Piedmont Office Realty sees positive turning point as office demand surges, boosting leasing and rental rates amid a strong Q3 2025 performance.

OPERATOR - (00:00:00)

Greetings and welcome to the Piedmont Realty Trust Incorporated third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. At this time all participants are on a listen only mode and a question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press Star0 on your telephone keypad. And please note this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Laura Moon, Chief Accounting Officer with Piedmont Office Realty Trust. Mom, the floor is yours.

Laura Moon - Chief Accounting Officer - (00:00:47)

Thank you Operator and good morning everyone. We appreciate you joining us today for Piedmont's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. Last night we filed our 10Q and an 8K that includes our earnings release and unaudited supplemental information for the third quarter of 2025 that is available for your review on our website@piedmontreit.com under the Investor Relations section. During this call you will hear from senior officers at Piedmont. Their prepared remarks followed by answers to your questions will contain forward looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform act of 1995. These forward looking statements address matters which are subject to risks and uncertainties and therefore actual results may differ from those we anticipate and discuss today. The risks and uncertainties of these forward looking statements are discussed in our Supplemental Information as well as our SEC filings. We encourage everyone to review the more detailed discussion related to risks associated with forward looking statements in our SEC filings. Examples of forward looking statements include those related to Piedmont's future revenue and operating income, dividends and financial guidance, future financing, leasing and investment activity and the impacts of this activity on the Company's financial and operational results. You should not place any undue reliance on any of these forward looking statements and these statements are based upon the information and estimates we have reviewed as of the date the statements are made. Also on today's call, representatives of the Company may refer to certain non GAAP financial measures such as ffo, core, ffo, AFFO and Same Store noi. The definitions and reconciliations of these non GAAP measures are contained in the Earnings Release and Supplemental Financial Information which were filed last night. At this time, our President and Chief Executive Officer Brent Smith will provide some opening comments regarding third quarter 2025 operating results.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:02:36)

