Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining our Q1 2023 earnings call. Our CEO, Kruno Crepulja, and our CFO, Foruhar Madjlessi, will walk you through our presentation and give you an update on our current business performance, including our outlook for 2023. As usual, this will be followed by Q&A session. With this, I would like to hand over directly to Kruno.
Good morning, everyone. I'm glad you could join. In an overall tough environment, we achieved solid results with still high margins on the basis of a strong balance sheet. If we look at the business development in the first quarter, we must certainly note that sales were generally very sluggish in the first two months in particular. Since then, we have seen a moderate recovery, but it certainly still seems too early to speak of a clear and sustainable trend reversal. With a high degree of uncertainty, the market is still in the process of adapting to the new interest rate environment, with buyers still hoping for bargains. Institutional investors are more or less still in a wait and see mode. Against this backdrop, we are pleased that we were able to sign an attractive institutional deal in a special situation.
We successfully sold a sub-project of our Bamberg project consisting of rent-restricted apartments without any price concessions. With a low visibility on the timeline, we do not expect a notable recovery prior to the start of 2024. On the supply side, we are observing receding material cost inflation. Our negotiation power is currently improving steadily and therefore we are currently feeling very comfortable with our cost budgeting. Given the current still low visibility on the demand side, we have increased our focus on costs and cash preservation. Accordingly, we are reluctant to enter into new investments and are working continuously on our platform costs. The cornerstone of our business model is our pioneering role in ESG. We are very pleased that we have once again achieved the top ESG rating.
In the update yesterday, Sustainalytics ranks us among the top 3% of real estate developers globally with a further improved score. Let's now take a brief look at our financial KPIs for the first quarter of 2023. Our adjusted revenues amounted to EUR 123.5 million, slightly above previous year's level and in line with our budget. Our gross margin stayed at a very high level of 27.4%. This clearly reflects an industry-leading profitability, but we expect a somewhat lower margin for the entire financial year. Due to a reduced margin from the cyclical peak and also due to a slightly higher tax rate, our adjusted earnings after tax dropped slightly to some EUR 8.5 million. Overall, the released figures show us on track to meet our financial targets for the full year 2023.
Accordingly, we reiterate our forecast and we expect adjusted revenues of EUR 600 million-EUR 700 million. An almost stable adjusted gross margin of around 25% and adjusted earnings after tax of EUR 40 million-EUR 50 million. Moving to Slide five in our presentation. As usual, we provide high transparency regarding the recent development of our retail customer business. In our last call, we already flagged that we had a very quiet start to the year following good year-end business. Also, due to full forward effects in Q4, sales in January and February were extremely low. Since March, however, we have been experiencing a moderate upturn again, even so it is still too early to speak of sustainable trend reversal here. The sales ratio is still well below the long-term mean.
In this context, it is also important to note that we have retained from reducing headline prices so far. The early indicators, such as reservation rates, are pointing in the right direction, but it's also fair to point out that cancellation rates, also due to stricter lending policies, are above the average historic levels. The informative value is somewhat limited at present. The entire sales and decision-making process, also on the part of the mortgage banks, simply is taking longer at present. This is also weighing on the overall sales speed in the current environment. The positive message, despite all the limitations, is that there are still high indications of interest from our clients. The underlying demand is definitely there, also from institutional investors. This is also confirmed by the successful sale of a sub-project in Bamberg to an institutional investor.
Should also be emphasized that our price expectations in this deal have clearly been met. We also do not want to create too much short-term optimism. Investment markets are still frozen, and we clearly believe it will take some time before we can expect a stronger recovery, and the visibility on timeline remains low for the time being. It is becoming increasingly unlikely that we can still expect a significant recovery in 2023. On the following slide six, we provide an overview of relevant macro indicators. We all know that the war in Ukraine, the sharp rise in inflation and interest rates, was a game changer. Nevertheless, the data points that can be taken from the market research show that prices for new builds have held up quite well so far, and this is also consistent with our assessment.
Overall market prices came down a bit during the first quarter, new builds still show a significant outperformance versus the broader market. The rising importance of energy efficiency also translating in a superior rental growth is clearly a key driver for this. On the right-hand side of this slide, we show the supply side with the development of the construction price inflation. The recently published data from February show a slightly receding inflation from very high levels. We have factored in a mid-single digit CPI growth also for 2023. Despite quarterly CPI growth of more than 2% in Q1, so far, our awards have been in line or below our budget, and we are observing that our negotiation power vis-a-vis our suppliers is currently improving steadily. Given that, the order books are evaporating. Over to page seven.
