Good morning. My name is Anas, and I'll be your conference operator today. At this time, I'd like to welcome everyone to the Minto Apartment REIT Q4 2021 Results Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. If you'd like to ask a question during this time, simply press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you'd like to withdraw your question, please press star followed by two. Before we begin, I want to remind listeners that certain statements about future events made on this conference call are forward-looking in nature. Any such information is subject to risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially. Please refer to the cautionary statements on the forward-looking information in the REIT's news release and MD&A dated 8 March 2022 for more information. During the call, management will also reference certain non-IFRS financial measures. Although the REIT believe these measures provide useful supplemental information about its financial performance, they are not recognized measures and do not have any standardized meanings under IFRS. Please see the REIT's MD&A for additional information regarding non-IFRS financial measures, including reconciliations to the nearest IFRS measures. Thank you. Mr. Waters, you may begin your conference. Thank you, Anas, and good morning, everyone. I'm Michael Waters, CEO of Minto Apartment REIT, and I'm joined on the call this morning by Julie Morin, our CFO. I'll begin the call by discussing highlights from the Q4 and other corporate developments. Julie will review our financial and operating results in detail, and I'll conclude with our business outlook. After that, we'll be pleased to answer any questions you may have. Our financial performance improved in the Q4 as Canadian urban rental market conditions continued to strengthen. We generated solid growth in occupancy and rental rates even as we reduced the use of discounts and promotions. We entered into 444 new leases in the quarter, an increase of 9% compared to Q4 last year. We realized an average rental gain on turnover of 7.2%, significantly higher than the 4.4% gain to lease we generated in the Q3 of 2021, and the 2.1% gain to lease we generated in Q4 last year. Average monthly rent was CAD 1,641, a year-over-year increase of 1.1%. When you exclude the acquisition of Le Hill-Park, which closed on 7 December 2021, average monthly rent would have been CAD 1,664, a year-over-year increase of 2.5%. We didn't provide same property information this quarter as Le Hill-Park was only included in the results for 25 days, and this wasn't considered material. Total portfolio and same property portfolio results were substantially the same. However, starting in Q1 2022, we'll be reporting both the total portfolio and the same property portfolio. Our average occupancy in the quarter was 95.0%, the highest level we've achieved since Q2 of 2020, which was the early stages of the pandemic. In comparison, average occupancy was 92.9% in Q3 2021 and 92.3% in Q4 2020. I'm pleased to note that this was the third consecutive sequential quarter in which move-ins exceeded move-outs and occupancy improved. Supported by these positive developments, in the Q4, we generated year-over-year growth of 5.2% in net operating income and 6.7% in AFFO per unit. During the quarter, our board of trustees also approved a 4.4% increase in monthly cash distributions. The increase took effect beginning with our November distribution, payable in December. This was the third consecutive annual increase in distributions since the REIT's inception, two of which came during the pandemic. We're determined to steadily increase unit holder distributions as AFFO rises, while also maintaining strong liquidity and a conservative balance sheet. The Q4 was also a busy period from a growth standpoint. We committed to provide a convertible development loan of up to CAD 19.7 million for the development of a new six-story mixed-use multi-residential and commercial property at 810 Kingsway in Vancouver. We completed the previously announced acquisition of Le Hill-Park in Montreal for approximately CAD 80.1 million. It's a high-quality 261-suite rental property located in close proximity to our other Montreal locations. We commenced construction on new buildings at the Richgrove and Leslie York Mills properties in Toronto. These will increase our suite count by a combined 417 suites. We completed a CAD 87 million bought deal offering of trust units. Proceeds were used to assist in the funding of the acquisition of Le Hill-Park and our convertible development loans, and also to provide financial capacity support to support future acquisitions. Finally, we continue to make progress in our repositioning program. We completed the renovation of 113 suites during Q4 to improve asset quality, reduce future repair costs, and drive strong growth in rental revenue. For the full year, we repositioned 367 suites. I'm pleased that we ended 2021 on a strong note. The last two years have been characterized by volatile markets resulting from pandemic-induced changes in work and lifestyle conditions. What we're seeing now is a steady return to more normalized market conditions. We're well-positioned to generate continued improvement in financial performance and to capitalize on new growth opportunities as market conditions continue to recover. I'll now invite Julie Morin to discuss our Q4 financial and operating performance in greater detail. Julie. Thank you, Michael. Turning to slide four, I'll start by reviewing the Q4 operating results. We reported revenue excluding furnished suites of CAD 30.3 million in Q4 2021, an increase of 4.7% compared to CAD 29 million in Q4 last year. The increase was mainly due to higher occupancy and average rents. Total revenue, including furnished suites, was CAD 32.4 million, an increase of 4.8% compared to Q4 last year, reflecting higher rents and occupancy for both furnished and unfurnished suites. NOI excluding furnished suites in the Q4 was CAD 18.8 million, or 62.1% of revenue, an increase of 4.6% compared to CAD 18 million or 62.2% of revenue in Q4 last year. Total NOI, including furnished suites, was CAD 19.9 million, or 61.5% of revenue, an increase of 5.2% from CAD 18.9 million, or 61.3% of revenue in Q4 last year. Higher NOI in Q4 2021 was mainly reflected higher revenue due to improved occupancy and rental rates, partially offset by higher property taxes