Brent thanks Laura, Good morning and thank you for joining us today as we review our third quarter 2025 results. In addition to Laura on the line with me this morning are George Wells, our Chief Operating Officer, Chris Colme, our EVP of Investments and Sherry Rexrode, our Chief Financial Officer. We also have the usual full complement of our Management team available to answer your questions. After nearly four years of steady losses, US office demand turned around in the third quarter. According to CoStar's data, about 12 million more square feet of office space was occupied than returned to landlords in the third quarter, the first positive figure since late 2021. More impressive was that it was also the largest total since the second quarter of 2019. The broader leasing data continues to validate what Piedmont Office Realty has been experiencing on the ground. Pent up demand is resulting in record levels of leasing across the Piedmont portfolio. In fact, five of our operating markets experienced positive absorption, with Washington, D.C. and Boston being the exceptions. In addition, new tenant leasing velocity has materially strengthened in 2025. The third quarter's total square footage leased on new agreements in the United States, excluding renewals, is estimated to have reached about 105 million square feet and is now within 10% of the 2015-2019 national quarterly average of about 150 million square feet. No doubt after a challenging four years, the Office sector is turning the corner. One explanation for this sector shift is is a surge in large tenant leasing. The limited availability of large blocks of premium space typically sought by major occupiers and corporate tenants is accelerating the decision making process. Despite generally slow hiring and an uncertain economic outlook, the upward trend in leasing volume signals that tenants still have a strong appetite for office space. With the supply pipeline contracting and prime availability is becoming scarce, more demand continues to chase a rapidly reducing supply landscape. According to jll, the cycle of footprint reductions is tapering off as today's users of over 25,000 square feet are cutting just 2.2% of their footprint at renewal. Inventory for high quality space, either new or renovated, is increasingly scarce and office construction has been reduced by an additional 20% from the second quarter. With new supply not a factor in most of our markets, these market dynamics of limited high quality supply and growing demand are allowing Piedmont to materially increase rental rates across its portfolio. And with asking rents still ranging from 25 to 40% below the rates required for new construction, we believe existing high quality office has a long, long Runway for rental rig growth within the Piedmont portfolio, which comprises newly renovated, highly amenitized buildings. Paired with our hospitality driven service model, we are experiencing multiple tenants competing for full floor spaces, providing the backdrop for Piedmont to increase rental rates at our projects by as much as 20% during the year. By way of example, at our Gallery in the park project in Atlanta, we executed our first $40 per square foot gross rental rate at the end of 2024 and this quarter we completed numerous transactions in the mid-40s and have increased rents now to $48 per square foot across our portfolio. Our hospitality driven environments have allowed us to increase rental rates to such an extent that we now estimate that more than half the portfolio's in place rents are at least 20% below market. Our strategy to strengthen the Piedmont brand within the Tenney community as the landlord of choice is driving more than our fair share of leasing demand and it's been reflected in our transaction volumes. Having now leased over 10% of the portfolio over the last two quarters, more than a third of the portfolio in the last two years, and an astounding 80% of the portfolio since the beginning of 2020, equating to almost 12 million square feet since the pandemic. Delving into the numbers, we are thrilled with our third quarter results exceeding consensus FFO by 3% and achieving record levels of leasing. Most exciting is that all the leasing the team has accomplished this year is positioning Piedmont for sustainable earnings growth. Our backlog of uncommenced leases have reached almost $40 million on an annualized basis and substantially all of those leases will commence by the end of 2026. Piedmont executed approximately 724,000 square feet of total leasing during the quarter, including over half a million square feet of new tenant leases. This new tenant leasing represents the largest amount of new tenant leasing we've completed in a single quarter in over a decade and brings our total year to date leasing to approximately 1.8 million square feet. Importantly, over 900,000 square feet of our 2025 new leasing relates to currently vacant space, and it's likely this number will reach over 1 million square feet by. The end of the year. That level of absorption equates to 10 to 15 cents per share of incremental annualized earnings, an indication of the growth we believe our portfolio is poised to experience. Of note, the three largest leases completed during the third quarter related to our out of service Minneapolis portfolio where we're experiencing incredible demand. As George will talk more about in a moment, our leasing Success during the third quarter pushed our in service lease percentage up another 50 basis points quarter over quarter now to 89.2%, bolstering our confidence in achieving our year end goal of 89 to 90% leased. While not reflected in our lease percentage, our out of service portfolio, again comprised of two projects in Minneapolis and one in Orlando, has experienced astounding market receptivity as differentiated amenitized workplaces continue to garner the majority of leasing in the market at the end of third quarter, Piedmont's out of service portfolio stood at over 50% leased and is approaching 70% leased including those that are in legal stage today. We couldn't be more excited that the leasing pipeline and continued tenant demand for our buildings positions both the in service and out of service portfolios to achieve 90% leased next year. Furthermore, we anticipate the out of service assets will reach stabilization by the end of 2026. In addition to the overall volume, third quarter leasing as expected resulted in favorable economics with rental rates for space vacant less than a year reflecting almost 9% and just over 20% roll ups on a cash and accrual basis respectively. In fact, as a result of the repositioning of the portfolio in the past two years Piedmont's leased over 5 million square feet with rental rate roll ups of approximately 9% and 17% on a cash and accrual basis respectively. Finally, cash basis same store NOI also turned positive this quarter as some previously executed leases began to reach the end of their abatement period. With over 35 million of annualized revenue currently in abatement and due to start paying cash in 2026, we expect same store cash metrics to continue to improve as George will touch on. Leasing momentum remains Strong including over 150,000 square feet of leases signed during the month of October and a robust pipeline with approximately 400,000 square feet currently in the legal stage. I cannot emphasize enough that the broader macro factors, along with our successful portfolio repositioning and elevated service model has and should continue to drive Piedmont's ability to grow FFO organically. We're still on track to meet or exceed our 2025 financial and operational goals with confidence in our ability to deliver mid single digit FFO growth or better in 2026 and 2027. Before I hand the call over to George, I want to mention that we have once again achieved a five star rating and Green star recognition from gresb placing us in the top decile of all participating listed U.S. companies for this prestigious recognition. I hope that you'll take a moment to review our recently published Corporate Responsibility report highlighting the team's hard work and many accomplishments that went to achieving this record. The report is available on our website under the Corporate Responsibility section. With that, I will now hand the call over to George who will go into more details on the leasing pipeline and third quarter operational results.

George Wells - Chief Operating Officer - (00:12:42)

