Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Nexus Industrial REIT first quarter 2025 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in a listen-only mode, and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To join the question queue, you may press star, then one on a telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star and then zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Kelly Hanczyk, Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.
Thank you. I'd like to welcome everyone to the 2025 First Quarter Results Conference Call for Nexus Industrial REIT. Joining me today is Mike Rawle, Chief Financial Officer of the REIT. Before we begin, I'd like to caution with regard to forward-looking statements and non-GAAP measures. Certain statements made during this conference call may constitute forward-looking statements which reflect the REIT's current expectations and projections about future results. Also, during this call, we'll be discussing non-GAAP measures. Please refer to our MD&A and the REIT's other securities filings, which can be found on our website and at sedar.com, for cautions regarding forward-looking information and for information about non-GAAP measures. This quarter, we closed on the sale of 15 of our 16 retail properties. This marks the completion of our strategic repositioning to make Nexus the only Canada-focused pure-play industrial REIT. This transition has been several years in the making.
First, we invested to improve our business. Our goal was to high-grade and optimize our portfolio, taking advantage of an uncertain economic backdrop and weaker real estate market to acquire and develop high-quality assets. Next, we focused our portfolio by selling our legacy office and retail assets, making Nexus a pure-play industrial REIT. Today, our NOI is now over 99% industrial on a pro forma basis. We have used the sale proceeds to strengthen our balance sheet and to construct three development properties and to advance two more. Thirdly, we delivered operationally, driving robust industrial same-property NOI growth through a combination of proactive leasing, realization of mark-to-market, lift-on renewals, and annual rent steps that are embedded into our leases. We'll dive into our Q1 details and our actions in a minute.
However, before I do, I would like to address the recent tariff-induced economic turmoil in Nexus' positioning in this uncertain environment. Overall, the tariff war is clearly negative for the [audio distortion] sector. There is no denying that. However, so far, our operations have performed very well. Despite the economic turbulence, our industrial occupancy increased in the first quarter to 97%, and we maintained momentum with our renewals by completing three exceptional leases which I'll expand on later. We also made headway with pre-leasing at our Calgary Small Bay development, which is exceeding our expectations. Structurally, we are well-positioned to weather the tariff-induced turmoil. Only about 6% of our NOI is related to the auto manufacturing supply chain. In fact, approximately 85% of our NOI is derived from tenants who are Canadian distribution and third-party logistics.
Our leases have a relatively long WALT of seven years, which reduces renewal risk, and our leases are on average 20% below market rates, which gives us pricing flexibility on renewal. Our portfolio is well-diversified across Canada, and we have strong tenant relationships, as evidenced by frequency of our tenant upsizings and development partnerships. Turning to our recent dispositions, as I mentioned, we closed on the sale of our 50% ownership stake in 15 of our 16 retail properties this quarter for a total of CAD 47 million, representing a 6.8% cap rate on in-place rents. Net of our share of the mortgages of CAD 32 million in transaction fees, we received proceeds of CAD 15 million. We used the proceeds to reduce our debt and also to fund our two in-process development projects.
Following the sale, apart from our industrial portfolio, we are left with one 50% owned retail property, which is Les Halles d’Anjou , and two 50% owned office properties. At d’Anjou, we have severed a portion of land and now have the land under contract for sale, which we expect will close in July for CAD 6 million and a vendor take-back of CAD 3 million. The mall is an attractive asset that cash flows well for us. However, we receive a lot of unsolicited interest, so I expect that it will sell relatively quickly, and I expect our joint venture partner in the project likely to buy out our share at or above our current sharing value. This would leave us with approximately 50% ownership in two office properties, one in Montreal where we have our Montreal office and one in Gatineau.
Given their low value and the nature of partnership agreements, I expect that selling them will be a longer-term project. During the quarter, we advanced our two in-flight development projects at Dennis Road and St. Thomas. We are completing a 325,000 sq ft expansion for an existing tenant. We have now spent CAD 49 million of the estimated CAD 55 million total cost. The tenant pays us 7.8% interest on the development cost, encouraging the construction phase, so there is no financing drag on our cash flow. Upon completion, which we now expect will be in the third quarter, the tenant will pay us rent equal to a 9% unlevered yield on the total development cost. At 102 Avenue in Southeast Calgary, we are developing a new 115,000 sq ft Small Bay industrial building on vacant land that we currently hold.
We have spent approximately CAD 11 million of the CAD 15 million project cost. We expect the project to also be completed in the third quarter and to deliver an approximately 11% unlevered return. The building will consist of nine units, which we started marketing to prospective tenants at the beginning of the quarter. So far, I'm very pleased with the high level of interest, and we have already signed conditional leases for seven of the nine units. We are still looking for a tenant for our 115,000 sq ft project in Glover Road in Hamilton, which we completed last summer. We own 80% of the property and expect to earn a 5.9% going-in yield on our CAD 25 million share of the development cost.
