Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Metrovacesa full year 2021 results presentation. My name is Bethany, and I'll be your operator today. If you would like to register to ask a question during the presentation, you may do so by pressing star followed by one on your telephone keypad. I will now hand the call over to Juan Carlos Calvo of Investor Relations at Metrovacesa. Juan, over to you.
Thank you. Good morning. Welcome to the Metrovacesa results presentation for the full year 2021. The slides of this presentation have been released to the market earlier this morning, and they are available through the CNMV website, as well as the company website. We have also sent it by email to our usual distribution list for analysts and investors. Just a reminder, my name is Juan Carlos Calvo. I am Director of Strategy and Investor Relations, and together with me, the main speakers today, as usual, will be our Chief Executive Officer, Jorge Pérez de Leza, and our Chief Financial Officer, Borja Tejada. At the end of the presentation, we will take questions from the audio conference call, as well as those sent online through the webcast platform. I now hand it over to our CEO, Jorge.
Thank you, Juan Carlos, and good morning, everybody, and welcome to our full year 2021 results presentation. Moving on to page five, let me go through the highlights of the year. For us, we consider it a year above expectations and a leap of change in our development activity, and hence consolidating our ramp-up period. Our residential deliveries are up 171% with 1,627 units delivered, which is on the higher part of the range that we gave as guidance last year. Also, pre-sales activity are close to 2,100 units. That's 2x what we sold in 2020. Construction starts also close to 2,100. Land sales is standing at forty...
or close to EUR 43 million, 2.7 x what we sold in 2020, and we'll touch upon that a little bit later. This results in a strong cash flow generation which is becoming more visible than ever. We exceeded our cash flow guidance for the year. We did two dividend payments in the year, EUR 121 million, which is around a 13% yield, dividend yield on current market cap. We have positive results in the year with a net profit of EUR 88.5 million. The operating cash flow that we will see later approaching EUR 180 million, and the dividend, as I mentioned, EUR 121 million, and we will talk about the future dividends as well.
I think, page number seven, the key operational data, we can jump it because it's a summary of what we will see later on. Talking about the Spanish market dynamics, I turn it over to Juan Carlos for this slide and comments.
Thank you. Just a few comments on the market dynamics. Essentially, what we see is that the demand supply outlook looks very favorable for the next few years. We see continued strong data from the demand side. We can see in the chart that the number of transactions has been rising well above pre-COVID levels, and particularly, when we look at the new homes, the new construction of new apartments, this is well above previous levels. This is way past the time when the question of whether this was pent-up demand. I think this is more underlying demand driven by a number of macro factors, low interest rates, different changes in the preferences from the buyers, et c.
So far, we continue to have to experience very good demand in the last few months and a continuation of that in recent months as well. From the supply point of view, we have seen some increase in the last few months, coming back to the pre-COVID levels, but essentially that's it. I mean, back to pre-COVID levels when demand is actually better than that. The outlook from the point of view of supply-demand, we think it looks pretty favorable for next few years. That should be translating to some positive house price appreciation. Moderate, we continue to think it will be moderate increases, more acute probably in those areas with favorable demographics.
Our view continues to be one of moderate price increases over the next few years. From the cost side, the construction costs, we have seen some increases in the last few months, in the order of 4%-5% in the recent bidding that we have contracted recently. This is mostly driven by raw material increases, but essentially absorbed by the house price appreciation. Therefore, our outlook for gross margins continues to be the same as it was before, which is the low 20s for the next few years, and that remains unchanged. For the commercial segment, we see continued improved momentum in the demand and the interest from tenants, from investors, and we expect this to be translating in a more favorable environment in 2022.
Back to Jorge.
Thank you, Juan Carlos. Now moving on with the KPIs, the operational KPIs, page nine. In terms of residential deliveries, as I mentioned before, we were at the top of the range with 1,627 units delivered, with a record delivery in the fourth quarter with 548 units. The average selling price for these units stood at EUR 290,000, a big difference compared to 2020, and turning into a revenue of EUR 472 million and a gross margin of 22.1%. Also worth mentioning is that we had 600 units ready for delivery at the year-end.
