having been in the midst of the pandemic for over year now.
While it has been highly disruptive to the office sector in general and Piedmont's leasing pipeline specifically, we are fortunate that the vast majority of our customers are current on rent and building utilization continues to improve, now approaching an average of 25% across the entire portfolio, primarily led by a return to the workplace by our small to medium size tenants.
While overall daily utilization for the portfolio remains far below pre-COVID-19 levels, that percentage is improving and is expected to continue to ramp up in the second half of the year.
But I will note the daily utilization still varies greatly based on tenant characteristics and geography.
With vaccines becoming widely available for all, we continue to see incremental gains in local economic activity week by week, particularly in our Sunbelt markets as I noted on our last earnings call.
However, this quarter, we track an increase in activity for our Northern markets as well, first since the pandemic began.
In addition, we are beginning to see medium-size space request in the 15,000 to 25,000 square foot range and starting to conduct tours with these tenants.
We're encouraged that our leasing pipeline has strengthened and we feel positive about our ability to generate some leasing momentum headed into the rest of the year.
While we saw consistent upticks in tour activity across the portfolio as the first quarter progressed, a 30% increase actually from January to March, we still anticipate it will take two to three more quarters for Piedmont leasing volumes to approach pre-pandemic levels.
With the USD GDP expected to grow 6.2% in 2021, per Bloomberg's April economist survey, U.S. feels like it's getting back to a new normal.
And with this backdrop, we are encouraged for our tenants, our employees and our stockholders as corporations and large businesses begin to plan their return to the office with most targeting the early fall for the workforce to reenter in mass.
Even more tangible evidence of this improving outlook is the fact that we experienced a sizable uptick in the number of executed leases for the first quarter of 2021.
The company completed approximately 678,000 square feet of leasing, with new tenant leasing accounting for approximately one-quarter of that activity.
Had it not been for one large tenant, new leasing would have actually outpaced renewals.
I would also note that the weighted average term of leases introduce during the quarter was approximately seven years.
Comparing the first quarter of this year to the first quarter of last year, both the number of leases and the overall square footage related to new tenants exceeded the first quarter of 2020s pre-pandemic levels.
Through this leasing activity and customer dialogue, we continue to better understand tenant space needs and design requirements.
I would characterize the majority of new leases is having a space plan matching pre-pandemic levels of square feet per employee, but with a greater focus on creating collaboration space and integration of technology to facilitate work from home and in-office employee communication.
That said, we believe a vast number of firms are still trying to understand what work from home truly means for the organization.
We are finding that medium-size enterprises are having the greatest difficulty in reaching a conclusion and as such, these customers typically requiring 15,000 to 25,000 square feet are those most often requesting shorter-term renewals of two to three years.
One positive note is that these customers are requiring very little tenant incentive or capital to transact on these shorter renewals.
As I noted in our last call, we continue to see the smaller user market, defined as those being less than 10,000 square feet remain rather resilient, almost approaching pre-pandemic levels of activity.
And in a large user segment, to find as those needing more than 50,000 square feet, we continue to see the companies who know their business well, use this market disruption as an opportunity to negotiate more favorable terms from their landlords.
While the large user segment has not recovered to the extent of small users, we are still experiencing elevated levels of activity from large tenants in Dallas, Atlanta, Orlando and Boston.
I am pleased to share that one example of this phenomenon has resulted in an early seven-year renewal of Raytheon's approximately 440,000 square foot lease, comprising the entirety of our 225 and 235 Presidential Way assets in Boston.
A more complete lifting of the larger leases executed during the first quarter of 2021 is included in the supplemental information that we published last night and is available on our website.
Looking ahead, our only expiration of any significance over the next 18 months is the City of New York lease of approximately 313,000 square feet, that remains in holdover at 60 Broad Street.
I am also excited to share that Piedmont has executed a five-year interim lease extension and the Department of Citywide Administrative Services has informed us that the public hearing and final approvals are in process.
As a reminder, all government tenant transactions, the landlord's required to execute documentation prior to the tenant.
Assuming things move forward as anticipated, we expect a conclusion to this interim renewal around the end of the quarter, very much in line with the economics in terms we've shared in the past.