Thanks Brent. Strong demand for Piedmont's well located hospitality inspired workplace environments generate exceptional operating results for the third quarter. A record 75 transactions were completed for over 700,000 square feet, well above our historical average. For the second quarter in a row, new deal activity surged, accounting for 75% of total volume and topping last quarter's record amount. Like last quarter, large users are driving new deal activity to record breaking levels with nine full floor or larger leases executed this quarter with another six large deals in late stage. Around 15% of new leases signed this quarter will begin recognizing GAAP revenue this year with the remaining 85% throughout 2026. A weighted average lease term for new deal activities stay consistent at approximately 10 years as we've experienced now for five straight quarters. Expansions exceeded contractions largely to accommodate customers. Organic Growth Atlanta and Dallas were the driving forces behind strong economics. As Brent mentioned, we posted a 9% and 20% roll up for the quarter on a cash and accrual basis respectively. Our overall weighted average starting cash rent of nearly $42 per square foot was essentially unchanged from the previous quarter, though we do anticipate more rental growth as our portfolio crosses into the low 90s lease percentage leasing capital spend was $6.76 per square foot, up slightly when compared to our trailing 12 months as this quarter's leasing volume was dominated by new tenant activity where leasing concessions are generally higher than renewals. Net effective rents came in at 2126 per square foot, reflecting a 2.5% increase from the previous quarter, so lease availability held steady at 5% with a modest amount expiring over the next four quarters. Atlanta was our most productive market during the third quarter, closing on 27 deals for 250,000 square feet or a third of the company's overall volume, with new lease transactions accounting for 75% of that amount. Most notable, our local team mitigated large fourth quarter 2025 expiration at Medici with a 35,000 square foot headquarter requirement and achieved the highest cash roll up for the quarter at Medici is uniquely located within a luxury mixed use development catering to wealth managers and ultra high net worth family offices. We anticipate additional cash roll ups there 20% or more as another 40,000 square feet is expiring soon and our pipeline remains strong at 999 Peachtree in Midtown. We continue to experience encouraging activity to backfill leverage its remaining 150,000 square foot expiration in May of 2026. We currently have four proposals outstanding which total 125,000s feet at significantly higher rental rates. 999 Peachtree has set a new standard for repositioning assets in Midtown Atlanta and we remain confident in our ability to backfill this known vacancy at very favorable economic terms. Minneapolis once again was our second most active market, capturing eight deals totaling almost 200,000 square feet, the vast majority of which was new deal flow into our redevelopment portfolio. The Piedmont redevelopment strategy underway at Meridian and Excelsior is generating tremendous interest with another 125,000 square feet in the proposal stage. Our team has moved asking rental rates up another 5% from last quarter with rates now in the low 40s of 15% from pre redevelopment phase at the beginning of the year and the highest within its submarkets. We continue to be the clear landlord of choice in the Minneapolis suburbs as many once competitive surrounding projects are now either dated uninspiring or financially impaired. Meanwhile, downtown is experiencing noticeably more foot traffic as two of Minneapolis's top 10 employers, Target and RBC Wealth Management, recently increased their mandates of four days a week. Deal flow at our U.S. Bancorp is growing and we're close to signing a new deal that would backfill one of the three floors being vacated next quarter. Dallas was quite active for us as well with 16 transactions for 156,000 square feet. Most notable was a 56,000 square foot deal with a global data center service provider in one of our 1.5 million square feet. Las Colinas portfolio which has experienced a surge at leasing activity for the year, moving up from 83% at the beginning of the year to 91% at the end of third quarter with another 35,000 square feet of deals close to being signed. Additionally, we're exchanging proposals to renew Epsilon and the subtenants for roughly 50% of its footprint. Our local team has pushed action rates there up 15 to 20% over the last six months. Overall market conditions in Las Colinas are improving rapidly and led all Dallas submarkets to net absorption for the quarter and year to date. With Wells Fargo's 850,000 square foot new campus in Las Colinas being delivered this quarter and no other development underway, Piedmont is poised to see additional rental growth here over the next several quarters. At 60 Broad, we continue to work with the Department of Citywide Administrative Services regarding New York City's long term extension for substantially all of its base. Unfortunately, additional delays during the planning process will result in the execution of a potential lease to spill over into early 2026. Coming back to the overall portfolio, we. Remain bullish about our near term leasing prospects. Our leasing pipeline remains robust even after two straight quarters of record new leasing activity and as Brett mentioned earlier now has over 400,000 square feet in the late stage phase with insurance, legal, accounting and financial services driving demand for new deals. Outstanding proposals remain steady as well, sitting at 2.4 million square feet for both our operating and out of service portfolios in comparable to last quarter's volume. As I noted on our last call, we have seen a large uptick in full floor users ranging from 25 to 50,000 square feet across a wide range of industries and throughout most of our markets. Considering our leasing momentum and a modest number of expirations in the fourth quarter, we remain comfortable in achieving our lease percentage guidance of 89 to 90% for our operating portfolio. Our redevelopment portfolio, which is on track to meaningfully contribute towards 2026 and 2027 FFO growth saw its lease percentage spike for the second quarter in a row from 31% to 54%. Based on early and late stage activity, we project this portfolio reach 60 to 70% by year end. I'll now turn the call over to Chris Comey for his comments on investment activity.

Chris Comey - (00:19:21)

Chris thanks George. As we have said for several quarters, we remain focused on pruning certain non core assets throughout our portfolio. We are under contract on two of our land parcels. Both are contingent on time consuming rezonings so if these are approved, neither will close in 2025. We are actively marketing another small non core asset that could potentially close around. The end of the year. The rationale for this disposition is entirely consistent with recent sales. There are no assurances that any of these will close and as is our customer, acquisitions and dispositions are not included in any of our projections. On the acquisitions front, we are certainly seeing elevated interest in the sector among more traditional institutional investors. The debt markets continue to improve and differentiated office environments have proven their resilience and durability over the past few years. High quality office is no longer redlined and liquidity is growing in the sector. Dallas in particular has seen a handful of sizable fully priced transactions over the past six months. We remain active in reviewing opportunities in Dallas and elsewhere. We will be disciplined and patient. Rest assured, our team is thinking creatively around compelling opportunities, including evaluating potential transactions alongside institutional capital partners. We do intend to put ourselves in a position to be more active on on the transaction front in 2026. With that, I'll pass it over to Sherry to cover our financial results.