This means with the final work certificate, just pending to obtain the occupancy license, which means that we will see a strong quarter of deliveries in the first quarter of 2022. In terms of pre-sales, once again, strong growth from 2020, doubling in sales, and a total net, again, this is net pre-sales of 2,093 units. This represents a healthy absorption, but depending on how you measure it, whether it's over, you know, having in the denominator unsold plus sold units or just unsold, we are, you know, at a ratio of about 3%, which is what we measure as a healthy figure to sell, you know, a whole development in a three-year period.
Also we see a sustained and solid housing demand in build to sell, not just in the year, but also 2022 has started strong. Also visible in Costa del Sol, I think the visibility is improving. You know, assuming there are no changes in the environment this year due to the recent events, I think we should see strong sales from foreign investors. Also BTR is stronger than ever, and we'll talk about that in a second. Moving on to other KPIs of operational activity on page 11. We have a pre-sales backlog that is quite strong. It's over 3,000 units with an average selling price of EUR 280,000.
77% of that is already in contract. 78% is retail clients. Remaining party is BTR, which turns into a strong sales coverage for 2022 with more than 80% and also for 2023. Units under construction or completed is now at about 4,000 units with new construction starts at close to 2,100 units, and we obtained building permits of close to 2,300 units. Units under commercialization are now 5,000, over 5,500 units with 104 projects, and 55% of all of that is already pre-sold.
In terms of active units, we are now at 7,500 after obviously all the deliveries with new net active launches of 1,000 above 1,800 units in full year 2021. And another 2,008 units in the design phase. We will see this figure growing in the coming years. Talking about in a little bit more detail about the build-to-rent segment. We see you know solid demand from institutional investors or institutional buyers. I would say a change or a shift in the profile of these institutional investors with lower cost of capital investors such as pension funds, insurance companies, or sovereign funds coming into the market.
I would say with large equity ready for deployment. We had a recent deal of a 152 units that was signed at the end of the year with an insurance company, with construction to be completed in 4Q 2022. This was an example of one of the projects that we call BTX, in which we started construction with equity with a goal of selling it either to BTR or BTS. In this case, it turned into a BTR project. The segment BTR represents 17% of our pre-sales in 2021, in line with what we mentioned in our guidance for this segment that was to be between 15%-20%.
We have signed a lot, so overall, seven BTR projects with 726, representing 24% of our sales backlog and with diversified locations. What we were mentioning a year and a half ago in tier two cities beyond Madrid and Barcelona becoming, you know, part of the radar of these investors is obviously now a reality. With increasing interest, I would say. We will continue in 2022 with our approach to be a turnkey developer for this kind of segment. We see, as I mentioned, strong interest. Again, I think BTR should represent, you know, between 15%-20% of our pre-sales. Moving on to page 13.
This is just a little bit of a more detailed view of Palmas Altas that we consider a success case for us, that we consider relevant because it should represent what, you know, will happen in other non-fully permitted developments. Areas that we have in our portfolio once they become fully permitted. We have now, as you may remember, sorry, Isla Natura in Seville, in the southern part of the city, is a new district with over 2,000 residential units and 100% controlled by Metrovacesa, where we started the urbanization and the accesses.
We launched at the beginning of the year around five buildings with 348 units, and with the success that we experienced, we launched another six buildings towards the end of the year. 40% of what's in commercialization is already pre-sold and with, you know, healthy price increases. We are expecting to start the construction of the buildings as the organization reaches a certain threshold in the first half of 2022. This is again a good example of how we can also combine, you know, in this kind of big environments, different client segments, meaning target by age, target by amenities, target also by pricing, by types of bedrooms. Also, I think, a potential interest from BTR will come this year in this area.
Moving into the land management page 14, we are now at 82% fully permitted by GAV. Take into consideration that the way this calculation is done every year, whatever we sell as fully permitted land or delivery of units comes out of the portfolio. In the period of 2018-2021, we've you know transformed to fully permitted around 2,400 units, and we will continue to do so in the coming years. I think in a more numerous way, as you can see on the right-hand side of the slides, with some key plots with good progress expected in the coming year, 2022 and also 2023.