When we talk about the further market and price development, we would like to draw your attention once again to a chart that we already presented in our last earnings call. The market is currently still in the process of price discovery following the sharp rise in interest rates. Transaction markets are illiquid and overall transparency is very low. There are clearly counterbalancing effects for the price development. Rising yield requirements are offset by accelerated rental growth. The latter is due to the increasing scarcity of rental apartments, which is reinforced by the decline in new construction. There is tremendous pressure in the letting markets in the metropolitan areas. It is becoming increasingly evident to all market participants that accelerated rental growth is materializing and that new builds with their superior energy efficiency are the main beneficiary.
The graph on the right-hand side clearly underpins the positive trend dynamic for new build properties. With an average rent growth in the top cities of more than 5% in the first quarter. In its analysis, the market platform, ImmoScout24, for example, even arrived at significantly higher growth rates. Due to the high demand situation, negotiate inflation-linked rental contracts. This clearly contributes to higher growth rates in the current environment, also in the existing leases and not only in new leases. As a result, we are still feeling comfortable with our base case scenario for the expected price development. As a reminder, we assume that market rents for new builds will grow by some 10%-12% over a two-year period, which is relevant for forward yield transactions.
We can imagine that yields will go up from slightly above 3% to maybe some 3.7% to 3.8% an expected price correction of some 5%-8% for the institutional market. Moving on to slide eight. Instone is ideally positioned not only to weather the current market downturn, but also to emerge from it as a clear winner in the medium term. Instone can build on its key strengths, but such as a strong balance sheet, industry-leading margins, and a high pre-sales ratio, which provides high visibility with regard to further cash flow and revenue development. On this chart, we illustrate that projects worth EUR 3.2 billion are currently under construction, thereof some EUR 2.8 billion or 90% have already been sold.
The total value of sold projects, including projects in the pre-construction phase, amounts to EUR 3 billion. This forms a stable source of future revenues of more than EUR 1 billion, which have not yet been recognized. With that, I would like to hand over to Foruhar for the financials.
Thank you, Kruno, good morning, everyone, from my side. Let me take you through the numbers in a bit more detail, starting with page 10. As Kruno has explained, we have achieved Q1 results in line with our expectation against a challenging market backdrop. Our Q1 sales volume of EUR 53 million is primarily driven by a mid-sized institutional sale of social housing units in Bamberg, as well as sales price increases from previously agreed indexed sales contracts with institutions. New retail sales contracts amounted to around EUR 6 million, reflecting muted demand as affordability has been heavily impacted by rising interest rates, and many more affluent buyers remain in a wait and see mode. Revenues of EUR 123 million are in line with our expectations.
As we had explained for some time, we continue to benefit from pre-sales amounting to EUR 3 billion, and revenues are driven primarily by construction progress of these pre-sold properties. Cumulative outstanding revenues from our pre-sold properties amount to EUR 1.1 billion. We continue to achieve attractive margins underpinning the quality of our projects as well as our ability to manage construction costs. Our Q1 gross margin of 27% is certainly market leading in the current environment. Please note that our full year guidance for the gross margin remains at around 25% as previously communicated. Kruno has already alluded to our continued focus on G&A costs.
We continue to expect approximately EUR 80 million of platform costs for the full year 2023, while we are working to achieve annualized run rate platform costs by the end of this year, that should be approximately at EUR 70 million. More details of our cost containment plan will be presented later in the year. Over to page 11. While our financial debt has slightly decreased, we have consumed approximately EUR 100 million in cash over the quarter. This is in line with our expectations as the massive cash position at Q4 last year had benefited from a number of milestone payments that were originally only expected to be due to us in Q1 of this year, and hence Q1 operating cash flow has been negative. However, with 25.6%, our Loan-to-Cost remains at a moderate level.
Clearly, with EBITDA now structurally at a lower level, our Net Debt to EBITDA ratio becomes a bit more volatile. Those metrics can be expected to stay around the current levels, but should be coming down slightly by year-end as we expect Q4 to be our strongest quarter in terms of cash flow generation. Turning to the next page. As just explained, operating cash flow for the quarter has been negative. This is in line with our expectation. We continue to expect a positive free cash flow in the mid-double digit EUR million region for the full year, with cash inflows geared to Q4. Also, considering the current environment and expectation for this to continue into 2024 before we expect to see the start of a recovery in institutional and retail demand, we will continue to focus on cash preservation until we see market stabilization.
