Earnings call transcript: Curbline Properties Q3 2025 shows solid growth

Curbline Properties Corp (CURB) reported a notable performance in Q3 2025, with earnings per share (EPS) of $0.09 and revenue of $48.65 million. The company’s stock showed a modest increase of 0.98% in the aftermarket session, reflecting investor confidence in its strategic direction and financial health. With a market capitalization of $2.6 billion and impressive revenue growth of 36.72% over the last twelve months, Curbline’s operational efficiency and strategic acquisitions have positioned it well in the market. InvestingPro analysis reveals strong financial health with an overall score of 2.9 (GOOD), supported by multiple positive indicators.

Key Takeaways

• Curbline’s Q3 2025 net operating income (NOI) increased by 17% sequentially.
• The company raised its outlook for funds from operations (FFO), projecting $1.04-$1.05 per share.
• Lease rates improved to 96.7%, indicating strong property demand.
• Curbline completed significant financing activities, including a $150 million term loan.

Company Performance

Curbline Properties demonstrated resilience and growth in Q3 2025, marked by a 17% sequential rise in NOI. This growth is attributed to strategic acquisitions and a focus on high-traffic convenience retail assets. The company signed nearly 400,000 square feet of new leases and renewals, with new lease spreads averaging over 20%. These efforts have solidified Curbline’s position as a market leader in convenience retail assets.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: $48.65 million, showing robust growth.
• Earnings per share: $0.09, reflecting strong operational performance.
• Lease rate: Increased to 96.7%, showcasing effective property management.

Earnings vs. Forecast

Curbline’s EPS of $0.09 aligns with its forecast, demonstrating consistent performance. The revenue of $48.65 million also met market expectations, reinforcing the company’s strategic initiatives and operational efficiency.

Market Reaction

Following the earnings announcement, Curbline’s stock price experienced a slight increase of 0.24, or 0.98%, in the aftermarket session, closing at $24.75. This movement places the stock near its 52-week high of $25.69, indicating positive investor sentiment. However, according to InvestingPro Fair Value analysis, the stock appears to be trading above its intrinsic value. Investors interested in identifying similar investment opportunities can explore the most overvalued stocks list for comprehensive market insights.

Outlook & Guidance

Curbline has revised its FFO guidance upward to $1.04-$1.05 per share, reflecting expected continued growth. The company forecasts a 20% year-over-year FFO growth and anticipates ending the year with over $250 million in cash on hand. Curbline’s investment activity for 2025 is projected at approximately $750 million, with a focus on maintaining a low 97% occupancy rate as a peak target.

Executive Commentary

CEO David Lukes emphasized the company’s strategic focus, stating, "We continue to lead this unique capital-efficient sector with a clear first-mover advantage." He also highlighted the importance of convenience in Curbline’s strategy: "Our strategy is clear: provide convenient access to customers running errands woven into their daily lives."

Risks and Challenges

• Market Saturation: As the convenience retail sector grows, increased competition could impact Curbline’s market share.
• Macroeconomic Pressures: Economic downturns could affect consumer spending and tenant stability.
• Interest Rate Fluctuations: Changes in interest rates might impact Curbline’s financing costs and investment returns.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about Curbline’s acquisition cap rates, which range from low 5% to high 6%. The company emphasized its focus on internal rate of return (IRR) over cap rates, highlighting a disciplined growth strategy. Analysts also raised questions about potential re-tenanting needs, to which Curbline responded by underscoring its model’s limited requirement for such actions.

Full transcript - Curbline Properties Corp (CURB) Q3 2025:

Bailey, Conference Operator: Thank you for standing by. My name is Bailey, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Curbline Properties Corp. Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker’s remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star, followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, again press star and one. I would now like to turn the call over to Stephanie Ruys de Perez, Vice President of Capital Markets. You may begin.

Stephanie Ruys de Perez, Vice President of Capital Markets, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thank you. Good morning and welcome to Curbline Properties Corp. Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Joining me today are Chief Executive Officer David Lukes and Chief Financial Officer Conor Fennerty. In addition to the press release distributed this morning, we have posted our quarterly financial supplement and slide presentation on our website at curbline.com, which are intended to support our prepared remarks during today’s call. Please be aware that certain of our statements today may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ materially from our forward-looking statements. Additional information may be found in our earnings press release and in our filings with the SEC, including our most recent reports on Forms 10-K and 10-Q.

