AvalonBay Communities, Inc. (AVB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to the virtual AvalonBay Communities, Inc. 2021 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. We do not expect any technical difficulties today. However, in the event we lose audio or connection, we are unable to provide an update, please wait 10 minutes for resolution. Please refer to the company's investor website for updates. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Edward Schulman, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, to begin the meeting.

Thank you. During the meeting today, the company may make forward-looking statements. There are a variety of risks and uncertainties associated with forward-looking statements and actual results may differ materially from what is said here today. Please refer to AvalonBay's 2020 Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC on February 25, 2021, for detailed discussions of those risks and uncertainties and to our subsequent SEC filings for updates. I would also like to draw your attention to the meeting agenda and conduct of virtual meeting guide that are posted on the annual meeting website. With that, I will turn the call over to AvalonBay's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Timothy J. Naughton, who will Chair the meeting.

Well, thank you, Ted. Welcome to the 2021 Annual Meeting of Stockholders of AvalonBay Communities, Inc. This is AvalonBay's second virtual meeting. We have elected to hold a virtual meeting in response to ongoing recommendations regarding travel and gatherings related to preventing the spread of COVID-19. As we look forward to the end of the pandemic, our thoughts are with everyone who's been and continues to be impacted by COVID-19. Housing has been an essential business throughout this past year, and I would like to thank AvalonBay's associates who have worked through this crisis to assure the availability and maintenance of our communities and service to our residents, many of whom have been challenged by the events of the last year. This meeting is now officially called to order. I would like to introduce our other directors in attendance, Glyn Aeppel, Terry Brown, Alan Buckelew, Ron Havner, Steve Hills, Richard Lieb, Susan Swanezy, and Ed Walter. Jay Sarles, a long-term director, has announced that he is retiring, and he is not here, but we thank him for all of his contributions over the years. I would also like to introduce our 2 new nominees this year, Dr. Christopher Howard and Ms. Nnenna Lynch. We are looking forward to them joining our Board, and we know they will make many contributions in the years to come. I would also like to introduce Michelle Montes and Tyler Crain from our auditors, Ernst & Young; and the company's executive officers are also attending this meeting. It is our intention to follow the agenda that has been posted on the meeting site. As is our custom, we will conduct the business portion of our meeting first, and answer general questions at the end of the meeting in accordance with the conduct of meeting guide. Questions may be submitted on the meeting website until the meeting is concluded. I will now turn the meeting back to Ted Schulman, the Company Secretary, who will act as Secretary of this meeting and record the minutes.

Thank you, Tim. Anna Hagberg, a representative from Broadridge Financial Solutions, is participating by phone and will act as the inspector of elections for this meeting. Anna Hagberg has signed an oath of office, which will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. The annual meeting is being held in accordance with the AvalonBay Communities, Inc. Bylaws and Maryland law. During the meeting, we will review the matters described in our proxy statement dated April 7, 2021. After that, voting will be completed, the preliminary votes will be announced and the formal meeting will be adjourned. Meeting participants can enter questions online at any point during the meeting. Beginning on April 7, 2021, Broadridge mailed the meeting notice and the notice of Internet availability of meeting materials to every stockholder of record as of March 25, 2021. Ms. Hagberg has now reported that the holders of more than a majority of the voting power of the company's common stock issued and outstanding and entitled to vote are present in person or by proxy at this meeting, thereby, constituting a quorum. With the quorum being present, this meeting is hereby declared open to proceed with business. We will now proceed with voting on the agenda items. The polls are now open and will remain open during the discussion of the proposals. You may vote online during this meeting while the polls are open. But if you have already voted and you do not wish to change your vote, you do not need to vote again at today's meeting and your vote will be cast as you have previously instructed. As presented in the proxy statement, there are 3 proposals to be voted on at this meeting: one, election of 12 directors to serve until the 2022 Annual Meeting of Stockholders and until their successors are elected and qualified; two, ratification of Ernst & Young as the company's auditors for 2021; and three, a nonbinding vote on approval of executive compensation. The Board recommends a vote for each of the nominees in Proposal 1 and for each of Proposals 2 and 3. As a reminder, please enter any questions about the proposals or voting procedures online, and if appropriate, we will read them aloud. I will review whether we have any questions about the proposals. No, there are no questions at this time about the proposals. As there are no further questions, we will pause for a few minutes to allow any final voting. [Voting]

I now declare the polls closed. No further proxies or votes and no further changes or revocations will be accepted. Ms. Hagberg, would you please provide me with your preliminary report of the results? According to the preliminary vote of the inspector of election, each of the 12 nominees has been elected as a director; the proposal to ratify the appointment of Ernst & Young as AvalonBay's independent auditor for 2021 has been approved; and the proposal to approve the compensation of AvalonBay's named executive officers has been approved. The final voting results will be set forth in the report of the inspector of election and will be included in the minutes of the meeting. The final results will also be reported in a current report on Form 8-K to be filed with the SEC. Tim, I'll now hand the meeting back to you.

Thank you, Ted. As there is no further business to come before the annual meeting, this meeting is hereby adjourned.

