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Ladies and gentlemen, good morning, everybody, and welcome to our results presentation for the first 3 quarters of 2022. Thank you for dialing in this morning. I trust you are all well and healthy. For this call, I am joined by Tim Brückner, our CFO; and Julius Stinauer, who leads our Investor Relations and Corporate Finance team since 1 month now.
We start off this call being all aware of the seriousness of the macroeconomic and political situation. To recall, the ongoing war in the Ukraine, the rapidly increasing inflation fueled by rising energy costs and the [ unprecedented ] rate hikes of the European Central Bank are the major challenges that the entire economy as well as the real estate industry is currently facing.
After the challenges of the pandemic, which have not yet been fully overcome, our country, our industry and ultimately, we at DEMIRE, are being again put to the test. After a decade of almost unrestrained growth, supported by low interest rates and the surge in investment by foreign funds particularly in Germany's prime locations, we are experiencing a change of [ signs ]. What lies ahead will be a test of business models of all players in the real estate industry in terms of sound investment strategy and prudent management. In this context, the pandemic appears to be a dress rehearsal, which DEMIRE has passed with flying colors. We have achieved a lot in the last Corona year.
The fundamental strategy of focusing on medium-sized German cities and on a regional tenant mix with a large number of public sector tenants has proven to be resilient and successful during the whole pandemic. While we have also benefited from the overall trend in [ multipliers ] in the locations we are invested in, uplift in our property values were to a large extent, attributable to the successful implementation of measures around our realized potential strategies.
The consistent sale of smaller properties before and during the pandemic has enabled us to focus our management attention even more intensely on improving the resilience of larger and such more important assets. So much for the dress rehearsal now.
Let me give you an interim summary of the current year. To put it in a nutshell, DEMIRE was [ one and ] able to demonstrate the resilience and robustness of its portfolio and its business model. Our tenant base does not have close ties to Ukraine or to Russia. We can pass on the largest portion of the price jump in energy costs to our tenants and the index clauses in the rental contracts lead to a higher rental income. This is also reflected in the strong development across our key metrics, which I will now walk you through in detail on the next slide.
The [ thoughtful ] and stringent implementation of our REALized Potential strategy continues to be the sound basis for sustained success. Once again, we have made progress on all pillars of the strategy. The first pillar, as always, Asset Management contributed again with an all-time high of square meters in lets, almost 200,000. This helped to achieve a like-for-like rental growth of almost 5% and to increase of our annualized contractual rents of EUR 83.8 million. We were also able to reduce vacancy to below 10%, while the WALT of our portfolio climbed to 5 years for the first time since first quarter of 2017. And the best news, our leasing pipeline is still full and promises further letting results in the next days and months.
It's a challenging market environment these days, we have also made some progress on the [ second ] transaction. Not only have we sold 1 asset in Bremen, above book value, which has been closed in November, but also executed on the disposal of the last remaining asset in Eastern Europe, in Romania. Our focus remains strongly on the disposal of further assets in order to reduce complexity and generate liquidity to ease the refinancing [ burden ] in 2024. We have approached the market with various properties and are confident that we can close further deals in the upcoming months.
Apart from property sales, we also plan to initiate a bond buyback to reduce the redemption amount at maturity and to take advantage of the favorable trading levels. Tim will go into more details on the [indiscernible] conditions and the intentions in his remarks.
Looking at our P&L, you will notice the lower profit from the rental of real estate, which is a consequence of the reduced portfolio compared to the last year as we have sold 11 assets in 2021. The positive effect of our latest acquisition, Cielo is due to the joint venture structure reflected further down in the P&L in the interest and investment income. Together with lower impairment and G&A expenses, this leads to a slight improvement of FFO up to EUR 30.8 million. We will provide you with further details in this regard in a minute.
As you might know, we have published our first sustainability report in June to shed some more light on our ESG efforts. We are proud that the EPRA has recognized our report with the Most Improved Award and the Silver Award. The goal is to expand and enrich this document with further and more detailed information soon. Furthermore, the EPRA has once again rewarded the comprehensiveness and the high degree of transparency of our financial reporting with the Gold Award. All that makes us confident for the future development of the company. And I am happy to confirm our 2022 guidance on rental income and FFO despite the rather challenging times.
Let's flip to Page 6 for a bit more details on our main KPIs. As said, with almost 200,000 square meters let in the first 9 months of this year, we have achieved another superb letting result after already strong numbers in the comparative period. Among others, we prolongated the rental contract with IMOTEX in Neuss comprising 56,000 square meters, found a new operator for the hotel in Kassel and concluded various prolongations and new lettings in our largest assets, the LogPark in Leipzig. Overall, the letting activities secured EUR 15.3 million of annual rental income with a WALT of about 4.5 years.