and utilities expense. FFO in Q4 2021 increased 10.2% year-over-year to CAD 13.2 million, compared to CAD 12 million last year, mainly due to the positive NOI variance. AFFO increased 11.4% to CAD 11.7 million, or CAD 0.189 per unit from CAD 10.5 million, or CAD 0.177 per unit last year. Higher AFFO primarily reflected the higher FFO, partially offset by an increase in the maintenance capital expenditure reserve. The REIT declared cash distribution in the Q4 of CAD 0.1171 per unit, resulting in an AFFO payout ratio of 63.1%. Cash distributions of CAD 0.1138 per unit were declared in Q4 last year, resulting in an AFFO payout ratio of 64.2%. As Michael noted, we increased our monthly distribution beginning with the November 2021 payment. At the end of 2021, our portfolio consisted of 7,538 suites, with an average monthly rent of CAD 1,641 per occupied unfurnished suite. Average monthly rent increased by CAD 18, or 1.1% compared to CAD 1,623 at the end of 2020. The average occupancy rate in Q4 2021 increased to 95%, compared to 92.3% in Q4 last year. Turning to slide five. This chart highlights our steady quarter-over-quarter growth and occupancy as urban rental market conditions improved over the course of 2021. In the Q4, we had 514 move-in versus 420 move-out or 94 net move-in. It was the third straight quarter with positive net move-in. Accordingly, occupancy increased from approximately 91.1% in the Q1 to 95% in the Q4. While Q4 occupancy is still lower than pre-pandemic levels, it represents a strong improvement in a relatively short period of time. On slide six, we have provided our revenue analysis as of the end of 2021. The upper chart breaks down our gain-to-lease performance in the Q4, while the lower chart shows our estimate of the gain-to-lease potential embedded in the portfolio. Beginning with the upper chart, as Michael noted, we signed 444 new leases in the quarter following suite turnover. This was a 9% improvement compared to Q4 last year. We generated solid gain-to-lease in all of our markets. The average rent on new leases increased by 7.2% from CAD 1,652 to CAD 1,770. This resulted in an annualized incremental revenue gain of approximately CAD 472,000. Turning to the gain-to-lease potential on the lower chart, we believe we can generate approximately CAD 7.9 million of annualized incremental revenue growth by bringing rents in 6,991 occupied suites to market level. We expect to realize a significant portion of this potential over the next three to five years. By comparison, we estimated gain-to-lease potential of CAD 7.3 million at the end of the third quarter. Turning to slide seven. The upper chart tracks our gain-to-lease and average monthly rent growth on a quarterly basis. Gain-to-lease remains highly positive, with room to improve to pre-pandemic levels, and we have generated steady growth in average monthly rent. You will note on the upper right section of the chart that there was a slight decline in average monthly rent in Q4 2021 relative to Q3. This reflected the acquisition of Le Hill-Park, which had sitting rents that are below the portfolio average. On a same property basis that excludes Le Hill-Park, average monthly rent continued to rise in the Q4. On the lower chart, we break out our rents by geography as at the end of 2021. Moving to slide eight, I want to provide an update on our furnished suite portfolio. Our furnished suites were severely impacted by the drop in business travel associated with the pandemic, but the recovery over the course of 2021 was impressive as market conditions improved. As the chart shows, we generated substantial growth in rental rates and occupancy beginning in the Q2. Average monthly rent in the Q4 was CAD 4,078, while average occupancy exceeded 80% for the second straight quarter. We are continuing to trim the furnished suite inventory by converting furnished suites to unfurnished and leasing them out on that basis. We had a total of 203 furnished suites at the end of 2021, a decline of more than 20% from two years earlier. On slide nine, you'll find a summary of our repositioning activities. We renovated and leased a total of 113 suites in the fourth quarter, or 85 of the REIT's proportionate ownership share. The average cost per renovation was approximately CAD 47,400 per suite. The average annual rental increase following repositioning was CAD 4,475 per suite, which generated a simple return on investment of 9.4%. In total, we have 2,350 remaining suites to reposition under the current program. We are also exploring repositioning opportunities at two other wholly owned properties in the portfolio. Combined, they have more than 400 suites with repositioning potential. We expect to reposition approximately 250 suites-300 suites in 2022, subject to turnover. On Slide 10, you can see our repositioning results for the full year. We renovated a total of 367 suites in 2021, which exceeded our expectations. This chart highlights the strong, predictable returns on invested capital that we generate from repositioning. During 2021, our average annual unlevered return was between 8.4% and 9.4% per quarter, with an overall average of 9.1%. As we've said before, repositioning represents the best risk return of any of our investment opportunities. It will continue to be a major priority for us moving forward. Now I'll move on to our intensification and development initiatives beginning on slide 11. Through our strategic alliance with the Minto Group, we're advancing seven different development projects with the potential to add 1,678 new suites to the portfolio, or 1,176 suites at the REIT's proportionate share. That would bring our total suite count to 9,216, up 22% from the current level. During the Q4, we made an initial advance of CAD 10.3 million on the convertible development loan for the 810 Kingsway project in Vancouver. We began demolition and site mobilization at both the Richgrove and Leslie York Mills properties in Toronto, and we also obtained a construction financing commitment for Richgrove under CMHC's Rental Construction Financing Initiative. Note that of our seven total developments, six projects totaling 916 suites are now in the active development phase. I'll now review individual projects in more detail, beginning with 810 Kingsway on slide 12. As we announced on 1 December, we agreed to provide a convertible development loan of up to CAD 19.7 million to finance Minto Properties' 