Finally, following our playbook, on the State of New York's lease in 2019, we continue to work with DCAS on a potential 20 year extension at the building beyond this extension.
Taking a step back, I would like to share three trends which are benefiting almost all our operating markets.
First, an accelerating population migration to the Sunbelt, along with other secondary cities which offer businesses and employees a lower cost, higher quality experience.
We believe this great affordability migration will constitute a decade-long trend that, in conjunction with the second trend, which is millennial family formation and a movement to the suburbs, will play well amenitized offices in mixed use environments located along a cities primary Ring Road and higher demand.
And finally, as we have dialogue with our tenants and track leasing activity, we're witnessing a third trend, a flight to quality with a focus on amenitize buildings with unique environments, owned and operated by responsive service oriented landlords.
Piedmont's portfolio is well-positioned to be the beneficiary of all three of these themes, a concentration of well amenitized buildings located near strong housing communities and highly regarded education systems, with easy accessibility to major highway thoroughfares and airports and with more than half of our portfolio in the Sunbelt where population growth is expected to surpass national averages.
But today's tenants are not only focused solely on location and neighboring amenities, the physical attributes of a building have never been more important.
The buildings indoor air and light, HVAC, fresher intake, elevator capacity and outdoor collaboration space are all critical.
In addition to a high quality building and a vibrant environment, customers are demanding a higher quality landlord as well and by that we mean a attentive operator, that focuses on ESG initiatives and which has the capital base and scale to provide tenant offerings and engagement.
Office space is no longer just a real estate product.
Our customers view our offering as a service, which excites us and gives us the opportunity to provide a differentiated product, when that we believe will allow us to achieve greater occupancy and real rates in the prevailing submarket.
Touching briefly on transactional activity.
Although we did not complete a capital transaction during the first quarter,, the Raytheon lease extension will likely provide a catalyst.
This is the first time that that tenant has executed renewal that provides a total of 10 years of remaining lease term at the buildings.
As the two assets represented by this renewal are now 100% leased to a single credit-worthy tenant with significant term, we believe that value has been maximizing the properties and we have a unique opportunity to realize that value which has been created.
Therefore, we began marketing our 225 and 235 Presidential Way properties for sale late in the first quarter and we received a good deal of interest.
We are therefore anticipate recycling the proceeds from the sale into high quality amenitized assets would fit strategically into one of our core markets.
Finally, I want to highlight the recent progress that we made on several key ESG initiatives.
ESG have gain more widespread investor and tenant attention here in the U.S. over the past few years and Piedmont's management team has made it a priority to establish a best-in-class ESG platform, getting involved to help to make our communities and planet a better place to live while ensuring our employees, tenants and vendors are treated with respect and given equal opportunities.
I would like to take a moment and point out a few recent achievements.
On the sustainability front, out of 1,000 of participants in the U.S. ENERGY STAR program, Piedmont was recently named one of 70 company's designated the 2021 ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year and Piedmont is the only office REIT headquartered in the Southeast U.S. to receive this designation.
I'm also very pleased with ENERGY STAR's recognition of our ongoing commitment to reducing our portfolio's carbon footprint, including lower energy consumption, in addition to water conservation efforts and reduced landfill waste from our buildings.
Approximately three-quarters of our portfolio is currently ENERGY STAR certified and we continue to make significant progress toward our goal of reducing the overall energy consumption by 20% at our properties over a 10-year period ending in 2026.
Additionally, during the first quarter, our five Atlanta Galleria properties were awarded the WELL Health-Safety Rating by the International WELL Building Institute.
The WELL Health Safety Rating is a new evidence based third-party verified rating for all new and existing buildings.
It focuses on operational policies, maintenance protocols, stakeholder engagement and emergency plans to address the post COVID-19 environment now and into the future.
Our Atlanta Galleria properties representing over 2.1 million square feet of rentable space, were the first properties in our portfolio, as well as the first for all office post the Atlanta to receive this new rating and we're actively working to expand this program across our portfolio.