Looking at the annualized rent of our portfolio, you see a material jump of almost EUR 6 million up to EUR 83.8 million which was primarily driven by the new rental contract with Amazon, but also by rent adjustment as a consequence of triggering index clauses. The growth of the rents on a like-for-like basis compared to end of Q3 last year was at roughly 5% and would even be above 7% if we could compare it to the end of the year.
On Slide 7, the positive development of our portfolio KPIs continues with the EPRA-Vacancy, which has been reduced to 9.4%, mainly driven by a ramp-up in occupancy in the assets in Leipzig, Bad Vilbel and due to an interim leasing in Kassel that will be replaced by the new long-term hotel contract afterwards. As there are no large expiries of rental contracts until the end of this year, only less than 3% of annualized rents. You can expect the vacancy to remain broadly stable going into 2023. The [ planned ] insolvency of our tenant Galerie, [ Kassel's Kurfürsten ] will only have a minor effect on DEMIRE's earnings this year as rents for only 2 months in Q4 could be deferred at worst. In which exact way DEMIRE's 4 properties will be affected in the future is currently unclear and directly dependent on Galerie's further strategy. The next discussion with Galerie will happen next week.
Looking at the WALT, the before-mentioned new rental contract with Amazon [ derived ] it up to 5 years, level that has not been reached since the beginning of 2017. On the leasing side, we expect another major deal in the next days. Follow us in the news and keep finger crossed for that.
Let me now hand over to Tim for some remarks on the latest developments of our P&L and balance sheet.
Thank you, Ingo. Welcome, everybody.
Looking at our financial highlights. Rental income is down due to the disposals happened in 2021. Operating expenses and income from utility and service charges are substantially higher given accelerated inflation as we all experience specifically energy costs. This results in a lower margin, which together is a mix of the rising energy costs and higher spending for maintenance and repairs.
Little trading activity of real estate happened so far. The disposal of 1 asset in Bremen above book value and the sale of 1 land plot in Romania leads to a profit of about EUR 1 million. The disposal of the land plot in Romania is the last asset that the company has from its history as a CEE developer and concludes our CEE investments completely and we plan to eliminate the remaining CEE structure by year-end.
Impairment of receivables are considerably down. We benefited from a lot of COVID payments from our tenants in the middle of the year. We successfully also managed our G&A with a further reduction to now EUR 7.2 million after 9 months this year, a historically low figure, and we are well on track to achieve our goals for this year.
The financial income is considerably up, driven by income from the Cielo transaction, as elaborated on many times before in the last call. Despite the lower rental income and the lower profit from the rental of real estate, we were able to generate a higher funds from operations number for the 9 months in 2022 than the [indiscernible] with EUR 30.8 million, which I think is a great success.
Having a very quick look on our balance sheet on the next slide. Obviously, very little news, as Ingo elaborated already. Cash position is down versus year-end mainly because of the dividend payment that happened earlier this year. But still, we have enough liquidity for liquidity management exercise that we announced this morning.
On the next slide, we have a still solid [ cushion ] on our net-LTV ratio, with 51.2%, slightly up versus the end of last year, obviously, also because of the dividend payout but again, slightly lower than the middle of the year. The average cost of debt remains stable, until, as you all know, the maturity of our bond and some mortgage loans in the mid-2024.
I'm sure that you will have some questions, but let me proactively speak about the refinancing requirements and let me ascertain you that we actively address those issues by the disposal strategy, by discussion with our banking partners and can trust us, we are well prepared for the upcoming refinancing talks that we will start next year.
Back to you, Ingo.
Thank you Tim.
To summarize, we have once again demonstrated resilience in these difficult and challenging times, which allowed us to post a very strong set of figures. We also remain confident to keep the positive trend up until the year-end so that we can confirm our rental income guidance of EUR 78 million to EUR 80 million and funds from operations of EUR 38.5 million to EUR 40.5 million.
We, as an Executive Board, we as a management team and we as DEMIRE team are aware that the coming months will keep being quite challenging for us. On the back of our solid business model, and on the basis of the strong figures we have just presented, we keep being optimistic about the year-end really and the coming year. We are convinced that we can offer the solidity expected of the real estate asset class in difficult times.
Thank you very much for your listening. We are now happy to answer any questions you may have.
Our first question today comes from Menelaos Tzagkournis of Jefferies.