Thank you, Tim. Tim, we did receive a number of questions, and I would like to read them out and direct them to the appropriate person at AvalonBay, who's best suited to answer the question. The first 2 questions relate to the same subject. The first is what is AvalonBay doing to reduce carbon emissions of its activities and those of its tenants, for example, energy-efficient structures, charge points, electrical provision of such and so on? And the second related question is, if AVB is addressing climate concerns and the carbon footprint of renters, either through efficiencies, such as building efficiency, heat pumps, et cetera, or the elective add-ons for residents, electric vehicle, preferred parking and the like? For those 2 questions about carbon emissions and carbon footprint and energy reduction, I would like to call upon Matt Birenbaum, our Chief Investment Officer, to discuss those questions.

Sure. Thanks, Ted. We are doing a lot in this area, actually. I'll just touch on it briefly, but I would encourage folks who are interested to download our annual corporate responsibility report, which is available on our website. As it relates to our own consumption and emissions activity, we're doing a lot of investment in our portfolio, including on-site solar generation at 30-some communities and LED lighting retrofits, which we've completed, I believe, at close to 200 of our communities. And as it relates to our resident emissions activity, we do have a certified building policy that requires that all new mid- and high-rise construction be certified by an environmental and emissions group, whether it's LEED or ENERGY STAR as well as installing electric vehicle charging stations as was asked about in the question.

Thank you, Matt. The second question I would like to refer to our President, Ben Schall. Ben, the question is, are there are any plans to expand to new markets adjacent to existing properties, such as Philadelphia and its mainland suburbs, Oregon or Portland, Maine?

Thank you, Ted, and thank you for the question. Our current focus is on growing our presence in our existing expansion markets, South Florida and Denver. So that's top of mind for the team. And as you would expect, we do consider additional markets from time to time that could be appropriate for our platform.

Thank you, Ben. The next question, Tim Naughton is going to address. I'm going to paraphrase the question for the benefit of others who are listening. Earlier in the year, Ben Schall joined our company as President, and we announced our CEO succession plan. Since Ben comes from a different real estate sector, the question asks whether that signals a change in strategy or direction for the company. Tim?

Yes. Thank you, Ted. As you mentioned, Ben Schall, who's with us today, was named President last year and will succeed me at year-end as CEO at which point, I'll become Executive Chairman. Ben prior to his joining AvalonBay does have CEO experience and experience across a wide number of markets, including all the regions in which we do business. And while he has experience in a number of other real estate assets, asset classes, this is a change in leadership, not the change in strategy.

Thank you, Tim. We did receive 2 other questions subsequent to them. Kathy, if you have those -- I'm going to refer to our Assistant Secretary. I see them now. This next question, I'm going to refer to Tim, and it comes from [ Patrick Wilby ] of the Carpenter Union or Carpenter Funds. And the question is that today's public company executive compensation plans are largely formulaic peer-related plans with simplistic annual say-on-pay voting, reinforcing plan homogeneity. Would you or the Chair for Compensation Committee speak to whether AvalonBay might be better served by an executive compensation plan tailored specifically to the company's particular circumstances and its unique long-term strategic business plan. Tim?

Sure. Thank you. Thanks for that question, Ted. We have a compensation plan that we develop in consultation with outside compensation consultants. And while we often benchmark against many of our peers, the metrics that we use are specific to our company and our business plan. So we have an annual incentive plan that is generally tied to our business plan and achieving some of the key metrics and outcomes of that business plan. And we also have a long-term compensation plan that is a combination of both total shareholder return metrics as well as operating metrics, most of which are benchmarked and relative to a group of companies that we compete directly with.

Thank you, Tim. The next question relates to political contributions. And it is asking us to describe our guiding principles and subsequent activities related to political contributions, specifically have you and will you continue to donate to support candidates directly or indirectly through party affiliations or PACs who support conspiracy theories and/or intend to disrupt efficient voting outcomes?

Yes. Thanks, Ted. First of all, in terms of our history in terms of supporting PACs, we do not have our own PAC. We have historically supported PAC sponsored by the National Multi Housing Council (sic) [ National Multifamily Housing Council ] and the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, both of whom are trade groups that support our industry and legislation and important to our industry and raise back money from a number of constituent companies in the industry. Since the first of the year and the events at the beginning of the year, we actually have -- we have suspended all PAC support. And until we better understand what NMHC's and NAREIT's intentions are with respect to making contributions going forward, at that point, we will reassess our strategy and level of support with respect to PAC contributions in the future.

Thank you, Tim. The final question we have today is also from Mr. [ Wilby ] of -- from the Carpenter Funds. And this is the question, The topic of stakeholder capitalism as an alternative to shareholder capitalism has received considerable attention recently. As long-term pension fund investors, the Carpenter Funds appreciate the sentiments embodied in the stakeholder capitalism perspective but feel that execution could be complicated. Could you discuss the Board's perspective on the concept of stakeholder capitalism and what principles the Board would use to balance the interest of various stakeholders as it develops and implements the long-term -- the company's long-term business strategy?

Yes. Thank you, Ted. I can tell you that both management and the Board subscribe to the notion of multi-stakeholder capitalism we have for really as long as I can remember in terms of weighing the needs and the objectives, not only shareholders, but those of associates, our customers and the broader community. And so anything that we do is done through a lens of looking through -- looking at it as it affects each of those constituents. So I would tell you, that's part of our DNA as a company. And so this recent movement towards multi-stakeholder notion of capitalism is totally consistent with how we've operated and our values.

Thank you, Tim. As there are no more questions, I will now turn the meeting back over to our operator, Sue.

Thank you. That concludes the 2021 Annual Meeting of Shareholders for AvalonBay Communities, Inc. Thank you for joining us today. You may now disconnect.