Additionally, Piedmont recently partnered with Morehouse College, Division of Business and Economics in Atlanta and with Harvard University School of Business in Washington D.C. to introduce the Piedmont Office Realty Trust Scholarship Program.
The program provides scholastic support to rising sophomore students, taking degrees in economics, finance, accounting, engineering or real estate with a renewable scholarship for the Piedmont scholars sophomore, junior and senior years.
Along with access to an executive shadowing program, the scholarship offers each recipient the opportunity to intern with Piedmont and acquire a first-hand experience in commercial real estate and participate in a board-level mentoring program.
It is our hope that this program will provide need based aid to ambitious students and expose the more diverse African pool to a career in the commercial real estate industry.
Our ESG efforts are overseen by our board-level ESG Committee which is chaired by Barbara Lang, the former president of Washington D.C.'s Chamber of Commerce.
Ms. Lang joined our board six years ago and immediately began making a positive impact, helping to lead the company's environmental objectives and social involvement in our communities.
For additional information on our overall ESG program, I encourage you to review our annual ESG report that's available on our website.
For the first-quarter 2021, our reported net income increased to $9.3 million, up 7.3% from the same period a year ago.
We also reported $0.48 per diluted share of core FFO up $0.01 over the first-quarter 2020.
AFFO was almost $39 million for the first quarter, well in excess of our current quarterly dividend level.
Rent roll ups, roll downs on executed leases during the first-quarter 2021 were largely influenced by the significant renewal with Raytheon, that Brent mentioned earlier.
Accrual based rents increased on average approximately 7% while cash rents decreased approximately 2.8%.
However, excluding the strategic Raytheon renewal, cash and accrual rents for the remainder of the leasing activity rolled up 8% and 10.1% respectively.
Same-store net operating income increased almost 4% on a cash basis and was down slightly on an accrual basis.
The increase in cash basis, same-store NOI was primarily attributable to the burn off of significant abatements at 11.55 Perimeter Center West in Atlanta and Arlington Gateway in Washington D.C., along with income associated with WeWork's termination in Orlando.
These increases were partially offset by reductions and transient parking and retail revenues as a result of the lingering effects of the pandemic, and by 0.8% decrease in portfolio occupancy during the first quarter of this year.
We continue to believe that same-store NOI on both the cash and accrual basis will end the year positively between 3% and 5% and economic occupancy is also expected to improve with the burn off of over 400,000 square feet of abatement during the second quarter.
Our overall lease percentage is estimated to end the year around 87% to 88%, but this estimate is before any capital transactions.
Turning to the balance sheet, our average net debt to core EBITDA ratio improved during the first quarter of 2021 to 5.6 times.
And our debt to gross asset ratio at the end of the first quarter remained relatively flat, compared to 2020's year-end at approximately 34.9%.
Our tenant rent collections have returned to near pre-COVID levels at over 99% collections and we now only have approximately $3 million of previously deferred 2020 rents remaining to be paid during 2021.
We currently have approximately 90% of our $500 million line of credit available for strategic capital transactions, along with proceeds expected later this year from the sale of the two Presidential Way assets in Boston.
We plan to repay the only secured debt remaining on our balance sheet, a small $27 million mortgage, once the loan allows for prepayment without yield maintenance later this quarter.
We also plan to go to the public debt markets later this year to refinance a $300 million term loan that matures at the end of November.
At this time, I'd like to reaffirm our 2021 guidance in the range of $1.86 to $1.96 per diluted share for core FFO for the year.
Also as a reminder, this is annual guidance and results vary by a penny or two by quarter due to lease commencements and expirations as a result of seasonal expenses and other such items.
Further, this guidance is before any significant capital transactions.
We'll adjust our guidance range when such transactions occur.
As Brent mentioned earlier, we are cautiously optimistic regarding our leasing pipeline, but please be reminded there is typically a six- to 12-month lag between the time a new tenant lease is executed and when occupancy physically occurs.
With that, I'll now ask our operator provide our listeners with instructions on how they can submit their questions.

user
qtrly core ffo of $0.48 per share.
sees 2021 nareit ffo and core ffo per diluted share $1.86 to $1.96.

assistant