In addition, we will be discussing non-GAAP financial measures on today’s call, including FFO, operating FFO, and same property NOI. Descriptions and reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures can be found in today’s quarterly financial supplement and investor presentation. At this time, it is my pleasure to introduce our Chief Executive Officer, David Lukes.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Good morning and welcome to Curbline Properties Third Quarter Conference Call. Let me begin by expressing my gratitude to the entire Curb team, not only for delivering another strong quarter, but also for marking our one-year anniversary as the only public company exclusively focused on acquiring top-tier convenience retail assets across the United States. We continue to lead this unique capital-efficient sector with a clear first-mover advantage. Before Conor walks through the quarterly results, I’d like to take a moment to reflect on what we’ve accomplished in our first four quarters since the spin-off of Curbline Properties. We’ve acquired $850 million in assets through a combination of individual acquisitions and portfolio deals. We’ve signed nearly 400,000 square feet of new leases and renewals, with new lease spreads averaging over 20% and our renewal spreads just under 10%.

Importantly, our capital expenditures have averaged just 6% of NOI, placing us among the most capital-efficient operators in the entire public REIT sector, an important hallmark of the convenience asset class. It’s hard to overstate the strength of this business model, but three key attributes help explain why we’re confident in our ability to deliver superior risk-adjusted returns. First, our investments align with real consumer behavior. Unlike traditional shopping centers built for destination retailers, our properties serve customers running daily errands. According to third-party geolocation data, two-thirds of our visitors stay less than seven minutes on our properties, often returning multiple times a day. These properties serve large and elongated trade areas along major traffic corridors, not just local neighborhoods. In fact, 88% of our customers live more than a mile away, and nearly half live more than five miles away. This is not a local business.

That’s why 70% of our tenants are national chains, eager to capture a share of the 40,000 cars that pass by our properties daily. In high-income markets, supply is limited, and tenants are willing to pay a premium for access to this valuable traffic. Second, we invest in simple, flexible buildings. Rather than purpose-built structures, we favor straightforward rows of shops that support a wide variety of uses. This flexibility drives strong tenant demand, rising rents, and minimal capital outlay. We don’t do lost leader deals, we don’t overinvest in tenant improvements, and we don’t rely on one tenant to drive traffic to another. Our strategy is clear: provide convenient access to customers running errands woven into their daily lives, and lease to tenants with strong credit who are willing to pay top rent to access those customers.

The result is a highly diversified tenant base, with only nine tenants contributing more than 1% of base rent and only one tenant more than 2%. Strong tenants drive strong sales, which leads to high retention and rent growth with little or no landlord investment. This is the essence of capital efficiency and a key driver of our growing free cash flow. Third, our balance sheet is built to support our growth. We believe we currently own the largest high-quality portfolio of convenience shopping centers in the United States, totaling 4.5 million square feet. The total U.S. market for this asset class is 950 million square feet, 190 times larger than our current footprint. While not all of that inventory meets our standards, our criteria are clear: primary corridors, strong demographics, high traffic counts, and creditworthy tenants.

Under John Catteneau’s leadership, our investment team is underwriting hundreds of opportunities each month. We have the luxury of choice, the discipline to grow one asset at a time, and the responsibility to maintain our leadership by acquiring only the best. Even in the top quartile of the convenience sector, it’s 50 times larger than our current portfolio, and we’ve structured our team, our balance sheet, and our operations to scale. Curbline Properties Corp. has all of the pieces on hand to generate double-digit free cash flow growth for a number of years to come. Based on our implied Fourth Quarter 2025 OFFO guidance, we’re forecasting 20% year-over-year FFO growth, which is well above the public REIT sector average. In summary, Curbline Properties Corp. has quickly built a track record that highlights the depth and liquidity of the convenience asset class.