As examples, we are present in ARPO, in Pozuelo, Madrid, in Los Cerros in Madrid, which is an area where we have 1,600 units and due to start construction, urbanization this year. Also in Getafe, and then in Mesena in Madrid, next to Arturo Soria. Also in Barcelona, Tres Chimeneas, we're expecting to have the approval of the plan director in the coming months. Finally, La Seda La Papelera, we are moving towards, you know, approval, fully permitted approval expected at the end of 2023 or beginning of 2024. Many of these areas are similar to what we experienced in, I think, Palmas Altas, and we will be able to most probably accelerate launches as they become fully permitted.
In terms of land sales, we've seen that the demand for residential land has remained solid. We sold EUR 42.9 million, including EUR 4.3 million that are in private contract that will be notarized in during 2022. With prices very close to book value, we have a gross margin of -4% overall. Really, this represents only residential land. I think commercial land was probably, you know, I would say the, you know, less good part or what did not become as fruitful as what we would have wanted last year. However, we do expect a stronger year in 2022 with the renewed interest in the recent months from prospective investors in the commercial segment.
Not only in mixed use segments, but also in the office space as we see that slowly, you know, companies going back to the office, and new tenants or tenants looking for new space are becoming more and more conscious about what they want in terms of offices. Getting into more detail of the commercial portfolio, let me remind you that our strategy again is to add value to the existing assets, either through land sales, through turnkey, or in some cases through a JV. This year, in 2022, we will deliver Monteburgos two to one of our turnkey clients, Catalana Occidente.
We will also deliver the healthcare residence in Manresa for one of the main operators in the country. We are working and we will see some results. We will announce some results in 2022 in what we called our Proyecto Oria, which is Clesa, in which we are developing close to 89,000 sq m of buildable area, with the factory already, the Clesa factory already handed it over to the municipality and where an investor will develop in the coming years a hub for life sciences. We will develop in this area a mixed-use complex with student housing, co-living and offices.
Very, very strong interest from institutional investors for this development and, you know, we will be announcing soon some of the results from that. In terms of sustainability and ESG, on page 17, we continue with our increased focus in the three legs of the ESG with environmental, you know, becoming a part of the Green Building Council and all of our projects now being certified by this. Strongly becoming, I would say, focused on energy certificate A or B in most of our projects. In terms of the social part, well, we've adhered ourselves to the United Nations Global Compact in 2021. Also in Forética and Ciudades Sostenibles.
We have been selected again among the top 100 best companies to work in Spain, as voted by our employees. Finally, in terms of governance, the sustainability has been included as a key function, and we created within the board the S part within the remunerations committee, which is now the remunerations and sustainability committee. The ESG targets from 2022 are now incorporated in the variable compensation of the management, as well as for the rest of the workforce in the company. With that, I will finish with the operational KPIs, and I hand it over to Borja Tejada, our CFO, for the financial overview.
Thank you, Jorge, and good morning, everyone. In terms of profit and loss account, just some key figures. More than EUR 510 million, out of which residential deliveries, EUR 472 million, representing more than 3.6 x previous year. Close to EUR 40 million from land sales. In terms of gross development margin, 22.1%, exceeding our guidance of low 20s. EBITDA closed EUR 51 million, and net profit EUR 18.5 million, meaning close to EUR 40 million of recurring pre-tax profit.
Now, if we move to slide 20, in terms of cash flow for shareholders, based on our real figures, starting with the EBITDA of close EUR 51 million, we just deduct corporate financial expenses and corporate income tax, and adding cash recovered from land sales and development deliveries, assuming there is no need to replenish the land bank, we get more than EUR 176 million of gross operating cash flow, well above the initial guidance of EUR 100 million. Adjusting it with CapEx in urbanization and work in progress, cost of goods sold of deliveries ex land and changes in cash from clients, we get cash flow related to work in progress.