85% interest in a joint venture for the development of this project. This is our second property development deal in the Greater Vancouver area after Lonsdale Square, which I will discuss shortly. The financing bears interest at 6% per annum and matures on 1 August 2024. The 810 Kingsway is expected to comprise 108 unfurnished rental suites, as well as approximately 11,500 sq ft of at-grade retail space. The conceptual images on this slide give you a good sense of what it's gonna look like. Site mobilization and demolition have commenced, and the project is expected to be completed and stabilized in Q3 of 2024. At that point, we'll have the option to purchase Minto Properties' 85% stake at a 5% discount to its then-appraised value. Slide 13 shows the locations of 810 Kingsway and Lonsdale Square in Vancouver and North Vancouver, respectively. Expanding into the Greater Vancouver area has been one of our key priorities since the inception of the REIT. Development of these two attractive urban infill projects gives us the ability to secure quality assets in Vancouver's highly competitive rental housing market. Moving to Lonsdale Square on slide 14. The photo on the right of the slide shows the good progress is being made here. Excavation is complete, and formwork is well underway. Concrete has been poured at the P1 basement level. Construction is expected to be completed by the Q2 of 2023, with property stabilization in the Q4 of that year. As a reminder, Lonsdale Square is part of a large master planned community on a 99-year land lease with the city of North Vancouver. The building is expected to comprise 113 rental suites and approximately 8,000 sq ft of retail space. The REIT provided financing to this project through a convertible development loan and has the option to purchase this project upon stabilization at a 5% discount to its then-appraised fair market value. Turning to Richgrove on slide 15. As I noted, construction got underway in the Q4. We are taking advantage of excess land on this site to add a new rental tower with 225 suites, including 100 affordable housing suites. Sorry about that. Stabilization is expected in the Q1 of 2026. One reason this property is attractive is that it is adjacent to the site of the future Martin Grove LRT station, which is expected to be completed by 2031. Moving to Leslie York Mills on slide 16. Construction also commenced here in the Q4, with demolition and site preparation underway. Currently, this site has three 18-story towers. We are planning to develop 192 new ground-oriented rental carriage suites, as well as a host of new amenities and a new underground parking garage. The large conceptual image on the left shows how this will significantly transform the existing site. Stabilization of this project is expected in late 2025. Turning to slide 17, I have a brief update on the Fifth + Bank redevelopment in the heart of Ottawa's Glebe neighborhood. This mixed-use multi-residential and retail property is financed through a convertible development loan from the REIT and is very near completion. Currently, 96 of the 163 suites have been leased and more than 50 are already occupied. Stabilization is expected in mid-2022. 2022, at which point we will have the ability to exercise our purchase option to acquire the property at a 5% discount to its then appraised fair market value. Finally, I'd like to review our debt financing and liquidity on slide 18. We are committed to maintaining a conservative leverage ratio and balance in our debt maturity schedule. The chart demonstrates that maturities are highly manageable through 2026. As of 31 December 2021, the weighted average term to maturity on our fixed-rate debt was 4.69 years, with a weighted average interest rate of 2.82%. Approximately 94.2% of our debt is fixed rate and 72% is CMHC insured. Our total liquidity was approximately CAD 151 million at year-end, and debt to gross book value was 36.5%. I'll now turn it back over to Michael. Michael? Oh, thanks, Julie. Sorry, I've been only living through COVID for two years and still doing the mute thing. I'll wrap up with our business outlook on slide 19 before we take your questions. The pandemic continued to impact us during 2021, but as you saw from our presentation this morning, our financial and operating performance improved steadily over the course of the year as urban rental market conditions recovered. Throughout the pandemic, we've adapted and executed our strategic plan to grow the business and build value for unit holders. We'll continue to do so in 2022 and beyond. It's important to remember that the long-term fundamentals supporting Canadian urban rental housing have not changed, despite the short-term disruptions caused by COVID-19. Our market is supported by population growth, including high levels of immigration, the rising affordability gap between owning and renting a home, and constraints on new housing supply, among other factors. We're optimistic that the market recovery will accelerate in the coming quarters, driving continued growth in occupancy and rental rates. By the middle of 2022, we anticipate that market dynamics will have returned to pre-pandemic levels. However, COVID-19 has proven to be unpredictable, and it's possible that future variants such as Omicron could disrupt the recovery in the short term. With our strong liquidity position and conservative balance sheet, we believe we're well positioned to manage any potential market volatility. To conclude, I want to reiterate that we have the right team, the right assets, and the right strategy for long-term success. They've served us well to date, and we're confident they'll continue to do so in the months ahead. We remain focused on four key areas to grow the REIT. Firstly, capitalizing on organic growth through gain-to-lease. Second, creating value from suite repositioning. Third, exploring attractive acquisitions and developments. Fourth, capitalizing on our relationship with the Minto Group. As Julie pointed out, we currently have six active development projects, and we're partnering with Minto Group on all of them. The Minto Group is the development and construction manager on four of the projects and is developing or co-developing all of the projects financed with convertible development loans. This underlines the value of that relationship. By continuing to focus on these four business priorities, we're confident that we will deliver significant value to unit holders as market conditions continue to improve. That concludes our presentation this morning. Julie and I would now be pleased to answer any questions you may have. Anas, please open the line for questions. Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, we now conduct the question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star then one on your telephone keypad. If you'd like to withdraw your question, press star two. If you're using a speakerphone, please lift the handset before pressing any keys. One moment please, for your first question. Your first question comes from Jonathan Kelcher with TD Securities. Please go ahead. Thanks. Good morning. Hey, Jonathan. First question, just on the occupancy. It came back nicely in the quarter. Q1 seasonally weaker. How should we expect that to trend over the course of 2022? Yeah. We did see a slightly slower January, and then things sort of returning to kind of a normal seasonal pattern after really two years of kind of disrupted seasonality. We're expecting that you know, the strong leasing season in Q2 and Q3 will see a you know, a real move in occupancy you know, from where we're at now to sort of, kind of what we would consider to be our kind of pre-pandemic normal in the you know, high 90s%, sort of 96%, 97% kinda range. That's kind of how we're looking at it. Certainly, the patterns that are developing thus far are kind of supporting that. Okay. As it ticks up, do you expect that to have any impact on the mark-to-market? The 7% seems conservative to me. I would expect that as we get into Q2 and Q3, that we'll see that continue to strengthen. You know, my hope is that we'll see a return to kind of where we were pre-COVID, which was low double digits, sorry. I think that would be something that we would expect in Q2 or Q3. Okay. Just lastly on the repositioning, you're targeting 250-300, and that's down from 367 this year. Is that just a function of your expectation of turnover in those suites? Yeah. It is. I mean, the gating item for us on the repositioning program is turnover of unrenovated suites. It's, you know, not always predictable with a great precision. What I can say is the Q1 repositioning is tracking ahead of where we were Q1 of 2021. That's, you know, encouraging. That is the limiting factor, turnover of unrenovated suites. Okay. Thanks. I'll turn it back. Great. Thanks, Jonathan. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you have any questions, please press star one. Your next question comes from Jimmy Shan with RBC. Please go ahead. Thanks. Just a couple of quick one from me. Do you keep stats on rent-to-income ratio for your tenant base, and what would that look like today? We, when we're qualifying a prospect for a lease, we would do income confirmation validation. There isn't an ongoing sort of income verification requirement. We really have our best picture at the time that the tenant signs the new lease. Our internal threshold is 30%. We wanna see income sufficient such that rents don't exceed 30%. Typically, what I would say is that our tenant prospects that are signing leases are below that level comfortably so. That's really, you know, the best stat that I can offer, Jimmy. Okay. Maybe to Jonathan's point, in terms of the market rent trends you're seeing in the different markets that you operate in. We've seen, you know, condo rents snap back quite nicely over the last few months. Again, just sort of any indication of what you're seeing in terms of how the market rents are trending in the market that you operate? Yeah. Condo rents certainly in Toronto were a leading indicator. Certainly, they fell first, and they fell most at the onset of the pandemic, if you remember back in early mid-2020. Certainly they have snapped back. What we've seen and we sort of highlighted this really, you know, beginning in Q2, but continuing through the second half of the year and certainly in Q4, was that we've been reducing the use of discounts and promos that we've been offering. That I think is generally consistent with what we're seeing broadly in the market. You know, where the strongest markets for us really had been in the Q4 were Ottawa and Toronto. Toronto was heavily impacted. You know, it was nice to see the recovery there. I think, you know, we're broadly seeing, you know, good strength in most of the markets, partly driven by, you know, kind of a return to workplace. We saw strong temporary student arrivals from an immigration perspective. We're anticipating strong arrivals from an immigration perspective for permanent residents. Certainly, the statistics that we saw in the latter part of 2021 were very encouraging. From our perspective, the other thing that we point out, Jimmy, is the widening gap between housing affordability and the rental option, which continues to be, we think, by far the most affordable housing option for Canadians. And that gap widened even further in 2021, with just runaway property prices in almost every market. Okay. Sorry, just one quick follow-up then on the discounts. What is roughly the amount of incentives that's currently baked into the current revenue numbers? Well, when you say baked into the current revenue numbers, are you saying what incentives are we offering now? Yeah. Like, if I look at the Q4 revenue run rate, what's rough percentage of that would be, incentives? I would say that, you know, we'd be in the range of, if you thought about it in terms of number of months rent, sort of 0.3, if you will, months rent on average. That's what we were sort of looking at, on a weighted basis in sort of this, you know, the latter part of 2021. That's what we were sort of using. That's an average across the portfolio, Jimmy. In many properties where we had very limited availability, there was no discounting, and no incentives being offered. In other places, we were using incentives and promotions strategically. Yeah, I don't know if that helps add some color to that. That does it. Okay. Thank you, guys. Thanks, Jimmy. Thank you. Your next question comes from Matt Kornack with National Bank. Please go ahead. Hi, guys. Matt. On the furnished suite front, occupancy was down a little bit sequentially, but obviously we had Omicron. Can you give us a sense as to how you think that trends through kind of the first half of the year? Does it exhibit similar type of strength through the back half of