Our original 2025 guidance range included $500 million of convenience acquisitions. We’ve obviously significantly exceeded that pace and now expect 2025 investment activity of around $750 million, with potential for additional upside. I couldn’t be more optimistic about the opportunity ahead for Curbline Properties Corp. as we exclusively focus on scaling the fragmented convenience marketplace and delivering compelling, relative, and absolute growth for stakeholders. With that, I’ll turn it over to Conor.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thanks, David. I’ll start with third quarter earnings and operating metrics before shifting to the company’s 2025 guidance phase and then concluding with the balance sheet. Third quarter results were ahead of budget, largely due to higher than forecast NOI, driven in part by rent commencement timing, along with acquisition volume. NOI was up 17% sequentially, driven by organic growth along with acquisitions. Outside of the quarterly operational outperformance and some upside from lower G&A, there are no other material callouts for the quarter, highlighting the simplicity of the Curbline Properties Corp. income statement and business plan. In terms of operating metrics, leasing volume in the third quarter hit record levels, even after adjusting for the growth in the portfolio. Overall, leasing activity remains elevated, and we remain encouraged by the depth of demand for space, which we expect to translate into full-year 2025 spreads consistent with 2024.

In terms of the lease rate, the strong aforementioned volumes resulted in a 60 basis point increase sequentially to 96.7%, which is among the highest in the retail REIT sector regardless of format. To put some context around that, in February of this year, we acquired a six-property, 211,000 square foot portfolio for $86 million. Since acquisition just seven months ago, in that subset of properties alone, we signed 28,000 square feet of new and renewal leases, taking the lease rate up to over 96% from 94% at the time of acquisition. This leasing velocity speaks to the level of demand for high-quality convenience shopping centers and the speed at which leasing can occur, given the simple format of the property type. Same property NOI was up 3.7% year to date and 2.6% for the third quarter, despite a 40 basis point headwind from uncollectible revenue.

Importantly, this growth was generated by limited capital expenditures, with third quarter CapEx as a percentage of NOI of just under 7% and year-to-date CapEx as a percentage of NOI of just over 6%. For the full year, we continue to expect CapEx as a percentage of NOI to remain below 10%. Moving to our outlook for 2025, we are raising OFFO guidance to a range between $1.04 and $1.05 per share. The increase is driven by better than projected operations, along with the pacing and visibility on acquisitions that David mentioned. Underpinning the midpoint of the range is, number one, approximately $750 million of full-year investments, with fourth quarter investments funded with cash on hand. Number two, a 3.75% return on cash, with interest income declining over the course of the quarter as cash is invested.

Number three, G&A of roughly $31 million, which includes fees paid to Site Centers as part of the shared service agreement. You will note that in the third quarter, we recorded a gross up of $731,000 of non-cash G&A expense, which was offset by $731,000 of non-cash other income. This gross up, which is a function of the shared services agreement and nets to zero net income, will continue as long as the agreement is in place and is excluded from the aforementioned G&A target. In terms of same property NOI, we are now forecasting growth of approximately 3.25% at the midpoint in 2025, but there are a few important things to call out. Similar to our leasing spreads, the same property pool is growing but small and is comping off of 2024’s outperformance.

It includes only assets owned for at least 12 months as of December 31, 2024, resulting in a larger non-same property pool that is growing at a faster rate on an annual basis, driven by an expected increase in occupancy. Additionally, uncollectible revenue was a source of income in both the third and the fourth quarters of 2024. As a result, uncollectible revenue will remain a year-over-year headwind, particularly in the fourth quarter, despite limited year-to-date bad debt activity and very strong operations. For moving pieces between the third and the fourth quarter, as a result of the funding of the private placement offering in September, interest expense is set to increase to about $6 million in the fourth quarter. Interest income is forecast to decline to about $3 million, and G&A is expected to increase to just over $8 million.

Additional details on 2025 guidance and expectations can be found on page 11 of the earnings slides. Ending on the balance sheet, Curbline Properties Corp. was spun off with a unique capital structure aligned with the company’s business plan. In the third quarter, Curbline Properties Corp. closed a $150 million term loan and funded a previously announced $150 million private placement bond offering, bringing total debt capital raised since formation to $400 million at a weighted average rate of 5%. Additionally, the company expects to fund an additional $200 million of private placement proceeds on or around year-end at a blended 5.25% rate. Curbline’s now proven access to unsecured fixed-rate debt is a key differentiator from the largely private buyer universe acquiring convenience shopping centers.

The net result of the capital markets activity since formation is that the company is expected to end the year with over $250 million of cash on hand and a net debt to EBITDA ratio less than one times, providing substantial dry powder and liquidity to continue to acquire assets and scale, resulting in significant earnings and cash flow growth well in excess of the REIT average. With that, I’ll turn it back to David.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thank you, Conor. Operator, we’re now ready to take questions.