Sherry Rexrode - Chief Financial Officer - (00:21:02)

Thank you Chris. While we will be discussing some of this quarter's financial highlights today, please review the earnings release and accompanying Supplemental Financial Information which were filed yesterday for more complete details. Core FFO per diluted share for the third quarter of 2025 was $0.35 versus $0.36 per diluted share for the third quarter Of 2024, with the penny decrease attributable to the sale of three projects during the twelve months ended September 30, 2025 and higher net interest expense as a result of refinancing activity completed over the past 12 months. This was offset by growth in operations due to higher economic occupancy and rental rate growth. As I have mentioned on the last several calls, our lease with Travel and Leisure in Orlando commenced in September and will contribute meaningfully to our fourth quarter results. AFFO generated during the third quarter of 2025 was approximately $26.5 million. It was a relatively quiet quarter from a financing perspective. However, as previously announced, we did amend our revolving credit facility and term loan during the quarter to remove the credit spread adjustment from the SOFR based interest rates applicable to those two facilities, thereby lowering the all in rate on each facility by 10 basis points. As we've highlighted before, we currently have no final debt maturities until 2028 and approximately 435 million of availability under our revolving line of credit. We continue to evaluate balance sheet management options including traditional bonds and hybrid instruments to smooth our maturity ladder and reduce our interest costs. Based on the current forward yield curve, we expect all of our unsecured debt maturing for the remainder of this decade could be refinanced at lower interest rates and thus be a tailwind to FFO per share growth. To illustrate how powerful this tailwind could be, I'll use the example. If we were to refinance the remaining $532 million of our outstanding nine and a quarter bonds at current rates, we would generate approximately $21 million of interest savings and be $0.17 accretive to FFO share At this time. I'd like to narrow our 2025 annual core FFO guidance from a range of $1.38 to $1.44 to $1.40 to $1.42 per diluted share with no material changes to our previously published assumptions. Please refer to page 26 of the Supplemental Information filed last night for details of major leases that have not yet commenced or are currently in abatement. As of September 30, 2025, the Company had just under a million square feet of executed leases yet to commence and an additional 1.1 million square feet of leases under abatement that combined represent approximately 75 million of future additional annual cash rent which will fuel the mid single digit future earnings growth that Brent mentioned earlier, although it does demand additional capital spend in the short term. With that, I will turn the call over to Brent for closing comments.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:24:42)

Thank you George, Chris and Sherry. Our portfolio of recently renovated, well located, hospitality inspired Piedmont places continue to set the standard for the office market, helping us to drive leasing volumes to all time highs. On that point, you may recall that we started 2025 with an operational goal to lease a total of 1.4 to 1.6 million square feet, which was inclusive of approximately 3,000 square foot renewal by the New York City agencies. Today we reiterated our Revised guidance of 2.2 to 2.4 million square feet, but note that that does not anticipate the completion of the New York City lease this year. In effect, we're on pace to lease 1 million more square feet than we anticipated at the start of the year and much of that leasing was for currently vacant space. An astounding accomplishment. I want to commend the Piedmont team for with office vacancy declining for the first time in years, quality space is becoming harder to find and new developments are becoming more expensive for occupiers. We believe that the recent investments that we've made in our portfolio combined with our customer centric place making mindset will continue to set us apart in the office sector, enabling us to push rents to all time highs across the portfolio and generate consistent earnings growth. We will continue to concentrate our resources on driving lease percentage above 90% and increasing rental rates while opportunistically refinancing above market rate debt to further drive FFO and cash flow growth. With that, I will now ask the operator to provide our listeners with instructions on how they can submit their questions.

OPERATOR - (00:26:35)

Operator. Thank you ladies and gentlemen. At this time we'll be conducting our question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press Star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. And for participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the STAR keys. One moment please while we poll for questions. Thank you. Our first question is coming from Nick Thoman with Baird. Your line is live.

Nick Thoman - Equity Analyst at Baird - (00:27:23)

Hey, good morning. Maybe for Brent or George, you commented a little bit on just expansion versus Contractions. I just wanted to clarify is that within the Piedmont portfolio, when you're quoting those numbers and then as you look at the new leasing and the strength there, has that been more new to market requirements or has that been market share gains and flight to the Piedmont portfolio? Just a little bit of color there would be helpful. Thank you.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:27:52)

In my prepared remarks. Good morning, Nick. I was referring that 2.2% was the JLL report noting that large users, 25,000 square feet or greater on the US data set was reducing footprint substantially less. So that's that comment, not specific to our portfolio. But George can talk a little bit more to that. We are seeing more expansions than contractions for sure. Thank you.