the year? Well, firstly, this segment is very small as a proportion of our total business, just 203 suites out of more than 7,000. I know it garners a lot of attention, probably out of scale with what it represents. It is and always has been a more volatile segment from an occupancy perspective. What we saw certainly in, you know, beginning in Q2, but really strongly in Q3 and Q4, we saw stronger demand. Our occupancy for the last two quarters has been over 80%, and rents were up higher. That segment is sort of always changing depending on business mix. It is seasonal. I will say that, you know, particularly in Toronto, you know, historically in the past, our 61 Yorkville property has had a heavy entertainment segment, and that tends to be quite seasonal. What we've seen recently is it's become increasingly transient. In Ottawa, our 185 Lyon property, which is right downtown, very close to Parliament, traditionally had a very strong government segment. Transient and corporate were kind of rounding out the business mix there. What we did see in Q1 is there was some impact due to the restrictions in January, arising from Omicron. That tended to alleviate as we've seen the quarter progress. So it's really hard to say with precision, kind of where Q1 or Q2 will play out. As I say, we continue to trim inventories there. Our target, which we articulated last year, early in 2021, was to sort of bring our overall inventory in the furnished suite segment into the sort of low- to mid-180 suites range. That helps us actually provide a little bit more yield management there in that segment as well. Fair enough. Looking at the U.S. Sun Belt in particular, it's a market with similar but maybe not as strong demographic trends as Canada and the ability to supply easier than we are here, and yet rent spreads have grown in a market like Austin to +30%. Do you think, I mean, we were talking about getting back to pre-pandemic levels on the leasing front in Canada, but is there the possibility that actually things are a lot more frothy post-pandemic in Canada, given, again, very strong demographics and limited new supply of housing? Well, yeah, I think that's a point, you know, a good point, Matt. I mean, the underlying fundamental dynamics in the housing market, and I'm talking about for sale and for rent, that existed pre-COVID, didn't go away just because of COVID. They may have been temporarily disguised, if you will, but those underlying trends are coming back. The first one is, you know, very strong population growth driven by immigration. What we've seen during COVID was the federal government reiterating and really doubling down on a very expansive immigration policy, setting targets well in excess of 400,000 for each of the next three years. That would bring us to levels we hadn't seen since 1913, if you can believe that. From that perspective, we know that immigrants tend to rent their first home in Canada typically until they've established credit history and employment. They tend to cluster in major centers where our portfolio is focused. What we do know as well is that these immigrants are good for the economy. They tend to be more highly educated. They tend to start businesses at a higher rate. These are fundamentally good things for the Canadian economy. In the short term, from a housing market perspective, or maybe even the medium term, we simply are not as an economy producing enough housing. You know, if you go back over 20 years of data, back to 2020. What you'll see is Canada, on average, is producing about something like 200,000 new homes of all types every year. At the same time, average household size continues to drop lower and lower, and so we need more houses per capita to house the population growth that Canada is experiencing. Those fundamentals that supply-demand mismatch, not surprisingly, coming out in housing prices, and we think will drive a resurgence in rents. I think Canadian incomes will probably grow as well. We've seen pressure on wages and other things like that. I mean, we're very, very bullish on this. I think the solutions to the supply conundrum that we face are deep and systemic, and they will take years to fix if they get fixed. They would require coordination by multiple levels of government. What we've seen to date is that their policy actions haven't been coordinated. In fact, quite the opposite. Makes sense. The last one for me, just on Montreal's relative performance. It was one of your stronger markets this quarter. Mark-to-market was a little bit weaker, but I think they got disproportionately hit earlier on with Omicron. Should we kind of attribute it to that, or is there anything specific in the Montreal market that was a little bit weaker quarter-over-quarter? You know, Quebec certainly probably had the strongest response, if you will. I mean, I think it was the only market in the country that had curfews. Certainly I think, you know, it probably was maybe more impacted temporarily at least. What we've seen there, as well as the amenities in most rental properties were shut down longer. We've been very active on our repositioning program. I think what you'll see in Q1 is our newest asset, Le Hill-Park, will register a bunch of repositionings as well. That's gonna help us. We've had higher vacancies in Montreal due to that repositioning program, which has been so aggressive. We're very bullish on that market and I think the mark-to-market for us in Montreal is probably skewed a little bit by Le Hill-Park because when we acquired it in December, the gap between sitting rents and unrenovated market rents was something in the order of 20%. We think that the gain-to-lease for repositioning those unrenovated suites is probably 20% again. You know, I think as we continue to realize on the turnover of unrenovated suites in that property in particular, I think that's gonna really help us there as well. You know, I think we look at a lot of these markets and we're very bullish. We forget that the compound annual growth rate in Toronto of rents pre-COVID was something like 8.5%. I think, you know, like I said, we're looking for sort of a return because I don't see the fundamental underlying changing from where it was pre-COVID. No, fair enough. My associate who's sitting across from me has been trying to find a place to rent, and it's been a little bit more challenging in Toronto these days. Appreciate the