I got a few this morning. So we hear from several yielding asset owners in Germany that inflation can be passed through. So help us understand a little bit the guidance, the EUR 80 million roughly guidance on the high end for the full year. Some properties were sold, so there was some rent loss there. In theory, you could pass up to, let's say, 10% on your indexed leases, so? Yes. Where should we expect? And then how does that work exactly?
[indiscernible] and we don't have any default besides Galerie [ Kassel's Kurfürsten ] at the moment. So at this time, we don't see any risk upcoming this year and what the next year brings, we will see.
Okay. But the question was more on passing through the costs, right, the increased energy costs, et cetera, et cetera.
So I answer again because I don't know what you heard. So currently, the rent increases can be passed on to the tenants. There are no defaults [ expect ] for Galerie [ Kassel's Kurfürsten ], we see it this way stable at this point, but of course, we don't predict the next year.
Understood. The question though was not if they can't be passed, but will you pass them on, do you intend to pass on rent increases for the next year?
Yes. Since our shareholders are listening, too, of course, we do.
Okay. That was clear.
But on the other [ side ], we have an intense dialogue with all tenants. So we can see where the burdens are and where the difficult are so that we can solve, if there is any. But at the moment, as said, it seems to be not a real problem.
Understood. If I may, 2 more quick ones. You mentioned that part of the plan to manage liquidity and the [ refi ] better is to do some property sales in the coming months. Obviously, we don't have as good of a market view as you do, but we are hearing from multiple sources on the ground in Germany that asset sales right now are frozen that the [ bid ask ] for assets has a [ 30% ] spread on the cap rates are being asked.
Berlin, which is -- we know is not a market where you're in, for example, we know sellers are asking for 3% for prime office and people are bidding 4.5%. So that's a huge delta. And there have been no cash transactions in the last, I don't know, if I remember 6, 7 months. So how do you see this moving forward? And is it different in your main cities?
Yes, it's as announced already in our half year report at end of August, we currently focus on creating liquidity caution for refinancing purposes. And the main driver to achieve this are disposals of [ properties, et cetera ], of course. We are currently working on sales processes for various assets and expect to come up with some news flow in this regard in the next month.
Of course, we are in the current surrounding and not getting as much response as we like, but we get response. So we are very confident that we can deliver some good news on the sales side in the next week and months. And we are talking about triple-digit million amount.
We now move on to our next questioner, which is Mattieu Reinholdt of Accunia.
Thanks for the presentation. Are you able to hear me properly?
Yes, we can hear you.
Perfect. So I have some questions to your recently renewed leases. So if we start with IMOTEX, if I look at your presentation, it seems that the gross rental income you have contracted is EUR 5.4 million, which was the same gross rental income that you previously had contracted with them. So just to confirm, is it correct that it hasn't changed? [indiscernible] has been renewed at the same terms?
I can answer this directly. There is no change in the rent, the same rent that we have.
Okay. And that was...
[indiscernible] for the next 3 years.
All right. So that one is not inflation indexed for the next 3 years.
No.
Okay. And same question with regards to your retail property in Kassel, where you got PremierInn [ taking ], I think, roughly 10,000 square meters. I see there, however, it seems that you have increased the rental income to EUR 3.4 million. Is that the one we should be -- see going forward on this asset?
Check the numbers again. We have to refurbish the floor where they move in, and we will finish it in to '24 to '25. And the rent is -- I think it's correct.
Yes. Okay.
It's expected to when they move in.
Sorry, could you repeat. So you expect the rent to stay at EUR 3.4 million or you expect it to be higher than that?
Give us a second, maybe. Do you have any other question? Then we take that and answer it later in the call.
Yes. No, sure. Then so the last [ thing ] here from my side. So you mentioned that -- we have seen that Galerie has been [indiscernible] and we just wanted to hear on your other kind of commercial properties and in particular, the one you have in [ Rostock ] through fair value, just [indiscernible]. Is that one facing similar challenges than the retail properties you have let out to Galerie? Or in general, do you see retail properties, commercial properties to be doing okay?
But as Ingo already said, the only relevant insolvency proceedings that we are seeing currently in the current crisis is the Galerie [ Kassel's Kurfürsten ] and especially the property in [ Leipzig, LogPark ] that you just mentioned is performing particularly well, the hotel and also the trading, the retail trading space. But we are obviously cautiously looking at the retail sector because as we, I think, all aware, the retail sector might come under intense pressure over the next coming months, and we will keep you updated on this but there is no further insolvency that we face currently.
Great. That was very helpful. Just last question from my side. The wholesale property you have in Frankfurt, are you able to detail whether that one is inflation indexed or not considering that it's a very long-term lease.