In order to get the variation of net debt, you just must deduct to this figure the dividend of EUR 121 million that we distributed last year. Summarizing, more than EUR 176 million of gross operating cash flow, figure used as reference for dividend calculation. Now, if we move to slide 21, concerning of our debt, net debt, very solid position of the group. 6.2% of loan to value, greater flexibility with our corporate financing, more than EUR 260 million loan refinance for 5 years with no maturities in a short-term period. 5-year bond issued in May, and continuous use of commercial paper are a very cheap source of financing for the group.
In terms of treasury, more than EUR 231 million of unrestricted treasury. Regarding our buyback, just some figures. More than EUR 21 million already invested, equivalent to 3.3 million shares, meaning 2.2% of our share capital. Finally, moving to slide 22, about asset price. 1.8% like for like, with positive increase of 2.5% in our residential uses. EUR 2.6 billion of GAV, out of which 77% represent our residential portfolio and 23% commercial one. Finally, in terms of net asset value, EUR 15.82 per share or EUR 16.61 per share ex-dividend. Now, I will hand over to Jorge with the strategy and outlook for the-
Thank you, Borja. I'm moving now to page number 24. We reaffirm our long-term strategy for the company, which in a few bullet points, we would summarize it as, first of all, to reinforce our leading position as a housing developer in Spain. Secondly, to reach an activity volume of north of 2,500 units annually. We are already, as you could see, in the 2,000 units in most of the KPIs, and now we will step it up to reach the 2,500 units. Also to have a land portfolio, of a size of around six years of residential activity. Finally, for our commercial segment, to progressively reduce our exposure in the coming years and become more focused on residential.
How we would do that is, first of all, in residential, continue with our focus on this core business for us with a drive in quality, innovation and sustainability as well. In terms of land management, our expert in-house team will ensure access to the quality land in the coming years, as we have seen in the slide about land management, with some key developments, key areas coming into a fully permitted stage in the coming years. Land sales, we will aim to optimize the portfolio through the sale of selected non-core assets in residential. Then as well in commercial, we will, as I mentioned before, maximize our portfolio with the opportunistic approach, either through land sales, through turnkey or in some cases JVs.
In the guidance for 2022, the implementation of that strategy puts us in terms of in residential development in a delivery range of 1,600-2,000 units, assuming, you know, there are no disruptions or anything like that in the construction. We are comfortable with this range for the next two years. In commercial development, we will deliver this year the office building for Catalana Occidente. In land sales, we will sign agreements of more than EUR 75 million, including here those that are notarized and private contract as well. That should give us an operating cash flow for the year 2022, north of EUR 150 million.
To finalize, I would like to again focus on our dividends, which, as you know, our key aim in these initial years of Metrovacesa. The next dividend to be paid in the second quarter of 2022, similar to last year, we stick to our policy, our payout policy, to distribute 8% of the cash flow, of the operating cash flow, generated. The figure for the second quarter of 2022 to be decided in the board meeting in March and then approved in the AGM, that would, you know, normally take place in April, as last year. This amount will be at least EUR 60 million, like we paid in December, 0.4 EUR per share.
The distributions in 2021, just a reminder, have been in total close to EUR 0.8 per share or representing a dividend yield of 13%. With that, I finish the presentation.
Yes. We take the floor back to the operator to see if there are any questions from the conference call, please.
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. That is star one. If you change your mind, you can press star two. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure you are unmuted locally. The first question comes from Fernando Abril at Alantra. Fernando, please go ahead.
Hi, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. I have three, please, if I may. First is with regard to the update you have provided with the non-permitted land, specifically with the residential units. You are expecting roughly 20%-25% of your full portfolio of non-permitted land to be permitted by the end of 2023, roughly 25%, more or less. What is the percentage of your GAV? Because I've seen that all residential non-permitted land amounts to EUR 450 million GAV. I would like to know these units that are expected to be permitted in two years, what is the percentage that they represent? Second question is with regard to your guidance of land sales.