George Wells - Chief Operating Officer - (00:28:18)

You know, it's amazing. It's been five quarters in a row we've had expansions. I mean, this past quarter we had 16 expansions versus two contractions for a net positive 40,000 square feet. But if you look at it totality for the past five quarters, looking at 55 expansions versus for a net of about 120, 130,000 square feet. So, you know, the dynamics in our. Portfolio have been quite positive. And in terms of where new leasing. Activity is coming from, the second part of your question, Nick, I would say that it's mostly intra market moves in terms of those users wanting to upgrade to higher quality space. I think the exception to that might be Dallas, where we continue to see a robust inbound activity. Atlanta, a little less so, still up from where we were pre pandemic. But Texas does seem to have a little bit more inbound and particularly Dallas.

Nick Thoman - Equity Analyst at Baird - (00:29:12)

And those larger requirements, the 25 to 50,000 square feet are those, if you look at what they're currently in place. What's the size change there? Is that a downsize or is it keeping the same sort of footprint? Just trying to get a better understanding of kind of larger tenant behavior. We're hearing about slowing hiring, I guess. How far are we along in a rationalization of just office utilization as you kind of look within the markets for larger users?

George Wells - Chief Operating Officer - (00:29:43)

Thanks, George, again. Absolutely. Well, let me first hit this. We had last quarter we had 15. Deals that were 25,000 square feet or larger. For aggregately, about 800,000 square feet. And this quarter we have in terms. Of proposals outstanding, 18 that are fit that size. So continues to grow within our overall portfolio. You know, I would say it's mixed. I mean, in a couple of instances we're hearing about some consolidations. In other words, companies wanting to create. A hub to bring their employees back. Together for increased collaboration. In some other cases it might be. A small deduct which they use to. Justify moving to a higher quality space and paying higher rents. I think that's one thing we've continued to see within the marketplace is the desire to upgrade the quality of your space to bring your people back. And that means having an environment and an offering that is compelling. And that's where our innovations and what we've implemented across the portfolio in terms of our service model while we're garnering our more than fair share of that lease.

Nick Thoman - Equity Analyst at Baird - (00:30:51)

That's helpful. And Brent, you alluded to this Runway you have for occupancy growth and mid single digit FFO growth at a steady state over the next two years. You guys touched a little bit on some of the larger expirations of the portfolio and the coverage you have there, but maybe anything over 100,000 square feet. You guys touched on the Piper, you touched on the Epsilon, you touched on 999. Anything else that we should be looking at as we kind of look at roll over the next two years?

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:31:22)

I think, you know, from our perspective, the chunky ones, if you will, in 2026 are well known, which does give us the confidence to be able to to look into 26 given the prior leasing success. Even with those no move outs to feel confident that there's going to be earnings growth next year. Unfortunately, you know, office REITs were a battleship. It takes a lot to move, but when you do start going, the momentum can carry. As we look ahead into 27, there are a couple of larger expiries. It's a little early to tell overall. They're in Atlanta, which is also our headquarters location and where we have the most depth in the market. So I feel very good about where we're positioned with those. But it's still, you know, 2024 months out for those. And so it's going to still take a little bit of time to get clarity. But we think we are well positioned for renewal.

Nick Thoman - Equity Analyst at Baird - (00:32:14)

That's it for me. Thank you.

OPERATOR - (00:32:18)

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Anthony Paulone with JP Morgan. Your line is live.

Anthony Paulone - Equity Analyst at JP Morgan - (00:32:25)

Yeah, thanks. Good morning, Brent. Just following up on just the conviction level that earnings will grow next year. I know you'll give more specifics when you actually provide guidance, but just wondering if do you think that comes by way of some of the debt refinancing that Sherry talked about potentially existing, or do you think the core in and of itself can move higher?

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:32:53)

Great question, Tony. And I want to clarify that is organic growth only within a static portfolio. It assumes no acquisitions, dispositions or refinancings. As you know, we don't have any debt maturities really for several years until 2028. But as Sherry noted on the call. We do have a pretty large embedded mark to market benefit if we were to refinance those bonds, which she outlined in her prepared remarks. And we will capture that at some point between now and when Those mature in 28. But rest assured, from a risk management perspective, the team is very focused on optimizing that transition from high cost debt. To lower cost debt. And what we laid out in terms of FFO growth again is just from organic lease only the comments that Sherry made is upside on top of what I described as operating growth.

Sherry Rexrode - Chief Financial Officer - (00:33:50)

Got it. Thanks for that. And then maybe Sherry, on the debt refinancing, I guess what are the gating factors to doing something there? Because I mean you kind of laid out the spread's pretty clear. Just what would it take to kind of go do something there? Well, as we've discussed before, there are a variety of ways in which you can refinance the nine and a quarter bonds that are outstanding. You can do purchase them in the market. You can do a tender or you can do a make whole. There's no gating factors related to that, but there are processes in place and there are periods of time where you can or cannot be in the market. And so that's really kind of the variables that we'll be considering as we go forward. The spread right now between the nine and a quarter and where we would refinance if we did a long 5 is about 400 basis points. And that's what's behind the math. Whenever we said if you hypothetically could buy back all of them, that you would achieve an interest savings of about $21 million or 17 cents a.