It has been a challenging market in Hamilton, but we have a brand new state-of-the-art 40-foot clear LEED certified product, and I'm optimistic that it'll be leased this year. Subsequent to quarter end, we closed on the purchase of land surrounding our industrial building at 555 Adams Road in Kelowna, BC, for CAD 18.9 million, composed of CAD 12 million in cash, and our vacant industrial building in Fort St. John, BC, which was a problem for us. Beginning in July, we will invest CAD 6 million over 12 months to build Small Bay industrial condominiums on the site, which we will sell as we go along and fund further development on that project. Due to the demand for more space and parking from our tenant at Richmond, BC, property, we'll add an additional 51,000 sq ft for an estimated cost of CAD 29 million.
This cost will be paid in REIT units issued at $10.50 per unit. The REIT will earn 6% on the cost during the construction period and will earn a contractual 6% yield upon completion. Construction is scheduled to begin in the third quarter. Turning to operating performance, our operations continue to perform very well. In the first quarter, the net operating income of our industrial portfolio improved $1 million, or 3.4%, compared to last quarter. This was in part due to an improved industrial occupancy ratio, which rose to 97% in the quarter. Compared to a year ago, our total net operating income was up $2.6 million, or 8.6%, to $32.1 million. This increase was largely driven by three factors: acquisitions, organic growth, and development. New properties that we acquired in the last year contributed $1.1 million to the NOI.
Same property NOI increased by CAD 1.6 million, driven by 6.6% growth in industrial same property NOI from the lease up of our Richmond, BC property, as well as mark-to-market lift on renewals and embedded rent steps in our leases. Our recent developments at Titan Park in Regina and Huby Road in London contributed CAD 1.6 million in the quarter. Looking forward to the remainder of 2025, we have already renewed over 80%, or 1.4 million sq ft, of GLA that was set to expire this year. The growth on expiring rents for these renewals is 30%, representing CAD 3.5 million of additional NOI. This includes three value-added renewals that combined will contribute CAD 2.6 million of additional NOI in 2025 and CAD 2.9 million in 2026, and increasing thereafter. The first of these renewals occurred at our 265,000 sq ft industrial building at Robins Hills Road in London.
Here, we completed an early blend-and-expand with the existing tenant for a free release, resulting in a rent increase from CAD 4.35 net per sq ft to CAD 12.50 per sq ft net. The agreement was backdated to January 1 of this year, so we are receiving a full year of benefit in 2025. The agreement has 7% annual rent escalation in 2026 and 2027. At our 293,000 sq ft industrial building on Riverview Drive in Chatham, Ontario, we completed a lease expansion and a five-year renewal with the primary tenant. Effective June 1, the tenant will increase their occupancy to 269,000 sq ft, absorbing 31,000 sq ft from a tenant who recently departed with a nice rent lift from CAD 4.50 to CAD 9.60 per sq ft and annual rent steps thereafter. In total, this will add approximately CAD 175,000 to the NOI in 2025 and CAD 250,000 in 2026.
The third renewal occurred at our 165,000 sq ft building located at 42nd Street East Calgary, where we facilitated an early lease termination effective March 31 at the tenant's request in return for a CAD 800,000 termination fee. The fee was received in April and leaves us slightly ahead for May through July when the building will be empty. Effective August 1, we have leased the building to a large multinational energy company under a 15-year lease term for CAD 15.41 per sq ft, with annual rent steps thereafter compared to the outgoing rent of CAD 12.50 per sq ft. Overall, this adds about CAD 240,000 to the NOI in 2025 and CAD 275,000 in 2026. As mentioned in March, we are aware of two tenants who have entered creditor protection that could impact our 2025 results. Through to the end of April, these tenants have continued to pay rent.
Peavey Mart , tenants at our building located at 40th Avenue in Red Deer and Clark Road in London, they have terminated their leases effective April 25 and will take us some time to find a new tenant in Red Deer. In contrast, I anticipate we would be able to quickly find a new tenant in London. Given the property had a long-term lease well below market at approximately CAD 4 net, releasing this property will be positive for us. We have strong tenant interest from three different groups as we speak and hope to have an offer signed in the next few weeks. The second tenant, Grace Road Lines, occupies the site at 102 Avenue in Southeast Calgary, but is anticipated to vacate either the end of May or June. Similar to London, we should be able to find a new tenant quickly.
We are currently marketing it and have strong interest from a group which hopefully will mitigate any impact to Nexus. We will act proactively to minimize any downtime on these sites. Due to our solid operational performance, I continue to expect that we will achieve mid-single-digit industrial same property NOI growth for the year. In summary, we continue to advance our strategy in 2025 as Canada-focused pure-play industrial REIT. We're making excellent headway on our developments. We will continue to recycle capital, and we will continue to realize organic growth through embedded rent steps and positive mark-to-market on renewal. I'll now turn the call over to Mike to give some more color on our financials.