Bailey, Conference Operator: At this time, I would like to remind everyone in order to ask a question, press star and the number one on your telephone keypad. Your first question comes from the line of Craig Mailman with Citi. Your line is open.

Thanks. It’s actually Nick Joseph here with Craig. Maybe just starting on kind of your last point, Conor. Obviously the balance sheet’s in very good position, but you did institute the ATM program or put one in place. How are you thinking about equity from here, recognizing the balance sheet is in a good spot, just given where the stock trades at least relative to NAV and where you’re seeing acquisition cap rates?

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Sure, Nick. Good morning. To your point, we put in an ATM on October 1. We also put in a share buyback on October 1. If you recall from our press release, we simply stated that, you know, like all other public companies, we should have all the tools available at our disposal. For equity, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, for us, we look at the source and the use. If we had a use of capital that we thought was accretive to fund with equity, we would consider it, similar to other public REITs. Outside of that, we’re sitting on a significant liquidity position. We’ve got pretty significant embedded growth. There’s a high bar there. To repeat my point, we look at the source and the use.

At this point, we haven’t issued anything to date, but that could change depending on what we see from an investment perspective.

Thank you. What’s the stabilized yield on the recent lease-up acquisitions, and how does that compare to the in-place cap rates at acquisition?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Nick, I would say that our acquisitions this quarter, the going-in cap rate was a bit higher than last quarter. I would say if you look at over the course of the year, we’re still blending to the low 6%s, which is a pretty good reflection of where the top quartile of the sector is trading. The stabilized yield, if you look out a couple of years, is really dependent upon market rents, which appear to be continuing to grow. You can see that in our spread. I hate to even put a number on what I think stabilized looks like in the next two to three years, but it sure feels like the indications are that markets are growing.

Thank you.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Todd Thomas with KeyBanc Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Hi, thanks. Good morning. I just wanted to talk about the acquisition activity and the pipeline heading into 2026. You talked about $750 million for the year. That’s up from around $500 million, so an incremental $100 million or so here in the fourth quarter. How should we think about the pipeline beyond 4Q, how the pace of acquisitions may trend into 2026, and whether you’re seeing more product come to market as the company continues to be active in the space?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Hey, good morning, Todd. It’s David. The amount of inventory we’re underwriting is definitely increasing every quarter. I think John’s team has built relationships nationwide where we’re starting to see things that we might not have seen in the past. I would say we’re being highly selective on exactly what we want to transact with and what we don’t. If you think about the prepared remarks, I know you said guidance was originally, you know, $500 million. So far, year to date, we’re at $644 million, and we would expect that the full year is around $750 million. There’s potential for upside on that. I think the pipeline going forward is really going to be more of a result of not only increased visibility and deal flow, but also the episodic nature of some of the portfolio deals that we’ve done. They’re harder to project.

They are out there, and we’re building the relationships so that we feel like we’re going to have the ability to take a peek at those when they come to market.

Okay. It sounds like maybe around $500 million is kind of the right target to think about on sort of a recurring basis. When you layer in some larger transactions, perhaps, that could be kind of the needle mover moving forward.

I don’t think that’s what I was implying. What I said is we feel confident that 2025 is going to be $750 million with potential for upside, and we’ll see what happens next year. We’re pretty confident that we’re seeing an awful lot of inventory that we like.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Yeah, and Todd, to David’s point, I mean, I think we’ve kind of built a machine now where we’ve got visibility on the fourth quarter and the first quarter of next year. To David’s point, our visibility is a lot higher than where it was when we set our initial bogey. Once we get to 2026 and talk about guidance, we’ll provide more of a framework around how we should think about investment volume. To David’s point, I mean, we kind of have visibility now on the next, call it, five or six months, which is a very different perspective than we had at the time of the spin-off.

Okay. As we think about 2026 and sort of the growth algorithm for the same store, which I realize is rapidly changing, you have blended leasing spreads that have been in the low double-digit cash spread range. Can you just remind us what the portfolio’s blended annual escalator looks like? Are there any other sort of considerations that we should think about moving forward?

No, it’s a good question, Todd. To kind of the genesis of the question, there is a significant pool change from 2025 to 2026. The good news is the net result is, you know, to David’s point, we’re buying assets that have very similar characteristics. There’s no material differentiator in terms of structural growth or bumps between the 2025 pool and the 2026. If you recall, at the time of the spin-off, we said we felt our 2024, 2025, 2026 growth would average north of 3%. If you think about it, 2024 was 5.8%. 2025, our midpoint of our range was 3.25%, which would imply that, you know, we would have pretty steady growth over the course of 2026 comparable to 2025. There’s no material considerations to your point on the growth algorithm. This is a really simple company with a really simple income statement.