Anthony Paulone - Equity Analyst at JP Morgan - (00:35:02)

Got it. Okay then just last one if I could. You talked about being out in the market, looking at potential deals out there and the liquidity coming back to office and so forth. What does a typical acquisition that Piedmont might be looking at at this point look like in terms of cash on cash type of asset going in, occupancy versus maybe the opportunity just kind of what is the type of stuff you're looking at right now?

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:35:34)

Great question, Tony. You know, as we continue to canvas the market, not only the existing markets we're in, as we've talked about in the past, select other Sun Belt markets where we would consider growing. If we took a dot off the map elsewhere, we really see two buckets of opportunities within those markets. The first would be I would call an opportunistic set. That's the situation where we've talked about in the past looking for a partner which we have identified several partners who would be looking for more like 20% IRRs or greater and really probably going in with a lower yield, higher vacancies and a significant amount of capital that needs to go into those. And so that's why we continue to to think about a partner in that situation because it would be a earnings drag and an FFO drag and an occupancy drag to bring it in house initially. But we always have a mindset if we're going to put any capital to work and our time and effort it would be something we'd want to bring into the REIT over time. And so those situations, you know, we have looked at a few, took a swung at buying some debt on some situations, didn't work out in that scenario. But we continue to work with those partners. I'd say that bucket right now it kind of comes and goes, they're off market deals. But right now I'd say it's in the $500 million range in terms of opportunity sets that we're looking in that bucket. And then the other category would be more on balance sheet, what I would consider more value add in nature. Very similar to what we've done at our Galleria project here in Atlanta or 999 in that it's going to be on balance sheet, it's going to be a little bit lower IRR probably called mid teens. You'd have an opportunity to go in that would probably be really close to where we trade, maybe a little bit below or a little bit above, but with more importantly the opportunity to grow that yield by call it 300 basis points over a couple of years again through our leasing model, our service model and leveraging the platform to drive that value. So they may start with gap yields in the 8.5 to 10 range and drive from there. And cash might be, let's say 50 basis points less, but those assets are going to be probably 70ish percent lease like I said and give us a good opportunity to lease up. You know one thing that we do think is unique about the Piedmont story is while other groups may be chasing particularly private capital, long term wall brand new assets, we do feel like there is a dearth of capital chasing well located good bones. But older vintage assets like a Galleria here in Atlanta where we've had immense success or a 999 and so those campus large kind of unique ability to create your own environment interests us and then highly accessible, walkable, mixed use environments also interest us. And there are very good opportunities set around that bucket, I'd say right now we're looking at roughly 800 million or so that I would characterize as that value add on balance sheet component. Okay. And unfortunately right now, given our cost of capital, we're not able to move on those immediately. But we continue to keep them warm and continue to have dialogue so that when we do feel like we have a green light from the market to grow externally, we're prepared to do so in pretty short order.

OPERATOR - (00:39:10)

Okay, thanks for all the color. Thank you. Our next question is coming from Dylan Brzezinski with Green Street. Your line is live.

Dylan Brzezinski - Equity Analyst at Green Street - (00:39:25)

Thanks for taking the question. Most my initial questions have been asked. But I guess just one quick one. I know in the past you guys have sort of talked about taking some. Non core assets to market. Just sort of curious where you guys. Are at in that process. And if you're starting to sort of. See capital markets side of things clear.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:39:43)

Up a little bit as the recovery story in terms of fundamentals start to pick up here. Dylan, thanks for joining us today. And in regards to dispositions, it's kind of, it's tough, it's still challenging honestly given the mindset in the office sector that everybody deserves a deal and if it's not 10 years of wall and just built in the last four years, I would say it doesn't price efficiently which is great if you're buying assets not optimal if we're trying to sell. But we continue to be focused on pruning, as you noted, the non core assets that can sell into this market and or just we don't have conviction that we'll have and be able to drive long term value. So we do have an asset in the District that we're in the market with. I would say we continue to feel like the District remains a challenging market that will not likely turn around in D.C. and so we will hopefully execute on that asset and continue to pare back our exposure in the District itself. So still very much have conviction in Northern Virginia and we're seeing good leasing velocity there and uptick in our assets. In terms of absorption. But the other market we consider non core are those where we have very few assets and we can't seem to grow and, or want to grow. And of course that would be Houston which has long term walls on one of the assets and then Schlumberger, great credit and another, we're going to continue to look to dispose those in 26 as well. They've been in the market and we'll reintroduce them again. Hopefully in a more constructive environment. But on that environment, it takes leasing really to give investors the conviction to underwrite an asset vacant space role in a constructive manner. And so what does give us positive, if you will hope that we'll be able to execute on some of this in 26 is that we are seeing more leasing in our markets. And that should give a better underwriting conviction that in terms of rates and absorption and not just underwriting, vacant space stays there forever. And then finally we do have our asset in New York City, as we've noted, and that will likely be something we would look to monetize upon a long term lease at that asset. The overall environment as well as improving. Particularly a note for that asset in. The debt capital markets, it would be a chunkier disposition. And so having the ability and you're seeing the strength right now in the secure debt markets will also improve execution, particularly on that New York City asset and when we monetize it.