Thank you, Kelly, and good morning, everyone. Starting with headline earnings in the quarter, net income was CAD 33.2 million, a CAD 10.5 million decrease compared to last year, primarily due to a higher loss on the fair value adjustment of derivative financial instruments by CAD 15.5 million and a lower gain on investment properties by CAD 6.3 million, partially offset by a higher gain on the fair value adjustment of Class B LT units by CAD 8.2 million and higher net operating income of CAD 2.6 million. As Kelly mentioned, our Q1 net operating income increased 8.6%, or CAD 2.6 million year- over- year, to CAD 32.1 million. Of this amount, an increase in same property NOI added an additional CAD 1.6 million, development projects accounted for CAD 1.6 million, and new acquisitions added a further CAD 1.1 million. This growth was partially offset by CAD 1.4 million relating to dispositions made since the first quarter of 2024.
Normalized AFFO for the period was $15.40 per unit compared to $13.50 per unit from a year ago, primarily driven by higher net operating income. Total general and administrative expense for the quarter was CAD 2.3 million, which was CAD 100,000 lower than a year ago, predominantly due to lower compensation expense. Net interest expense in the quarter was CAD 13.3 million, a CAD 200,000 increase from the same period last year. This increase was primarily due to lower capitalization of interest expense on development properties of CAD 200,000 and due to higher deferred financing cost amortization by CAD 100,000 resulting from the property dispositions. At March 31st, 2025, our NAV per unit was $13.21, a $0.02 per unit increase from last quarter. Our weighted average cap rate decreased by one basis point to 5.81% in the quarter compared to 5.82% at December 31st, 2024.
The carrying value of our investment properties increased by CAD 10.9 million in the quarter, primarily due to development spend of CAD 7.1 million, capital expenditures and tenant incentives of CAD 3.6 million, and CAD 11.6 million of positive fair value adjustments, partially offset by a CAD 11.5 million reduction from investment properties we classified to asset held for sale. I'll now turn the call back to Kelly.
Thanks, Mike. With that, operator, please open up the line to any questions.
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To join the question queue, you may press star, then one on your telephone keypad. You will hear a tone acknowledging your request. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing any keys. To withdraw your question, please press star and then two. We will pause for a moment as callers join the queue. Your first question today will come from Brad Sturges with Raymond James. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Just want to start off on the announcement with the expansion at Richmond. Just want to understand, I guess, a little bit more how the fee or the class fee issuance would work. Is there a certain milestone that we should think about in terms of how that payment would happen?
Yeah. They get released as construction progresses, so drawings and permits, foundation, etc., etc., as it goes. They get released and call it 5%, 5%, 5%, 10% as the project moves along.
Gotcha. What's the timeline for the project in terms of commencing and then completing?
I think it'll probably—I mean, the drawings are being completed now, then it's in for permit. We're kind of expecting end of the third quarter, I think, for commencement, and it'll be about a year.
Perfect. Last question. Obviously, you guys have done a lot of heavy lifting on rebalancing the portfolio and hit your target in terms of your industrial weighting. How do you think about further rebalancing or capital recycling on the industrial side? Should we expect to see some activity going forward in terms of hydrating the industrial side, or do you think you're pretty stabilized at this point beyond development or acquisition?
Yeah. I think the overall portfolio quality is really, really strong now, but we had interest from some groups on individual assets out west. I have probably targeted—we will see what the pricing looks like, but initial discussions, it seems okay, pretty good. I have targeted maybe, call it, five assets that maybe we will recycle capital on, move out of them, and because we are looking at a few that kind of have fairly good significant mark-to-market lift on them. If we can recycle all those, we will cycle back into some other ones. We are seeing a lot of stuff in the Montreal area that I think can give us some pretty positive lift going forward. There will be a little bit of capital recycling for the balance of the year. That is what I am expecting.
A little bit opportunistically, a little bit out of west and maybe comes back to some opportunity. That's the way it plays out. Okay.
Exactly. Exactly.
Perfect. Thank you.
Thanks.
Your next question today will come from Mike Markidis with BMO Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks, operator. Good morning, guys. Kelly, maybe just first, congrats on the Robins Hill Road lease. It's a great win for you guys. Maybe just give us a little bit more color on the negotiation there and why a three-year term was selected as opposed to something a bit longer.
Yeah. They had a renewal option that was fairly lengthy. At the end of the day, they have a contract, and that contract expires at the end of the three-year term. That is how we were—it was either stick them with the five-year or five-year plus term or shorten that period and gain it now. That tenant has been in there for a couple of decades. I do not anticipate they are going to leave, but it is a big U.S. multinational, and the local guys were only given the mandate to renew as long as the term of their current contract. That contract has kind of been renewed over and over and over again. I do not anticipate them leaving, but that is why the three-year term versus something longer.