I'll come back to the first question before we answer the inflation index of the [ rumors ] hotel in Frankfurt, PremierInn will get in with a rent of [ EUR 1 million and 39,000 ] a year, and they will assess move in, in -- end of '24 or beginning '25 depends on the renovation period. And the current GRI will agree by this amount. So it will be more than EUR 3.4 million as you mentioned the [ current ]. So [ rumors ], this is -- my memory -- inflation index, but we double check this with the contract and give you an answer in a second.
Great.
And up next, we have Philipp Sennewald of Hauck Aufhäuser Investment Banking.
Yes. First of all, thank you for the presentation. In the presentation, you talked about the acquisition strategy. Can we expect DEMIRE to be a net seller in '23 and '24?
At the moment, our acquisition pipeline is not so full because, as said, we are trying to build a portion of liquidity in our portfolio. So only if a very interesting property comes across, we will go to this and check it. But at the moment, there is none in a detailed investigation process.
All right. Then a follow-up question, which is regarding the [ partial redemption ] of the 2024 [ bond ]. Could you elaborate more on how do you intend to refinance it with [indiscernible] or with existing funds?
The announced partial potential buyback of the bond is only a part of our ongoing liquidity management exercise. As you know, we carry a substantial amount of cash that we don't probably use for acquisitions currently such that we decided to the price that the market are still attractive, go into some partial repurchase at the amount stated in the press release published earlier.
Obviously, it's of utmost important that in 2024, we are well prepared for the refinancing due for some mortgage loans mid-2024 and the bond later in 2024 and as Ingo mentioned before, we are trying to dispose of various properties. Ingo already gave indication about the potential volume and we are quite positive that by mid-next year, we pile up a sufficient amount of cash that will help us to partially refinance the bond. And then we have quite a number of unencumbered assets in our portfolio that we will use to pile up sufficient cash by mid-2024 to fulfill all the refinancing requirements in October.
Okay. Understood. And one last question, if I may. It's about the LTV, which I understand is impacted by the dividend payment. It rose to 51.2%, if I'm not mistaken. How confident are you to bring that figure back below 50% in the upcoming year?
As part of the disposal program and if that is successful as we expect it to be, we will mechanically basically bring down the LTV ratio by increasing cash positions and lower net debt position. So we are confident to bring down LTV.
We now take a question from Daniel Walther from MS.
Two quick questions. One on the disposal in Bremen and Romania. What was the size of those disposals?
Romania was roughly EUR 1 million and Bremen was EUR 3.5 million.
Okay. Great. And then...
Both were above book value, just to add.
Okay. And then you mentioned before, you're trying to sell the LogPark asset. Is that -- there was some speculation about this, so is this sort of one of the assets that you're evaluating selling? And so how is that progressing?
I [ didn't ] mention any specific property. We have a pipeline of properties that we prepare for a sale and no more information about the individual properties because maybe some of the potential buyers are listening to this call.
I hope you understand that.
No, makes sense. Last question I had. It's a very strong performance on the indexation given you were actually kind of below 1% in like-for-like rental growth for June and you've gone above 4% now. That's obviously very strong. I'm wondering how these conversations are going. Is there no tenants pushing back? I'm actually quite surprised to the positive that it is so strong. And what's your outlook on that going forward given inflation is still very strong today?
It is very strong, as you say, absolutely correct but you have to look at it in a more detailed way, 50% of this comes just from indexation. And the other 50% comes from the rental income that we [ grow ] specifically the new letting to Amazon. This adds another EUR 2 million to our like-for-like growth. And so this explains how -- why this figure is so huge.
We had to fight in the last figures against the decrease in [indiscernible] because [indiscernible] moved out last year, and this affected the last like-for-like. If you count it out, in the comparison, we are at the moment at 7.4%, so even better than the 5% you saw.
As to future, we see the indexation as said, we have 70% of all of our properties are indexed related. We see this going further, but not in the size of the 4.9% you saw because Amazon was a specific [indiscernible] at this time.
May I -- the answer to the question, we already get for the hotel, the [ rumors ] in Frankfurt we looked in the rental contract leases index and 80% of inflation is passed on to the tenant. So this was not just to your question, but maybe it has.
Okay. Thank you very much for that, and good luck.
Thanks a lot.
That concludes today's question-and-answer session. I'd now like to hand the call back over to Mr. Hartlief for any additional or closing remarks.
Again, thank you for dialing in today, and we look forward to reconnecting at the latest in March for our full year results. Have a pleasant day, and thank you again.