Dylan Brzezinski - Equity Analyst at Green Street - (00:42:33)

Great. Brent, thanks for that color. I really appreciate it.

OPERATOR - (00:42:39)

Thank you. As a reminder, ladies and gentlemen, if you do have any questions or comments, you may press Star one on your telephone keypad. Our next question is coming from Michael Lewist with Truist Securities. Your line is live.

Michael Lewist - Equity Analyst at Truist Securities - (00:42:56)

Thank you. I'm sorry if I missed this, but did you say why New York City was pushed back again? And you know, with that lease expiration now kind of almost right on top of us, is there any reason for concern there that they might do something surprising, you know, give back space or anything else?

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:43:17)

Michael, it's Brent. Thanks for joining us today. Great question. We hadn't touched on any specifics and given it's a live transaction, I don't like to get into a lot of detail, but as we've noted on prior calls and we are still very highly engaged with both DCAs, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services who runs the leasing process for the city. They're working with omb and of course there's also three different agencies within that block. So there are a lot of moving pieces and groups that need to weigh in. As we've noted on prior calls, though, it is a unique envelope that is their own entrance, their own elevator bank, a building within a building. If you would add, you would say. And so the other note would be downtown in Manhattan. There are very now few large blocks, competitive buildings that we would historically have been competing with. Some of them have been converted to residential as well. And so we feel like it's, I guess not as much a concern that they would go elsewhere in lower Manhattan. And then the fact that there's an. $8 million holdover penalty on top of their current rental rate, that's on an annual basis. But if they do trip over into holdover, we've reiterated to them as a public company, we will be upholding that. In the pandemic, we were a little bit more lenient on that. Of course, if they renew, we're not going to enforce that, but it is a pretty heavy stick that also goes with the carrot of a building that really suits the agencies well. We do recognize there is a new administration coming in. However, given the Department of Homeless and the other agencies, there seem to be more geared towards helping the community. We think there is a strong likelihood that they will continue to stay engaged at this location. But at that point, that's all I can share. And we still remain very positive on a renewal sometime in the early part of 26.

Michael Lewist - Equity Analyst at Truist Securities - (00:45:11)

No, that's helpful. Thanks. As far as the, you know, the $75 million of cash rent, that's kind of pending, signed but not paying yet, you give a lot of great detail in the supplemental package, but there's a lot of detail at a high level. How should we think about that 75 million coming online for examp, you know, what percentage of that might be, you know, might be paying by the end of the first half of 26 versus the back half? And can you just kind of, at a high level, kind of frame how that will flow through?

Sherry Rexrode - Chief Financial Officer - (00:45:51)

So, Michael, thanks for your question. And the, you know, most of it is going to hit in the middle of the year. I recommend about 70% within 2026. And note that those numbers are annualized numbers. So I'm trying to think what other clarity I can give you. Does that help?

Michael Lewist - Equity Analyst at Truist Securities - (00:46:16)

Yeah, no, that. Yeah, that's helpful. And then just my last question, I.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:46:22)

Might add real quick. Sorry, Michael. I might add, you know, you think about that 75 million, it's really split into two buckets, right? There's 40 million yet to come, and that's pretty wide margin historically, that we would say that would be 3% of the portfolio. It's now approaching, I think, almost 5% of the portfolio. And so we're expecting a lot of that, if you will. The 40 million commits next year more towards the middle of the year than the end. So we might realize roughly about 26 million of that 40 within 2026. It's on the cash component, which is about 35 million. That's going to bleed in on a similar pace as well. So again, 35 million is your annualized number. Not all that's going to start paying cash next year, but on that same kind of ratio of about 60% of it, a little bit higher than that. Say, maybe 70% of it will be realized next year.

Michael Lewist - Equity Analyst at Truist Securities - (00:47:21)

Okay, got it. And then lastly for me, this might be, you know, beating a dead horse. You talked about all the office leasing demand, you know, given, you know, the jobs numbers. I guess back when we used to get jobs numbers, but what we know about jobs numbers, and then AI, you know, there was a headline recently, you know, layoffs now at Amazon, I saw an article that said, you know, more layoff announcements this year since. In any year since 2000, you know, is some of the leasing velocity. Is it just that reits like yourself, you had more space to fill, and so that helps explain why there's more new leasing volume or, you know, it sounds from your comments like it's really a stronger demand, just more, you know, more space out there looking for a home. You know, any way to kind of. Reconcile, you know, those two things I just said, you know, the jobs and the layoffs and everything that's happening in the broader economy with this, what feels like a surge in office demand?