Specifically, we will focus on working on our existing EUR 7.6 billion pipeline rather than investing in new land purchases. Our liquidity position remains extremely strong. Of our EUR 170 million of revolving credit facilities, we have just successfully extended the UniCredit that syndicated RCF, including also Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse and others until May 2025. Between our cash position and the undrawn revolving credit facilities, we have EUR 330 million of liquidity available. In addition, we have contractually secured undrawn project financing lines of EUR 340 million. It is worth noting here that we remain one of only a few developers with continued access to secured project financings. We have successfully completed three project financings since the start of the year to finance the construction phase of existing projects.
We expect our access to corporate funding and project funding will be yet another competitive advantage for Instone versus many other players. Moving to page 13. Our maturity profile shows no major debt maturities prior to August 2025. We will continue to work on new financings with a focus to further improving the distribution of our debt maturities and in order to prove to the market our continued access to liquidity. Turning to page 14. We reiterate our 2023 financial outlook, which we consider to be particularly robust in respect to our P&L targets, as revenues are primarily driven by construction progress from existing projects. Our visibility beyond 2023 remains limited. However, at this stage, we cannot reasonably expect 2024 revenues and earnings to exceed our 2023 guidance.
The overall market is unlikely, in our view, to provide for any notable recovery prior to H1 of 2024. Hence, revenue and earnings potential for next year limited. We will provide further guidance regarding margins and costs at a later stage. On a very quick personal note, this will be my last Instone earnings call. The decision to leave is really driven by personal considerations. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with Instone and will continue with full dedication until the end of my term on July 31st. I feel good about the company's financial strength in these demanding times, as well as the choice of my successor, David Dreyfus, given his track record and previous involvement with the company. With that, I'd like to open the call for questions.
Ladies and gentlemen, at this time we will begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star followed by one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star followed by two. If you're using speaker equipment today, please lift the handset before making your selections. Anyone who has a question may press star followed by one at this time. One moment for the first question, please. The first question is from the line of Thomas Rothäusler with Deutsche Bank.
Hi. Morning. Actually, two questions. The first one is on this Vonovia deal we've seen, I think last week, EUR 600 million institutional deal at 3.9% yield, which was sold to CBRE. As I understand, CBRE is planning to invest another EUR 1 billion. Maybe it would be helpful to get your view on the deal. I mean, I would say if you would have done the deal, I assume you would have to increase your guidance quite significantly. Especially the 3.9% yield. Roughly speaking, the 4% yield? Is it a threshold where you see demand from institutional investors? What is the yield level actually you are targeting currently? I think you referred to 3.6%-3.8% yield in your calculation.
That's the first question.
Thank you, Thomas. I think it's overall a positive signal that CBRE is starting to buy the first big portfolio. I can't comment on details of the deal because I have no transparency here. Your question regarding the yield levels. I think the 3.6%-3.8% we are targeting is not so far away from the 3.9%. From my perspective, and that's what we are seeing in the market, that there is investor appetite, but the biggest part of the market is still on the wait and see mode. We will start the sales activities when there is competition in the market.
We are pretty sure that the level of 3.6%-3.8% will be achievable.
The second question is actually on balance sheet. I mean, we saw LTC then up to 25% now, Net Debt EBITDA close to four times. I mean, up to what level would you regard your balance sheet as robust as you say?
Thomas, I think, certainly with these figures we are completely satisfied and happy. I think there is significant headroom for the figures to go up, even though we're not expecting them to go tremendously further up to the contrary. As I said, I think by year end, given our positive cash flow generation, we're expecting slightly improved figures versus the Q1 situation. There's no strict limit that we see or would
There's also absolutely no concern with these figures. At 25% LTC, I think we are in a very, very strong financial position. I also think that in the current environment, liquidity is almost more important than leverage.
Mm.
Okay. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone. Please do that now. We wait some seconds for any further questions. The next question is from the line of Philipp Kaiser with Warburg Research. Your question please.
Yeah. Hello, and thanks for the presentation and congrats to the sound start to the year. Just one follow-up question. You also mentioned it during the call. Could you elaborate a bit more on the cash outflow of roughly EUR 100 million you mentioned already in the presentation on page 11? That would be helpful.
Yeah, sure. The cash outflow I'd say is mostly related to our construction activities. You have to bear in mind that if you look back throughout the quarters of last year, our cash position has always been around EUR 150 million-EUR 160 million. We had a number of milestone payments that we, as I said in my script, received a bit earlier. We were not expecting them to enter our balance sheet prior to year-end that have driven up the cash balance and therefore, you know, for Q1, the milestone payments were a bit less than let's say in a normal quarter.
These payments tend to accumulate in Q4 also again this year. Nothing spectacular and not a trend in any way. We will stay at current leverage levels for the next few quarters and in Q4 we will probably improve from where we stand today.
Okay. Thanks a lot. Very helpful. Although for my side.