Got it. That makes complete sense. Thanks for that. Okay. Just touching on Richmond a little bit more, maybe you could just help us understand. I think the tenant in place is still not paying full rent on the existing, so maybe walk us through how you're comfortable funding the expansion on the remainder.
Yeah. They are paying full rent on the existing right now. What's happened is the club is now in earnest operating and running, and it's pretty busy. This is to provide more courts and additional parking because the parking at the site is pretty tight. Hence, it's a little more expensive than what it typically would be, but there's going to be some additional underground parking. That's at the front of the building close to the road. At the same time, while we build that, we're also going in for bonus density and a significant amount of bonus density. If we get that bonus density, it's huge valuation for that property. I think at that time, we would probably look at completely exiting out if we can to sell it and sell it with that bonus density.
It's a little bit of a two-phase thing here to complete that addition because comparative that I have that club operating and thriving, and the parking's required, and they will need additional courts. That's how it all came together.
Oh, okay. Interesting. That would be one into my next question here. This doesn't impact the potential for incremental density at the site. In fact, if anything, it might facilitate it to some degree or at least a tiny bit.
Yeah. Listen, the city's been—it was brutal to work with on permitting and getting everything done. Now they're kind of bending over backwards because the project is—it's probably one of the best projects in Richmond going on right now. The mayor is really excited about it. Everybody's excited about it. I'm pretty hopeful that they're going to allow some bonus density.
Okay. Can you just remind us of the potential scale of the bonus density listed?
Yeah. It's upwards of, call it, 240,000 sq ft.
That's an industrial use?
Yeah. It'd probably be—yes, yes. But something more along the lines of probably like a storage use or something along those lines that would fit in there.
Got it. Okay. And then just so I'm clear, the existing—because I think there was a rent break that was done initially. That's now gone. They're fully being paid?
Yeah. We originally reset the leases after this whole debacle of the permits and all that to the existing rental rate today. I think it steps up next year, and then I believe the year after as well.
Okay. Got it. Okay. That's it. I'll turn it back. Thank you.
All right. No problem.
Your next question today will come from Jimmy Shan with RBC. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Just to follow up on that Robins Hill rent and lease deal, yeah, it does look like a pretty good deal for some translation, etc. Is that representative of what you could do today? I guess I'm looking at your Peavey site, and it looks like it's not far off. Would that be your expectation, kind of a similar market rent for that site?
Okay. On the Peavey site, we are in negotiations with someone pretty close. It'll be a little different. That building's a little bit older. The Robins Hills Road site is one of the best buildings in London. It's a really great site. The Peavey, half of it is lower tier height. We either have to pump some money into it or we're going to structure a deal where it starts lower and then incrementally ramps up over the next five years. We're working on a long-term deal. It might start lower and then ramp it up to kind of market in over a course of five years, which is kind of how we're structuring it. That would be more on an as-is basis, take it and take it right away. That's what we're working on right now.
Okay. Is the expectation still that if once you do that deal, the Peavey site, it'll kind of make you whole on the whole? Even if you don't unlease the Red Deer asset, you'd be able to—your NOI would sustain more or less?
Yeah. I would think by next year. By the end of next year, we would kind of be whole, I think, on both of them.
Yeah. I think just when we spoke in the past about being whole, it was on that. We were thinking about that we could rent half of the Clark Road, London site, and renting half of it would keep us whole on that site. It was not about keeping us whole on the whole PV portfolio. It was just on that one site.
Okay. Got it. Then my other question was you mentioned your exposure to auto is 6%. I guess two questions. One is, do you have a sense of what your exposure to steel would be or steel-related tenants? When I look at your top 10 tenants, I do see Ford Motor, KEN USA. I guess those would be the bulk of the auto exposure?
I haven't included Ford and our KEN USA or call it Stellantis West. Those are distribution centers. They're not manufacturing. They're parts distribution. One is for Eastern Quebec and parts of Ontario, and the other one is for the West. Those are distribution. We don't foresee anything happening along those lines. I'd say KEN USA is an auto parts distribution center. That's what they do. It's not manufacturing. There are some aluminum and auto parts suppliers, one in Barry, Automax that we have, but they do engineering and manufacturing stamping, and one in Cambridge, and then a few in Windsor more on the plastic side. That's kind of, I'd say, the majority of our exposure.
Okay. Okay. Thank you.
Okay.
This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Kelly Hanczyk for any closing remarks.
Yeah. Just thank everybody for attending the call, and we'll see you next quarter.
This brings an end to today's conference call. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating and have a pleasant day.