George Wells - Chief Operating Officer - (00:48:22)

I'll start with that. Good morning, Michael. This is George. You know, it's interesting we keep seeing. Announcements with layoffs, but as I kind of reconcile that to what we're seeing in our portfolio, we just. I'm not seeing that effect just yet. And I get back to the comment. That I made earlier. People are still looking to upgrade their space because collaboration and innovation just happens a lot quicker when you're working together. So just to give you some statistics. That supports that theme in terms of why we don't see a letdown at all in overall leasing, we talked about overall proposals earlier. 2.4 million square feet overall, that's quite comparable to what we've seen for the past several quarters. But most notable is two thirds of that is for new space. Right. And so that is amazing, considering how much new leasing activity we've done for the past two quarters, that we continue to backfill that pipeline. And then looking even further out, you know, tour activity is an interesting early indicator of what's happening for demand in our portfolio. We did hit a low point in July for 34 tours, but that was kind of more seasonal than anything else. It recovered in August of 45 tours, September, 41 tours, and here we are sitting 27 days in October at 43 tours with four more days to go. So we're just not seeing it right now. Getting to your point about Amazon, it is interesting, it's new information we like to absorb. But although we have a large hub. In Dallas for them, they lease a tremendous amount of space through WeWork and other sub markets which are more on. The short term situation. So if I were to guess, I suspect that those shorter term contracts in these co working operations would probably be first to go.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:50:06)

And I'd add on that, Michael, I've really taken a step back. You know, two things I think about our portfolio have lent to our success and they're not just because we had more space available. The first is we don't lean in or have floor plates and buildings designed heavily for just tech use. It is much more of a professional services fire conducive amenity set, finish level, floor plate size, et cetera. And so as tech has pulled back from the being kind of the incremental lessor in a lot of markets, our assets have continued to perform because we were never beholden specifically to that group. As George note, we do have tech in our portfolio, particularly in Dallas and Boston. But it's that, you know, buildings that fit well for a law firm as well. And so that would be one factor I think. The other one is you look at our portfolio and our strategy of having great assets amenitized location but we don't cost as much as new construction. So if you're a firm, a national firm or a local kind of regional firm and you want to create a presence, regional headquarters, et cetera, and you want it to be fabulous space to bring your people back, but you don't want to pay 65 to $80 gross when you come to a Piedmont building. And so we are much more appealing. To a, a larger segment of the. Market in my opinion. And I think the data set shows that. And that's why we also have had so much uptick into our assets. And then you layer on the fact that a lot of landlords are kind of stuck in the capital structure that doesn't allow them to think creatively, work with the clients and create the environment and the common areas that are necessary to lease space. So trophies full. And our set of assets are very compelling. I'll give you one last anecdote. We are working our buildings in Minneapolis at Meridian and having great receptivity in the marketplace. A tenant toured that building before the renovations were completed about four months ago, ended up going to new construction and entering a lease on that new construction. They since come back to us. We don't have that deal. But they are very compelled now to see the completed product and the fact that that's a 30%, 40% discount to new construction rents that they are about to enter a lease into and we'll see if we'll get that 60,000 square foot user. But I think there's an opportunity to snag that because our environments are so compelling, we can compete for new construction and we don't have to charge as much. And again, that goes to my point in our ability to push rate across a lot of the portfolio, given we've done this investment and we've got a service level that is truly differentiated and. It'S not just that we have more available.

Michael Lewist - Equity Analyst at Truist Securities - (00:52:58)

Thank you for that. Can't argue with those leasing results. Thanks.

OPERATOR - (00:53:05)

Thank you. As we have no further questions on the lines at this time, I would like to turn the call back over to Mr. Brent Smith for any closing remarks.

Brent Smith - President and Chief Executive Officer - (00:53:16)

Thank you. I appreciate everyone joining us this morning. I do want to remind you of two important dates. First, this Friday, Happy Halloween to all those. And the second is in December. We are going to be at the NAREIT event in Dallas. On the 8th. We're going to hold an office tour. We'll be sharing and showing off all the success we've had at our Dallas Galleria project. We'll also have additional brokers and others from the investment community giving their thoughts and insights on the office sector. So please join us. Reach out to either Sherry or Jennifer if you're interested in joining that tour and discussion and dinner. Hope everyone has a great week. Again, thank you. Again.

OPERATOR - (00:54:07)

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's call. You may disconnect your lines at this time and have a wonderful day. And we thank you for your participation.