I don't know if you can give us more color, what is the mix between residential and commercial. Then also, if you are exploring selling minority stakes in some of your commercial projects. Last is with regards launches. What is the volume of launches you expect for 2022, so we can see where the delivery range guidance could be more longer term. Thank you.
Yes, Fernando. Jorge speaking here. Going through your third questions. On the first one, regarding the non-fully permitted land and how much of that will be transformed by the end of 2023, I think 25% would mean that roughly all of the land is transformed, that is now non-fully permitted, will be transformed into fully permitted. And I think that would be too aggressive. It's not what we said. I think around half of that will probably be transformed. What that represents in number of units, I don't have the figure right now here on top of my head. I would say let's hold on to that, and we can come back later to you.
Definitely, I would say north of 6,000 units by 2023. On your second question, which is land sales and the mix between resi and commercial, I would say, you know, we're not getting to that detail. I mean, I think the goal is to be over EUR 75 million. Commercial normally has, you know, is a little bit more binary, meaning that if we sell one big plot of land then it becomes, you know, the figure can go much higher. And...
I don't want to be too specific about that because our strategy in land for commercial land can be either the land, direct land sales or in some cases to maximize the value and to maximize the return we may do a turnkey. Okay. You know, we consider that figure EUR 75 million to be you know a figure that we are comfortable with in combined. And the way we get there at the end, it shouldn't be you know something that affects our cash flow for the year, which is our main goal. In terms of what you mentioned about selling the minority stakes in the projects, I'm not sure about what you mean there.
The project that we have in terms of you know a minority stake would be the JV with Tishman Speyer for our project in Las Tablas. There as you know first phase is completed, and we are right now under full leasing effort. As compared to last year, I think you know not only the interest visits have increased, but also we have a few offers out there in the market. I think this year we will see the building becoming open and operational. We're not planning to sell our 24% stake in that JV.
Clesa is 100% owned by us, and I think in Clesa, as I mentioned before, I cannot get into too much specifics right now. Throughout the year you will see, you know, how several initiatives being signed and in order to put that project into adding value for the company. Then coming to your third question, in terms of number of launches, we will in both 2022 and 2023, we will be getting closer, if not there, to the figure of 2,500. Because if you want to reach 2,500, that was our, you know, midterm goal in three years, we need to start getting close to that figure.
Between 2,100 and 2,500, you know, at the end it will, I think, if the year 2022 is as good as 2021 and no disruptions are seen, you know, due to the recent events, we should be close to 2,500.
Okay. Thank you, Jorge. Just one quick follow-up on the land sales again. Wanting to know how has it gone, 2021 in residential land sales compared to your initial targets? Because you almost complete your EUR 50 million guidance with only residentials, but I was wondering what was your initial expectations.
Yes, Fernando, it has gone better or much better than expected, I would say. You know, 'cause really we didn't sell any commercial. If we had sold, you know, one of the big tickets commercial, then we would have definitely been above EUR 50 million. That is something that could happen in 2022 as well, you know, if you sell one of the big ticket ones. But that's coming back to 2021, what we have seen is all that figure being sold is with land plots in resi that are non-strategic for us either because they are in regions where we don't want to develop or small projects below 20 units or something like that. The figure has been better than we expected.
Also, what you can see in the gross margin of -4% is that, you know, if we have an opportunity, we are not going to not sell a plot of land because it has a slightly negative margin. That's not the goal. I mean, if it was, so again, going into 2022, if we do sell one commercial plot of land that is big, that figure could increase. I'm not saying no.
Also what we see right now, and I think that has an impact on the figure that we offer as or that we present as operating cash flow target, is that what we see for big land plots and especially in commercial, is that you can sign something, but it cannot be 100% that you will collect full payment of that in the year. Meaning, you know, if we sign a private contract with obviously a meaningful prepayment, it is something that you will not see on the P&L of 2022. You will not see the full cash flow on the 2022, but you will see it in the two years now. That's why we are a little bit more ambiguous in there in that figure.
I think private agreements we will sign this year.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much for the answers.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Florent Laroche-Joubert from ODDO BHF. Florent, please go ahead.