There’s nothing for us to call out that will be headwinds to next year, redevelopment opportunities that will be headwinds, nothing like that. I don’t want to make it sound formulaic. There’s obviously a lot of work to get there, to your point, in terms of leasing and volume, et cetera. It should be a growth level that’s pretty steady on an occupancy-neutral basis compared to any portfolio we’re looking at in terms of same-store pools. Let me know if I answered your question there.

Yeah, that’s helpful. All right, thank you.

You’re welcome.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Ronald Kamdem with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

Hey, I just want to go back to sort of the cap rate conversation. Obviously, you guys are thinking about IRRs here, which I appreciate. Maybe if you could just double-click, I think you said low sixes. Just wondering what are the ranges of those and any difference between larger deal and portfolio deals. More importantly, as you’ve sort of a year in and more people are finding out about this business, how should we be thinking about the potential for cap rate compression as you’re thinking about the next 12, 24, 36 months? Thanks.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Hey, Ron, good morning. It’s David. I mean, cap rates as you are aware and you alluded to, we underwrite for IRR, but of course, the result is a going-in cap rate. When the assets are quite small, the cap rate on year one can be pretty wildly different, most importantly if there’s a vacancy. One of the things we noted last quarter was we had some assets that we bought that had one or two vacant units, but in a small format strip center, that means that the cap rate can be quite low to make up for that vacant space and the growth opportunity. On the other hand, there could be fully stabilized assets with strong credit that has a little bit less growth opportunity, but it’s also a stable growing asset with not a lot of cap back.

The net result is the cap rate range can be quite wide in this sector. I mean, it can be low fives to high sixes, even for the top quartile. If you’re buying assets with worse demographics, pretty low traffic counts, and kind of tertiary markets, you could end up closer to a seven. Those aren’t the assets that we’ve been interested in. That’s why I’ve kind of averaged it down to say that we’re blending to a low six, but I’d say there could be a 100 basis point swing on one asset to the next, just given the fundamentals of that rent roll.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Yeah, to David’s prepared remarks, Ron, we were just over a 6 in the third quarter, to David’s comments on buying some vacancy. Our fourth quarter blended to 6.25. That’s pretty consistent with where we’ve been buying over the course of the year. To David’s point, vacancy could swing that 20 basis points on a blended basis, but it’s been pretty steady. To your point on where they could go, it feels like that’s a macro question as opposed to a sector question. There’s a lot of interest in retail in general. I don’t think that’s unique to convenience assets, but I think it’s going to be much more dependent on rates more than anything.

Great. I think that’s really helpful. Just going back to the same store conversation, look, occupancy has been building this year, so presumably that’s a tailwind for next year. When you sort of look at the lease rate, what do you guys sort of think is the structural sort of cap that you can sort of get on that? Thanks.

Ron, it’s a really good question. If you look at the total portfolio, we’re at 96.7%. The same property pool is 97.1%. It feels like low 97%s is probably the peak here. It doesn’t mean there’s not occupancy upside though, because we’ve got a little bit wider least occupied spread than we historically had to run out of the last, called, seven, eight years that we’ve been tracking this for the portfolio. David, I don’t know if you feel differently. It feels like a couple hundred basis points of structural vacancy is probably the right spread, and that’s just churn of a tenant moving out and the timeline to put someone back in.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Yeah, I think the only thing I would add to that is that the S&O pipeline and the amount of occupancy upside you would typically see in a retail portfolio kind of gives the high watermark for growth. The difference with a portfolio where we’re specifically buying a shorter WALT with a higher mark to market means that most of our growth going forward is going to come through renewals, not necessarily through occupancy.

Helpful. Thanks so much.

Thanks, Ron.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Alexander Goldfarb with Piper Sandler. Your line is open.

