Joshua Dicker - VP, General Counsel, & Corporate Secretary Christopher Constant - CEO Mark Olear - COO Danion Fielding - CFO.

Analysts:.

Good day, and welcome to the Getty Realty Corporation First Quarter 2016 Earnings. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Joshua Dicker, Vice President and General Counsel and Corporate Secretary. Please go ahead..

Thank you operator. I would like to thank you all for joining us for Getty Realty's quarterly earnings conference call. Yesterday afternoon, the Company released its financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2016. The Form 8-K and earnings release are available in the investor relations section of our Web site at gettyrealty.com.

Certain statements made in the course of this call are not based on historical information and may constitute forward-looking statements.

These statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs and are subject to trends, events and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statement.

Examples of forward-looking statements include our 2016 guidance and may also include statements made by management and their remarks and in response to questions, including regarding lease restructuring, future Company operations, future financial performance and the Company's acquisition or redevelopment plans and opportunities.

We caution you that such statements reflect our best judgment based on factors currently known to us and that actual results could differ materially.

I refer you to the Company's annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2015 as well as our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and our other filings with the SEC for a more detailed discussion of the risks and other factors that could cause actual results to differ from those expressed or implied in any forward-looking statements made today.

You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements which reflect our view only as of the date hereof. The Company undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statements that may be made in the course of this call.

Also, please refer to our earnings release for a discussion of our use of non-GAAP financial measures including our revised definition of AFFO and our reconciliation of those measures to net earnings. With that, let me turn the call over to Christopher Constant, our Chief Executive Officer..

Thank you, Josh. Good morning, everyone and welcome to our call for the first quarter of 2016. With Josh and me on the call today are Mark Olear, our Chief Operating Officer and Danion Fielding, our Chief Financial Officer.

I will begin today's call by reviewing our performance for the first quarter of 2016, and then pass the call to Mark to discuss our portfolio in more detail. And after Mark, Danion will discuss our financial results.

But first quarter of 2016 was another productive quarter for the Company, which continues to demonstrate the strength of our core net lease portfolio. For the quarter, our AFFO per share was $0.39, which represented growth of 18% over the prior year’s quarter.

The quarter benefited primarily from the embedded growth from our 2015 midyear acquisition and our ongoing efforts to control overhead cost.

During the quarter, we continued to make progress on our remaining transitional properties as Mark will discuss we ended the quarter with 38 remaining sites, an improvement of 17% from year-end and applications 75% from where we were at the same time last year.

We now have a portfolio of well located properties and with our triple net lease structures, which have favorable attributes we are able to enjoy consistent cash flows.

In the broader picture, we remain committed to growth strategy, which combine steady and a wide growth from our core net lease portfolio, redevelopment of select properties for higher and better uses and pursuing acquisitions of properties in a conveniently cash sector.

We are continuing to evaluate opportunities and we remain disciplined and selective on what we are pursuing. This includes continued internal analysis of our portfolio to determine the potential for high return redevelopment prospect along with potential acquisitions.

We are being systematic in our approach and are confident that this approach to our investment strategy will contribute to our performance as we move ahead.

As we look forward, we are energized and encouraged by the results from our net lease portfolio, our emerging pipeline of redevelopment opportunities, which are unlocking the value embedded in the portfolio and the steady progress we are making on our asset repositioning activities.

The net result of which is that we continue to improve the quality of our portfolio, while maintaining a watchful eye on our balance sheet and our cost of capital. With that I will turn the call over to Mark Olear to discuss the portfolio and investment activities..

Thank you, Chris. For the first quarter of 2016, we completed six sales for 1.5 million in the aggregate during the quarter. These properties were largely part of what we call our transitional properties and they were usual to our earnings.

These sales represented continuation of our ongoing process to dispose the properties which require investment and/or are located in markets and in areas that we do not believe justify additional capital investment relative to our expected return.

Of our remaining transitional properties we anticipate that we will sell or otherwise dispose of approximately half of the remaining 38 sites and leased or redevelop the remaining properties. The cumulative result of our transaction and leasing activities is that we ended the quarter with 804 net lease properties and 38 transitional properties.

Our weighted average lease term is approximately 12 years and our overall occupancy is 97%. In terms of the acquisition environment, we continue to see quality opportunities within the convenience and gas sector to expand our portfolio and we are being extremely disciplined as we evaluate and determine which opportunities to add to our Company.

On the redevelopment platform in addition to one project, which rent commenced this quarter, we have an additional four leases signed for projects which we are optimistic will come online primarily in 2017 and 2018. We continue to grow this effort and look forward to discussing future projects with you as they materialize.

With that I turn it over to Danion..

Thank you, Mark. Turning to our results. As Chris mentioned, we had a productive quarter and delivered strong operational results. For the first quarter our total revenues from continuing operations increased by 15% to $28.4 million compared to the same period last year.

And our contractual due rental income, which excludes tenant reimbursements increased by 18% to $24.3 million. Rental income growth for the quarter was driven primarily by the impact of our mid-year 2015 acquisitions. On the expense front, property cost excluding tenant reimbursements increased by 11% for the quarter.

This reduction can be attributed to declines in rent expense and maintenance expenses. Our environmental expense improved by $1.1 million for the quarter relative to the same period last year.

The reduction was due to a $0.3 million decrease in litigation of this and legal and professional fees, and $0.8 million of decreases in environmental remediation cost. It is worth noting that there are several non-cash items to improve this line, which caused the reported announced to vary from quarter-to-quarter.

For the quarter, G&A was fairly flat after adjusting for $200,000 of one time employees related expenses. As a result, for the quarter, our FFO was $14.1 million or $0.42 per share, which represented an increase of 35%. And AFFO was $13.2 million or $0.39 per share, which represented an increase of 18%. Turning to the balance sheet.

We ended the quarter with $323 million of borrowings, $148 million on our credit agreement and $175 million of long-term fixed rate debt. Our debt to total capitalization currently stands at approximately 32% and our net debt to EBITDA at quarter end was 4.7 times.

Our weighted average borrowing cost was 4.6% at quarter end and the weighted average maturity of our debt is approximately 4.5 years with 54% of our debt being fixed rate. Our environmental liability ended the quarter at $82.7 million, down $1.6 million so far this year.

For the quarter ended March 31, 2016, the Company’s environmental remediation spending was approximately $3.6 million. It is important to note that the net number on our balance sheet is also impacted by additions to the principle amount of the liability and accretion since GAAP requires us to book the liability on the present value basis.

Subsequent to quarter end, we would see payment for the entire outstanding balance of $13.9 million with seller financing mortgage from our former tenant Ramco. This payment will result in an approximately $0.01 impact to the FFO per quarter. Finally, we are reiterating our 2016 AFFO per share guidance at a range of $1.40 to $1.45 per share.

Note that our guidance does not assume any acquisition or capital markets activities but it does reflect our expectation that we will continue to execute on our leasing disposition activities. It also assumes we continue to execute on our existing redevelopment pipeline. That concludes our prepared remarks.

So let me ask the operator to open the call for questions..

Operator:.

Thank you everyone for joining us this morning. We look forward to speaking to you again when we report our second quarter and we appreciate your interest in the Company..

Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today’s conference call. We thank you for your participation..