color, guys. Yeah. No, great. Thanks, Matt. I appreciate the questions. Thank you. Your next question comes from Brad Sturges with Raymond James. Please go ahead. Hi there. Just expanding on the repositioning program there. The two assets you're talking about, exploring whether or not the asset program. Maybe I missed it, but what assets are you looking at right now within the portfolio? The first one is Castleview, it's an Ottawa asset. The second one is a component of our Parkwood Hills portfolio in Ottawa. They're just going through our normal feasibility analysis. You're going through the testing process right now and then figuring out whether it makes sense to do more of a full program there? Yeah, correct. I mean, there's lots of opportunity, in particular at Parkwood Hills. I mean, if you think about that asset, it's a lot of low-rise wood frame, and we think there's opportunity there, you know, even maybe more broadly from a redevelopment intensification. Just on the repositioning, there's different unit types. There's all sorts of opportunity from a repositioning perspective. We're really spending a lot of time on that right now. Our asset team, you know, getting into that and working through a bunch of different scenarios. Okay. Then Le Hill-Park, obviously, you identified the mark-to-market opportunity, and there's already, I guess, some of the suites renovated there. I think based on turnover, you can probably get at that fairly quickly in terms of the renovation or repositioning potential there. Yeah. The previous owner had renovated something like 72 suites, and had actually done a pretty good job in their execution. The manager of that asset, Cogir, we've retained on a short-term basis, and we've sort of tweaked their program, but really adapted it, you know, almost wholesale and continued to just roll straight through that. So we actually had some leasing of renovated suites at Le Hill-Park in December. We don't count those as repositioned till they actually occupy the suite. So you know, some of the tweaks that we made, like their spec was largely in line. You know, there was a lot of good things done there. So we've made a few minor adjustments, but otherwise I think we'll just keep rolling at Le Hill-Park. Got it. Last question, just, in terms of acquisitions right now, just how does the pipeline look or, you know, the opportunities you're seeing in the market today? Well, I think what we're seeing, you know, we continue to spend a lot of time in Toronto, in Montreal, in the Greater Vancouver area. There's lots of activity. A lot of what we focus on, as we've talked about in the past, if there are acquisitions of existing assets, we're looking for assets where there is gap to market between the sitting rent roll and the unrenovated market rents. We're looking for assets where there is repositioning potential, like Le Hill-Park, where we can deploy some value add capital into amenities, into suites. We're looking for assets in particular where there's intensification potential, maybe excess real estate in the form of surface parking where we can add additional density as we're doing at Leslie York Mills in Richgrove. We've become quite expert at that. The fourth opportunity is development. You would've seen certainly our market entry strategy into the GVA has been build versus buy. Frankly, we found the buy option in the GVA very challenging. There's very little what I would call institutional-grade product available to purchase. It doesn't trade. It's really a market characterized, I would say, by small wood frame, walk-up dated products that has sort of limited potential, at least to our our sort of, you know, way of thinking. You know, the CDL deals that we saw there, Lonsdale Square Phase One, the first phase of a three-phase redevelopment project in the upper Lonsdale node of North Vancouver. 810 Kingsway, the latest deal that we did, which closed in late November of last year, which is an infill development in the Fraserhood area, which is, you know, an area that's rapidly transitioning. If we could find more opportunities like that, I think that would be an area that we'd focus on. We are looking at markets that I would say are near to some of the big six. By that I mean places like Hamilton, connected with GO Train to Toronto and its huge population center. Markets like Victoria, with its large, you know, student population and proximity to the Greater Vancouver area. We think there's a huge amount of opportunity out there. We're going to exploit the relationships we have with large institutional investors. That's an opportunity for us to continue to grow as well. Look for more of that, of course in 2022. Okay. That's great. I'll turn it back. Thank you. Thanks, Brad. Thank you. Your next question comes from Mario Saric with Scotiabank. Please go ahead. Hi. Thank you, and good morning. Just maybe coming back to the repositioning, the 250-300 target for 2022, what would that look like on a proportionate basis? Would that include Le Hill-Park or plans at Le Hill-Park? Good morning, Mario. It would include Le Hill-Park. On a proportionate basis, it's sort of hard to say with precision because of course the mix will depend on where we're seeing, you know, the unrenovated units turn. If you think of the assets that are in that program, Leslie York Mills, High Park Village, these are two of the bigger assets where we don't have a 100% stake. Rockhill, of course. Those three assets in aggregate have something in the order of 1,550 suites remaining to reposition out of the 2,300. Again, it's really gonna depend on where we see that unrenovated suite turnover. It's hard to say with precision, Mario, exactly what the effective mix would be. If you think about, you know, where we did the work in 2021, it'd probably be a reasonable proxy for modeling for 2022. Okay. That's helpful. Just coming back to incentives and to Jimmy Shan's question, I also appreciate the color on the 0.3 months kind of average that you highlighted. Do you have any sense in terms of what percentage ballpark of the buildings or suites are actually offering incentives as of Q4 2021? You know, it's so variable because, as I said in the earlier remarks, it really depends on buildings where we've got white space or availability. In many buildings where we have limited or no availability, it really goes right down to the plan. Certain plans and certain buildings, we've got zero availability, so