Hello. Thank you very much for the presentation. I would have two questions, if I may. First question. Could you please maybe give us some visibility on the percentage of units pre-sold for your 2023 deliveries. My second question would be on your recurring margin. I understand that it is 11%. I understand that maybe your recurring margin is maybe lower than some of your peers. Have we any chance to see some convergence with your peers regarding your margin? My third question would be on the commercial exposure. I understand that one of your strategic pillar is to reduce this exposure.
How many years can it take, actually? Thank you.
Yes. Hello, Florent. Good morning, and thanks for your question. I think in regards to our deliveries for 2022, I mentioned that, you know, we are above 80%. In 2023, I would say a healthy figure of a little bit more than 60%. 60%, six-zero. In terms of your gross margins, you know, we've always guided towards lower 20s, and I would say we stick to that figure. They can vary slightly upwards or downwards depending on the mix that we are delivering. If we are delivering more, you know, higher margin projects like Costa del Sol, then it will be a little bit higher. And if not, you know, closer to 20%.
Between 20%-23%, that's our ballpark figure. Can that get better? That was your second part. Well, I think we are experiencing HPA in the higher margin projects because they're normally in the best areas where affordability is less of an issue. But also we have, let's say, construction costs threatening us in a way. And when I say threaten, it's a light threatening experience that we've had in the last year. And I think we feel more comfortable saying that we will maintain the margins and that the HPA will offset the construction costs that may appear.
I think that, you know, we will see, comparing to our peers, we will see, you know, in subsequent years when the land that has been purchased more recently, I think we will see, you know, a convergence in the margins of all the industry. Finally, your third question around commercial exposure. I think, you know, our goal is to reduce that in four to five years.
Okay. Thank you.
Another reminder to press star one if you would like to ask a question. The next question comes from Ignacio Romero at Sabadell. Ignacio, please go ahead.
Good morning. I have a question regarding the guidance for cash flow this year on page 25. Jorge, you mentioned before that part of the. I wanted to know the moving parts of the figure, because according to my numbers, just with the deliveries, you should reach EUR 150 million. There's also the asset that you are delivering in the office building, and you also have the land sales. You mentioned before that part of the question here might be that not all the. You are not going to collect all the money of the sale of the land. But I'm. Please, if you could tell us what the moving parts are here, I'd.
That would be appreciated.
Yes. Hi. Good morning. Yes. This figure is, you know, you should take it as going, you know, in the different moving parts in the lower range. You know, if you take 1,600 units deliveries at EUR 280,000 and then multiply that by 30%, which is normally the cash flow that we extracted of each delivery, you would be, you know, in a figure around EUR 130 million. You add on top of that the net from the commercial building that we are delivering. We are assuming, and that's where the upside is, you know, that most of the land sales are, let's say, deferred in payment.
Which has not been the case in residential in 2021, by the way, because we signed EUR 42.9 million in total, but we cashed in EUR 38 million out of that, no? Let's, you know, our focus is, I think, in our strategy to sell the land, non-strategic land in residential and to sell commercial land. If that means that we. The market right now is expecting or is asking, especially in the big-ticket land, negotiating more on payment rather than on price.
You know, we don't want to be prey to saying, "Look, we're signing EUR 100 million and we are collecting EUR 100 million, and therefore the cash flow should be much higher than EUR 150 million." I think if everything goes well and we are, you know, in the mid-range of all the things, we will, you know, like this year, be above that guidance. We prefer to be, you know, to continue building our credibility, which I think, you know, is something that we've been very focused on in the last four or five quarters. I think 2020 for us was a year that, as you may recall, not a very good year, where basically our credibility was destroyed and we just want to continue. This is an effort of quarter by quarter.
What we will do is, you know, we will follow these KPIs every quarter, and then, you know, hopefully by mid-year we will see whether we are, you know, close to 150 or better than that.
Okay. Very clear. Thank you. Regarding the land sales, I don't know if you've mentioned this before, but could you please give us the breakdown between commercial land and residential land that you are planning in those EUR 75 million?
