Clipper Realty Q1 2026 Earnings Call - Residential Rents Hit Record Highs as Office Asset Struggles

Conference Call Operator, Conference Call Operator: Good day, and welcome to the Clipper Realty Earnings Call. At this time, all participants have been placed on a listen-only mode. The floor will be open for questions and comments following the presentation. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to your host, Lawrence Sava, Corporate Controller at Clipper Realty. Sir, the floor is yours.

Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer, Clipper Realty: Good afternoon, thank you for joining us for the first quarter 2026 Clipper Realty Inc. Earnings Conference Call. Participating with me on today’s call are David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer; JJ Bistricer, Chief Operating Officer; and Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer. Please be aware that statements made during the call that are not historical may be deemed forward-looking statements, and actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including those disclosed in the company’s 2025 annual report on Form 10-K and 2026 first quarter report on Form 10-Q, just filed today, which is accessible at www.sec.gov and on our website.

As a reminder, the forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this call, May 14th, 2026, and the company undertakes no duty to update them. During this call, management may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures, including adjusted funds from operations or AFFO, adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, or adjusted EBITDA, and net operating income, or NOI. Please see our press release, supplemental financial information, and Form 10-Q posted today for a reconciliation of these non-GAAP financial measures with most directly comparable GAAP financial measures. With that, I will now turn the call over to our Co-Chairman and CEO, David Bistricer.

David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you, Lawrence Kreider. Good afternoon, and welcome to the first quarter 2026 earnings call for Clipper Realty. I will provide an update of our business performance and some new developments, after which JJ Bistricer will discuss property level activity, including leasing performance, and Lawrence Kreider will speak to our quarterly financial performance. We will take your questions. I am pleased to report that our residential properties continue to perform very well due to the continued high residential rental demand, generating excellent cash flow. Overall rents are generally at all-time highs and continue to increase, and we are nearly fully leased. In the first quarter, new free market leases exceeded prior rents by over 7%, generally consistent with last quarter across the entire portfolio, as JJ Bistricer will detail. We are also in the third quarter of the initial lease up at our Prospect House development, 953 Dean Street.

We bought the property online in August, on time and on budget, having placed a bridge loan last quarter that will provide funds through stabilization. We are presently fully leased with free market rents of about $78 per foot. This project, excuse me, was a ground-up development in Brooklyn, where we bought the land in 2021 and built a 9-story fully amenitized residential building with 160,000 residential rentable square feet, 240 units, 70% of which are free market and 30% are affordable, 31 parking spaces and 19,000 commercial rental square feet.

At 250 Livingston Street, after New York City vacated mid-August in 2025, and as more fully described in the 10-Q press release, we notified the lender that we do not intend to support the property’s ongoing operations, and debt service had ceased making payments of interest in real estate taxes. In May 26, we began receiving reimbursement of expenses paid by us from the lender. We are also discussing a consent and cooperation agreement with the lender to sell the property loan, although there can be no assurance an agreement will be finalized. I will now call on JJ to take over this call.

JJ Bistricer, Chief Operating Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you. I’m pleased to report that residential leasing at all our stabilized properties is very strong, and they are 99% leased overall. Rents are at record levels and continuing to increase. Overall, new rental rates at residential free market properties in the first quarter exceeded previous rents by 7% and renewals by 5%. We expect demand for our residential leasing product to remain strong in the foreseeable future as the overall rental housing supply in New York City remains constrained and new development discouraged. Our residential free market rents are now at record highs. In the first quarter, Tribeca House had lease occupancy of 99%, overall rent per foot of $90 per foot, and new rents at $92 per foot.

The Clover House property had occupancy of 99%, average overall rents of $90 per foot, and new leases at $95 per foot. Our recently completed Pacific House property, consisting of a blend of free market and rent-stabilized tenants, had lease occupancy of 98% and free market rents of $66 per foot on new leases. Our Aspen property continues to perform at record levels with average occupancy of above 98% and new rents 8% higher compared to previous leases. We have nearly completed leasing at the newly completed Prospect House ground up development at 953 Dean Street with free market rents at $78 per foot. Rent collections versus billings across our portfolio remain strong. The overall collection rate in the 1st quarter for all free market residential properties was approximately 100%.

Looking ahead, we remain focused on optimizing occupancy, pricing, and expenses across the business to best position ourselves for growth. I will now turn the call over to Larry, who will discuss our financial results.

Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you, JJ. Our results this quarter versus last year reflect the effects of four items worthy of note, namely the termination of the New York City lease at the 250 Livingston Street office property on August 23, 2025. The initial lease up of results at Prospect House placed in service, August 1, 2025, reflecting excess of expenses over limited but growing revenue. The absence of results from the 10 West 65th Street property sold in May 2025, and the settlement cost of litigation regarding historical payroll practices at all of our properties. I refer to the remaining properties as the ongoing stabilized properties. Overall, we had revenues of $38.1 million versus $39.4 million last year, a decrease of $1.3 million.