a lot of pricing power, not seeing, you know, use of discounts or incentives there. In other cases where we do have availability, we are applying it, but really on a tactical basis based on suite type. The other element I would say, Mario, is it's very seasonal. You know, we're thinking about the end of Q1, early part of Q2. As you head into the busy leasing season where leasing demand is really strong in the months of April, May, June, you know, if you think about the last month of Q1, you're probably not gonna go crazy incentivizing to fill suites when you're gonna see strong demand as you get into Q2. Now contrast that with, say, November. You know, November, late in Q4, heading into Q1, which is a lower leasing season demand typically, and I think that's the pattern we've seen. You know, we might be more open to using incentives on a tactical basis. Otherwise, the risk is that you could be sitting on vacant suites for a little bit longer as you head into, you know, like I say, a lower leasing season in December, January, February, March. It's quite variable. I hate to give you the non-answer, but it's hard to say precisely, you know, how that will play out in 2022 by property, by market. Would it be fair to say that the 0.3 would have been a bit lower in the summer of 2021? You know, I would say, you know, in Q1 of 2021, we saw very heavy use of incentives and promotions. Where we really changed that, and the turning point for us was May of last year. We really saw that use of promotions. It's not just in our portfolio, but in our competing sub-markets, the competing properties dropped way off. That trend certainly, you know, in the summer, I'd say July, August, was probably a little bit higher than where we are now. We're lower still than where we were at that point. Perfect. Okay, switching gears just to the OpEx. It was essentially flat year-over-year in Q4, the property operating costs. The suite count was up a little bit, even if I exclude Le Hill-Park. Just curious in terms of whether, you know, there's anything unusual timing-wise in terms of the recording of expenses. And then secondly, whether you feel comfortable that the amount of R&M required within the portfolio is up to date, notwithstanding perhaps maybe having less access into tenant suites during the pandemic. Yeah. I think one of the drivers for us in Q4 was we did have some vacancies in our head count. That would've, you know, artificially depressed salary and wage expense. You know, Q4 was warmer. I would say as well, you know, it got cold in Q1. That might be impacting on the utility expense. I would say from a repairs and maintenance perspective, we're not really being held back. That wouldn't have been a factor that really played on us in Q4. I mean, from that perspective. I think what you could see going forward is now the amenities in most properties are going to be unrestricted, and there could be an operating impact of, you know, slightly higher cleaning costs. I think we will fill some of those vacancies in the staffing side. Looking further ahead, we do think about, and we've talked about this at length, property taxes, insurance, those are areas where we've seen, you know, cost growth. I think, you know, broadly speaking, just thinking about inflation, particularly in energy, those are areas where we see risk as well. Just something to be mindful of, from an OpEx perspective looking into 2022. Notwithstanding that, you know, the expectation of some OpEx growth next year, we think that the combination of improved occupancy, burn off of the amortization of promotion incentives granted in 2021 and higher rate gain to lease and the repositioning programs, we should see revenue growth outpace the OpEx. No, that makes sense. Okay. My last question is just more of a high-level question. Michael, if you had to, like, pick one or two initiatives in 2022 that you're really focused on as an entity, you know, whether it's capital per unit growth or capital deployment or what have you know, what would those one or two initiatives be that if you were to achieve them by the end of the year, you'd consider the year a success? You know, we're very long-term thinkers. You know, these are long-term investments. We're very focused on, you know, long-term value growth in the portfolio. I would say that adding and improving the portfolio through the convertible development loan program and acquisitions, I think if we are able to exercise the option to purchase Fifth + Bank, for example, if we are able to deploy capital on some new convertible development loan investments, those would be, I think, value drivers for the long term for the portfolio. I think our repositioning program at a near-term level is always an area of focus for us. It's probably the highest and best use of capital from a risk-adjusted perspective in our portfolio. I mean, that's for us, it improves the attractiveness and value of our properties to tenants. I think, you know, it reduces R&M expense. It drives higher revenues from a revenue rent perspective. I mean that at a near-term tactical level will always be an area of focus for us. You know, we recognize that a lot of these initiatives are dilutive in the short term from an AFFO perspective. Capital that's, you know, developing for example, 192 new suites at LYM is going to dilute our AFFO. Long term, value creation, both at that property level, Leslie York Mills, but more broadly for the REIT portfolio, I think outweighs the near-term dilution impact. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Mario. Thank you. Your next question comes from Mike Markidis with Desjardins. Please go ahead. Thanks for taking my question. Correct me if I'm wrong, I think you'll probably say, Michael, that the demand for assets in the market certainly hasn't slowed down. At the same time, you've mentioned increased uncertainty with respect to OpEx and potentially with respect to regulatory management. You didn't refer to that, but we all know it's out there, and the equity markets are pricing that in to some extent. My question would be, as an entity or as an organization, when you look at existing assets in the market, has your risk premium or your underwriting parameters changed at all in the past three to six months? You know, I think just turning. Let's talk about acquisition of stabilized buildings. I think we, you know, we're careful in our underwriting, you know, in not just underwriting where we think revenues are and what we might see from a rent growth and turnover perspective, but certainly from an OpEx perspective as well. I think we are conscious of, you know, the inflationary impact that we're seeing right now in energy and other segments that we've talked about. I mean, we continue to run scenarios through our underwritings to really evaluate, you know, kind of how robust the returns could be if there were cost shocks. I would say that we I don't think we've changed the threshold underwriting return requirements, though. I just think we're probably doing a little bit more work from a valuation and risk mitigation perspective in the underwriting. On the development side, you know, obviously Minto Group, you know, outside the REIT is very involved in the construction of residential housing in multiple markets across the country. So we have a you know our I think our finger on the pulse of sort of where we're seeing trade availability, materials costs, where construction costs are headed. We continue to be very conservative on that front and quite cautious in how we risk mitigate. Again, I don't think that we've changed the underwriting threshold requirements, but probably just doing a lot more work upfront in terms of really making sure that our underwritings are as robust as they can be for some of these potential negative impacts on returns from cost inflation. Okay. That's helpful. Thank you. You know, the REIT has acquired some assets where there's an institutional partner that was there in the existing ownership structure. I think if I remember Rockhill, you brought in an institutional investor. And you've got certainly a robust pipeline of near-term and longer-term capital deployment opportunities without third parties, just with your relationship with Minto. With the equity markets not necessarily cooperating, have you looked at potentially bringing in a partner on one or two of your existing assets as a source of capital in the near term? You know, I mean, we've looked and we keep having continuously looked, I guess, at the portfolio, and the opportunity to recycle capital, whether it's through sale or whether we could work with, you know, institutional investors as we did at Rockhill, for example. It might be something that we see in future growth opportunities working with, you know, institutional investors, particularly where we can have a managing interest in the investment. That certainly would be a focus for us. It's something that we are looking at. I mean, obviously, trading at a fairly significant discount to NAV right now, it's not an appetizing time to be out raising equity. No, absolutely not. Markets can change pretty quickly, so here's hoping for a better remainder of the year. Thanks very much. Thanks, Mike. Thank you. Your next question comes from Joanne Chen with BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead. Hi. Good morning. Just a quick one from me. It was nice to see that on your repositioning pipeline, the average cost actually went down per suite. Just kind of wondering how should we be thinking about the returns given some potential inflationary cost pressures for your repositioning program? Yeah. We target an 8%-15% ROI for our repositioning program. I think in Q4, we saw that ROI increase. It was at 9.4% over where we were in Q3. The spend per suite is highly variable. Joanne, as you can imagine- Okay. The difference between a, you know, a three-bedroom, two-bath unit and a bachelor, even if you're repositioned to the same spec level, the overall investment in those two suites could be quite significantly different. To some extent that, you know, average investment each quarter will be somewhat variable, and it's dependent on, you know, the suite mix of what was actually renovated in the quarter. The reason that we like the repositioning program so much, as I've said in the past, it's the highest and best use of our capital on a risk-adjusted basis, is that we have a high degree of visibility on what the renovated market is for suites. Because we're typically leasing those in that same building, you know, on a regular and continuous basis. At the same time, on the cost side, we have long relationships with the trades that we have. While we are seeing cost inflation, it's mitigated by those relationships and the buying power that we have. Right. You know, the beauty of this program is you're really metering out capital in very small and discrete chunks. Mm-hmm. You know, we can accelerate, slow down, you know, the program in buildings as needs dictate. You know, we're very careful about, you know, that ROI threshold and what we want to achieve and optimistic that as much as we're seeing cost inflation, we're also seeing, as we talked about early in the call, I think potential for market growth rate in rents that in many cases will outpace the rate of cost inflation. From our perspective, again, you know, I think we're able to assure ourselves of achieving that minimum ROI threshold with a high degree of assurance. Right. Okay. Just one last quick one from me. Obviously it was great to see the pickup in, you know, your gain on lease potential. I guess could you maybe comment on what you're seeing in terms of the turnover activity thus far in 2022? I mean, I think what we'll see in January. Well, in Q1, I think we're expecting a sort of a, as I mentioned earlier, January was a slower leasing month. I expect that we're gonna see the quarter overall will look kind of like Q1s of past, pre-COVID, you know. Tends to be a lower turnover, lower leasing demand. And that sets us up well for Q2 and Q3, where we're expecting to see, I think, you know, again, strong, you know, leasing market conditions, you know, and strong pricing power. That, that's kind of how we're sort of looking at a return to normal seasonality. Got it. Okay. No, that's helpful. That's it for me. Thank you very much. I'll turn it back. Thanks, Joanne. Thank you. There are no further questions. Mr. Waters, you may proceed. Thanks, Anas. Well, that concludes our call this morning. Thank you for joining us and for your interest in Minto Apartment REIT. We look forward to speaking with you all again after we report our Q1 2022 results in the spring. Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today. We thank you for participating and ask that you please disconnect your lines. Have a great day.