Good morning down there. Two questions. David, let me just go to that comment that you just made about the types of centers you’re going for. Increasingly, it seems that just given the dearth of product, people are sort of eager to buy credit or vacancy issues to be able to get at availability to put tenants in. As you guys look at your target convenience shopping centers in the deal flow, are you seeing a lot of opportunities where there is some potential credit or vacancy issues that would allow you to really drive rent increases by taking out a less productive tenant, replacing it, or convenience shopping centers don’t really offer that same potential that you’ve seen in a normal open-air shopping center?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Good morning, Alex. You know, there’s always going to be opportunities to upgrade credit, but I will say that in a larger format retail environment, you might be especially proactive because the benefits of upgrading tenant also have a strong traffic driver, and you need that traffic driver to feed your other tenants. What’s unique about this business is that there’s really not much crossover traffic between even adjacent tenants. The tenants are leasing space because they want to be near the customers on their errand runnings. Our desire to re-tenant buildings is pretty low. What’s most important is that we have tenants that are able to generate enough profit to afford the rents that we want to charge. I would say we’re not going to be very aggressive on retrofitting and merchandising properties. What we are going to be aggressive on is raising rents at renewals.

That’s part of the reason why I like the convenience center, because you tend to have leases that don’t have nearly as many options as a larger format tenant. We can actually get to the market rents, which are continuing to grow.

Okay. The second question is, you talk a lot about the consistency of your earnings growth, and obviously you’re doing that with the balance sheet the way you’re mutually funding, using debt and cash. As we think about the spreads to your implied cap rate, is it your view that you will always maintain a positive spread in order to be able to drive the sort of double-digit earnings growth that you aspire to, or your view is that you could buy inside of your implied cap rate, but through rent outgrow and have that asset be accretive?

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Alex, it’s Conor. I’m going to attempt to answer and let me know if I address this. Our view, our kind of business plan when we completed the spin-off was to invest over a five-year period. There’s $0.5 billion per year, and that led to double-digit growth, and that required no additional equity. If equity over the course of that five-year plan was accretive, we would consider it, and that would extend that timeline or add to that growth profile. Our view in terms of how we structured that growth algorithm to Todd’s point was to say that we could buy at a, call it, 100 basis point debt spread over the course of that five-year period, which is consistent with the last 30 years and the kind of debt spread for high-quality assets.

If that spread compressed, it obviously would impact that, but there are other levers we have to pull. One of the unique and exciting things to David’s point to Ron’s question was we can generate pretty compelling occupancy-neutral same property growth and generate significant free cash flow relative to the enterprise. Those two pieces are pretty powerful growth drivers that lead us to, in our view, have the ability to generate better than average versus peers or the public REIT sector occupancy-neutral growth or leverage-neutral growth, kind of the genesis of your question. If spreads compressed, it could impact things, obviously, in terms of relative growth, but we have some other levers that help. The last piece is on G&A. We are still scaling our G&A load. Over the back half of the five-year business plan, we start to scale that G&A load, which is pretty impactful as well.

It’s a really complicated question. Let me know if I’m addressing it, but there are a lot of levers we have to pull. There’s no doubt that investment spread’s impactful to us as it is to other companies that are externally growing.

Ultimately, Conor, what I hear you saying is your focus is on FFO growth, not same property. The focus is on delivering double-digit FFO.

Correct.

Okay, just want to make sure.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, look, they should be correlated. Our same property growth, remember, our whole pool’s in there. There’s no redevelopment pipeline. There’s nothing that’s an ebb or a flow to growth. Of course, it’s important to us. It’s important to David’s point for us to express how powerful the organic growth profile is. For the majority of the business plan, what drives the most, the biggest proportion of FFO growth is external growth and scaling our expense load. We’re focused on it. It’s important to us. Until we are a couple of years in this business plan, we are less reliant on organic growth.

Thank you.

You’re welcome.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Floris Van Dijkum with Green Street. Your line is open.

Floris Van Dijkum, Analyst, Green Street: Hey, morning guys. Thanks for taking the call. Question on your options. I can’t actually see what % of your leasing activity this past quarter was option renewals. What is that typically, and how do you think about that going forward in terms of limiting that ability for your tenants?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Hey, good morning, Floris. I would say that in general, the option rents for large national chains that do have options are consistent with the rest of the industry, which is 10% every five. The difference is that they typically don’t have as many options as part of the original term. If a landlord does a five-year deal with a five-year option or a 10-year deal with two five-year options, by the time we buy the asset, if you look at our WALT, we’re buying into that first option or even second option. We tend to be able to capture a lot more growth than if you had five or six options, which is fairly common for a much larger store.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Yeah, and the only thing just to expand on that, Floris, the reason the question might be why your spread’s less than 10%, remember, we’re getting fixed bumps on an annual basis, which is different than, you know, an anchor tenant where you’re just flat for a significant period of time, and then you get a big pop after 20, 30, 40 years. That’s why we just go straight line rents as well. You can see we’re closer to 20% there on renewals. We’re, to David’s point, realizing some of the mark to market over the course of the lease, but then we get another bite of the apple earlier than you would from a lease that you signed and sit on for 20 years.