NOI of $20.1 million this quarter versus $21.7 million last year, a decrease of $1.6 million and AFFO of $2.3 million this quarter versus $8 million last year, a decrease of $5.7 million. The following details these results. For revenue, residential properties reflect a $2.7 million or 9% increase due to the excellent residential leasing, as JJ noted above. This consisted of a $2 million increase from ongoing stabilized residential properties, a $1.7 million increase from the third full quarter of initial leasing at the Prospect House property, less a $1.1 million decrease from the absence of the 10 West 65th Street property sold in May of 2025.

For office properties, re-revenues reflect a $4 million decrease, consisting of a $4.2 million decrease from the New York City lease termination at 250 Livingston Street, partially offset by a $0.2 million increase from new retail leases at the Tribeca House and Aspen properties. For NOI, the $1.6 million NOI decrease reflects a $1.8 million or 10% increase from ongoing stabilized properties, a $1.3 million increase from the inclusion of Prospect House this quarter, less a $600,000 decrease from the absence of the 10 West 65th Street property sold in May, and a $5.8 million decrease from the New York City lease termination at 250 Livingston Street.

For AFFO, the $5.8 million AFFO decrease reflects a $1.2 million or 18% increase from ongoing residential properties, a $1.2 million decrease from the inclusion of Prospect House due to full expenses as it completes lease up, and a $0.1 million increase from the absence of the 10 West 65th Street property sold in May, finally, a $5.8 million decrease from the 250 Livingston Street property, resulting from the New York City lease termination. With regard to our balance sheet, we have $26.1 million of unrestricted cash and $28.6 million of restricted cash at the end of the quarter.

As of the end of the quarter, our operating debt is 89% fixed at an average rate of 3.87% and an average duration of 3.4 years. Our debt instruments are non-recourse, subject to limited standard carve-outs and not cross-collateralized. We finance our portfolio on an asset by asset basis. Finally, today, we are announcing a dividend of $0.095 per share for the first quarter, the same amount as last quarter. The dividend will be paid on June 4, 2026 to shareholders of record on May 26, 2026. Let me now turn the call back to David for concluding remarks.

David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you, Lawrence. We remain focused on efficiently operating the portfolio. We look forward to full stabilization of the Prospect House property, resolving the 250 Livingston Street capitalization, and all possibilities that may present themselves. I would now like to open the line for questions.

Conference Call Operator, Conference Call Operator: Thank you. At this time, we’ll be conducting a question and answer session. The first question today is coming from Buck Horne from Raymond James. Buck, your line is live.

Buck Horne, Analyst, Raymond James: Hey, good afternoon, guys. Just a quick question on Flatbush Gardens, if you could speak to that property for a few minutes. Just thinking of, you know, operationally, you know, how, I guess, how things are going in terms of, you know, being able to navigate the potential for the, I guess the, I don’t know, the Rent Freeze Act that could be in place going forward and/or funding the CapEx for that property in the quarters ahead. I guess I’m also thinking ahead lastly to any possibility for refinancing the mortgage on Flatbush ahead of the interest rate reset in 2027. Any comments would be helpful there. Thank you.

David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you for your question. I think the property is performing as planned. You know, a lot of planning went into that Article XI that we have there, and it’s basically doing as it’s supposed to do. We will be looking at, you know, all possibilities of refinancing. It’s got a ways to go yet, obviously we will look at what the possibilities are, as soon as we come to some kind of a conclusion, we’ll let you know, obviously.

Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer, Clipper Realty: Yeah. Buck, I might add, you could look to our supplemental and you’ll see, you know, our net operating income. That would give you a sense of how the property is doing, which is pretty well.

Buck Horne, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay. One quick follow-up. It appears there’s still some interest in default fees owed on related to 250 Livingston, so I believe it’s in the ballpark of $7.2 million. Are you planning on paying that cash out over the next quarter or two, or are there any additional fees to be aware of?

Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer, Clipper Realty: Well, no, I think we as we said, we indicated to the bank that we were no longer funding the operation, and we’re not paying any interest right now, including default fees. We’re as we said, we’re negotiating a consent and cooperation agreement in connection with potentially selling the debt.

Buck Horne, Analyst, Raymond James: Thank you. Okay, thank you.

Lawrence Kreider, Chief Financial Officer, Clipper Realty: Right now, there has been no cash paid out on that.

Buck Horne, Analyst, Raymond James: Gotcha. All right, thanks, guys.

David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you.

Conference Call Operator, Conference Call Operator: Thank you. Once again, it’s star one if you have any questions at this time. There were no other questions at this time. I’d now like to hand the call over to David Bistricer, CEO at Clipper Realty, for closing remarks.

David Bistricer, Co-Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Clipper Realty: Thank you for joining us today. We look forward to speaking with you again in the future.

Conference Call Operator, Conference Call Operator: Thank you. This does conclude today’s conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day. Thank you for your participation.