Yes. Hi, Nacho. I think that question was asked before, and to be honest, I wasn't specific. I just said that, you know, we feel comfortable with 75, and that, you know, will impact the cash flow, which is what, you know, we care about for our investors. Whether it comes from one segment or the other, it shouldn't be that meaningful.
Okay. Thank you.
We have no further questions, so I'll hand the call back to the team to conclude.
Well, actually, not conclude because we have quite a few questions from the webcast. So starting with the first one, we have a question from Mariano Miguel, analyst, Banco Santander. Good morning. Thanks for your presentation. We have three questions. On the cash flow guidance, EUR 150 million looks a little bit low looking at 2021 performance. Could you please elaborate a little bit on this? Although possibly this one has been addressed, I think. About the EUR 75 million land sales target, split of residential and commercial, I think we have already addressed. Land CapEx stood at EUR 20 million in 2021, which looks a little bit low. Could you expect an important increase here going forward? Thanks.
Another follow-up from the same analyst is, can you give some color on the situation with contractors and your expectation about construction cost inflation in the year 2022?
I will go to the third and fourth questions, as the first two ones I think were already answered. On the land topics, the EUR 20 million in 2021, I think that figure in 2022 should be between EUR 70 million and EUR 100 million. And then regarding your fourth question, which is about construction costs and how we see that in the market. I think in 2021 we have had, you know, a construction cost increase that could be between 5% and 10%, you know, depending on the project. Keep in mind also that, you know, I think this is similar to what I've been seeing with our competition.
Keep in mind also that in 2021 we did have a new technical code coming into place, which represents a cost increase on a like-for-like basis anyway for a similar project in the previous year. Around 5%-10%. In the recent, let's say, tenders that, you know, different rounds of tenders that we've been receiving in the last weeks or at the beginning of the year, we do not see any, you know, any big increases or anything that is not similar to what we had experienced last year.
I think a little bit of the feedback that we were getting from the construction companies is that some of the materials, which is the source of construction cost increase so far, were already stabilized. Obviously now we have one new event, which is, you know, the recent events in Ukraine, et c. What that will mean in terms of construction costs, we have no idea. So far, something as I mentioned before, that does not affect our gross margins because we are definitely having HPA to cover that.
Okay. Thank you. Next question from another analyst, Ignacio Domínguez from JB Capital. First one I think has been addressed already about construction costs. Secondly, about guidance for development gross margin in the year 2022. Will it remain roughly at 22% since last year or not?
Well, I think that one has been addressed as well a couple of times. I think lower twenties, you know, let's say between 20%-23%, and we will see at the end, depending on the mix that we will deliver our projects on. All our projects are in that kind of range.
Okay. Next question from an investor. How is the pre-sales going in the beginning of 2022? Particularly, how is demand from foreigners in Costa del Sol?
We have data obviously for two months, very strong. You know, a healthy increase compared to 2021. Actually part of that as well is coming from the second part of the question, which is investors, buyers in Costa del Sol. I think generally January and February are not great months for Costa del Sol. Seasonality, you know, means that these buyers start coming more like in March, Easter, around Easter time. We have seen a good performance of our projects in Costa del Sol in January and February.
Our feeling is that, I think as Juan Carlos mentioned at the beginning, we are, you know, benefiting from this good or let's say good balance for developers of supply-demand, and the sales are reflecting that with a stronger performance than last year.
Okay. Next question is from an investor. He is asking about the surprising performance in the last two years after the pandemic. The performance has been negative over that period. How do you explain this performance, and what is the action plan? Are you purchasing more shares more aggressively?
I think you have to look at the share performance as well as dividend payment, because I think both, you know, both are remuneration for the shareholders. If I take, let's take 2020 and 2021, like the question is addressing. If we take into consideration those two things, I think Metrovacesa would be +20%. Our competitors, without giving names, I think, like, +12% and +24%. We're not that bad off. If we look at 2021, which is, as I mentioned before, 2020 for us was a year that was not that great. In 2021, our ramp up was, you know, consolidating, as we have seen.