Floris Van Dijkum, Analyst, Green Street: Thanks. Just to, I think your peers are somewhere around 40% of all leasing activity each quarter is options. Is that something similar with your portfolio today, or is that a little bit lower already, and you expect that to trend even lower going forward?

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Floris, I don’t have the exact number off the top of my head. We do skew towards the nationals, so I bet you we’re modestly lower, but I don’t have the number available at my fingertips right now.

Floris Van Dijkum, Analyst, Green Street: Thanks, Conor. My second question, I noticed you had a couple of larger assets in your acquisitions. I think Mockingbird Central, which is like 80,000 square feet, and you had one Spring Ranch at 44,000 square feet. Could you talk maybe about the rationale behind those acquisitions and are they different assets than the rest of your portfolio?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Floris, it’s David. The size of the asset in many cases is simply to do with what someone was able to get zoned in a certain submarket. I think in general, you’re looking at assets that we typically buy that are significantly smaller. There are locations, Boca Raton is another one where we have a large asset we bought a couple of years ago. If you’re in a market that’s highly supply constrained, a lot of the local kind of running errands shop business is concentrated in certain zoned areas. You do get larger properties in some of these higher density markets. Honestly, the big difference for us is when we look at those types of properties, we’re just very careful to understand why the consumer is coming there, what their trip generation is looking like. We want properties that have very little control from larger tenants.

Even if the property is larger, it’s generally made up of smaller tenants.

Floris Van Dijkum, Analyst, Green Street: You’re not concerned that you got too much shop space that you have to lease partly because of the supply constraints?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Yeah, it’s more like if you think of, you know, a major thoroughfare through the United States, take Roosevelt Road in Chicago or think of, you know, in Phoenix, you’re kind of up and down a long thoroughfare. A lot of the supply is just strung out along a long corridor. In certain older markets where the zoning was different, instead of being linear zoning, it’s more like concentrated pocket zoning. You end up with having the same amount of inventory, but it’s just concentrated at an intersection as opposed to a long, an elongated thoroughfare.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Okay, thanks, David.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thanks, Floris.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Michael Mueller with JPMorgan. Your line is open.

Yeah, hi. I guess it’s a mix of institutional competition that you’re up against for acquisitions. Has it been changing materially over the past few quarters? For a second question, how sensitive is the competition to changes in interest rates, say, like the 10-year dipping below 4% again?

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: I’ll start with a second first. I think the competition tends to be very impacted by rates. Most of the competition that we’re bidding against are levered buyers, and that’s either small families, local investors, but it also could be private equity funds or even institutions that are using an advisor or an operator. The debt component is important. I do think that they’re more impacted than we are because we still remain to be one of the only cash buyers out there. I think on the acquisitions front, we’re able to be pretty desirable as a counterparty simply because we don’t rely on rates. As far as competition goes, there’s definitely competition in the space. These assets are well attended when they come to market. I think I said last quarter, about half of our inventory is off market.

That’s really coming through relationships where we have a chance to acquire assets before it’s broadly marketed. That is an earned position if you’ve got a reputation for abiding by your word in closing. I think the kind of pre-marketed or off-market deals are a pretty important source of inventory for us. We are seeing competition, whether it’s significantly more than a year ago. I’d hate to say that. There’s a lot of assets out there in the market. We tend to be focused on the top quartile in terms of quality. There are others that are focused on the middle or the bottom quartile. The sector does get a lot of demand, but I wouldn’t say there’s been an amazing difference in the last 12 months with competition.

Conor Fennerty, Chief Financial Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Got it. Thank you.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thanks, Mike.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. David Lukes, I’ll turn it back over to you.

David Lukes, Chief Executive Officer, Curbline Properties Corp.: Thank you all very much for joining, and we’ll talk to you next quarter.

Bailey, Conference Operator: Thank you. This does conclude today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.

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