Taking into consideration dividend plus share performance, we are at 31% compared to 22%, and 1%, +1% for those years.
Okay. We have two questions from the analyst of Deutsche Bank, Thomas. Are you also experiencing slower building permitting from the municipalities? In other words, is permitting a bottleneck for more sales? Can you provide an update on new residential regulation in Spain?
Permitting, I mean, I would say that no change to what we saw in 2021. I mean, I think the pandemic did mean a slowdown because, you know, 100% of the administrative workforce of the municipalities went to work from home, and in some cases they didn't have the tools and the means to work effectively. That was in most cases addressed and we are at around nine months in average to obtain a license, which is what we consider in our building, sorry, in our business plan as the standard case. We have a huge variance. I mean, in some municipalities it could take three months and in a very extraordinary cases, so only a few projects, you take three years.
I think nine months and nothing that would say, you know, that has gotten much worse than what we had post-pandemic. The second question was
Yes. Comments about the residential regulation in Spain.
Sorry, the residential regulations. I think, I mean, there's nothing new that we haven't seen in the last quarter or in the quarter before that. I think you know, the kind of the new law, which is still quite vague in my opinion, and needs you know, to be more detailed in terms of implementation. It is what we have discussed in previous quarters. You know, it has on the one hand you know, some limitations in the rental business. On the other hand, some implications on the development business. On the rental business, we will see you know, how again, how is that implemented at the national level and at the regional level.
What we see so far is that the interest from investors and from, you know, BTR institutional buyers is strong and has not gotten any weaker. In fact, I would say higher. With the change of mix of these institutional investors being, you know, pension funds and insurance companies, etc. , that I think have lower cost of capital and a longer term view. This is not a key firm, you know, wanting to flip around the assets in two, three years or something. That long term view, I think, is less worried about the implications of the rental limitations that will be finally implemented.
On the development side, you know, the main implications there could be the percentage of social housing that is implemented in new developments. In all the developments we're now not fully permitted. We are above that figure. I think, you know, an example is Los Cerros in Madrid. Social housing is close to 50%, so we are above that. In the Tres Chimeneas in Barcelona, the initial plan that was approved is with 40% social housing, which is in line with that. Nothing that should have a meaningful impact.
Okay. From the same analyst, he's asking whether an increase in interest rates or mortgage rates is already having any impact on sales momentum.
No. The reality is that no. Also keep in mind that somebody buying now, not a finished product for delivery, but buying off-plan, you know, is thinking about getting a mortgage a year and a half or two years from now. There is the sentiment that, yes, the interest rates will go up, but I think, you know, if they go up and your fixed mortgage, instead of being 0.8%, 0.9%, is 1.5%, that will not affect the decision of buying your first home.
Okay. Another question from the analyst of JB Capital. Just to confirm, is the company long-term target to reach a run rate of 2,400 deliveries?
That's the medium-term target, and it can be revised as we move forward and the non-fully permitted land becomes fully permitted.
Okay. We have another question from an investor regarding the timing of the dividend. Do you expect a similar sequence as last year? That is to say, do you expect to pay a first dividend based on the cash flow and of the year before, and again, a second dividend if the cash flow clearly comes in higher?
Well, I think we will operate the same as in 2021. First of all, you know, in the after the shareholders meeting in April, we will have a dividend payment that will be based on the cash flow of 2021. As I mentioned, at least EUR 60 million, to be decided the final figure on the March board. Then towards the second half of the year, we will do the same as we did in 2021. We will see where we are at cash flow generation, what is the forecast for the end of the year. You know, the goal is to have a second dividend payment in November, December.
Okay. This is all from the webcast side. From the conference call, any follow-up questions?
There are no more questions on the conference call.
Okay. I think if that's the case, I think we can close the conference call and the webcast at this point. We thank you all for participating in the conference call and the webcast. Obviously the team, or the investor relations team, will be available for any questions that you may have during the rest of the day and the next few days and weeks. We expect to see you again next quarter. Thank you. Goodbye.
Thank you.
Thank you.
This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for joining. You may now disconnect your line.