Land Securities Group Plc (LAND) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, and welcome to Landsec's Capital Markets Update. Now it's been just over 4 years since I shared the results of our initial strategy review back in 2020, which you may recall was all done virtually as we were still then in the middle of COVID lockdowns. Now a lot has changed since then, not only in the external world, but also within Landsec. So over the next 45 minutes or so, what we're going to do is provide you with an update of our plans for the next phase of our strategy and our focus on driving returns. So I'm going to start with an introduction, an overview of the market opportunity as we see it, after which Remco is going to talk about what this means in terms of capital allocation. Vanessa will then set out what this is expected to deliver in terms of returns, before I come back, wrap up and open the floor to questions. So through a mix of targeted investments and over GBP 3 billion of disposals, we've created a high-quality portfolio focused on 3 types of urban area where customer demand is strong. Now whilst the predominant use of spaces in each of these areas differs, there is increasingly more binding them together than setting them apart as the lines between how we work, live and spend our leisure time have blurred materially. In offices, our portfolio is virtually full at around 98% occupancy, and so rents are rising. In retail, our occupancy is now over 96%. And as new supply is nonexistent, rents are growing, too. And for both, this is resulting in healthy like-for-like income growth, and that underpinned our increasing guidance for the FY '25 earnings per share at our most recent half year results last November. We've also created a significant residential pipeline with 3 prime sites in London and Manchester that together could cater for over 6,000 homes deliverable over the next decade. With structural growth in demand for more homes, continued undersupply and long-term rental growth closely tracking inflation, this is an attractive sector into which we intend to deploy significant capital. But across each of those areas, it is Landsec's unique ability to shape places that stand the test of time, which underpins their long-term growth potential. So building on the opportunity that we've created over the past 4 years, the delivery of the next phase of our strategy will see us move towards higher income, higher income growth and lower cyclicality. We will further rebalance our portfolio mix as we build on our best-in-class urban real estate platform with a greater share of retail, the establishment of a sizable residential platform and as a result, a smaller share of capital employed in offices. Now this should not only enhance our longer-term growth prospects, but also reduce the cyclicality in our returns, given the higher volatility in offices -- higher volatility, I should say, in offices than residential, as shown in the middle chart here. And at the same time, through a combination of capturing like-for-like income growth, cost savings and a clear focus on capital allocation, we have the potential to deliver compound growth in earnings per share totaling around 20% over the next 5 years, supporting continued growth in dividends. In terms of financial objectives, our primary focus will be delivering sustainable income and EPS growth, with return on equity being the output of this rather than a stand-alone target. Over short periods of time, movements in valuation yields mean the return on equity in property fluctuates and is rarely within a precise range every single year. Yet it is clear that over longer periods, it is income growth, which drives value growth. Over the next 5 years, there are 2 strands of activities for us, which support this. Firstly, over the next 1 to 3 years, our EPS growth will be driven by capturing the growing reversion in our existing portfolio, delivering cost efficiencies and releasing capital from low or non-yielding predevelopment assets. From 2026 onwards, this will start to be supplemented by rotating capital into assets with, to some extent, higher income, but more importantly, higher income growth. And this remains underpinned by our strong capital base with a target net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of below 8x and a loan-to-value ratio around the mid-30s. With an existing income return at NTA of 5.8% and circa 20% growth to come, our strategy will result in an attractive, less cyclical return on equity over time. This focus on income and EPS is not just about emphasizing a different financial KPI. It has clear strategic implications for what we do as a business, principally in terms of focusing on like-for-like income, costs and our investment decisions. Vanessa and Remco will talk through each of these items in more detail later. But this slide highlights the key areas and capital allocation decisions for the next 5 years. Following the successful sale of our hotel portfolio and acquisition of Liverpool One earlier this financial year, we aim to continue to grow our retail platform and exit our residual assets in subscale sectors. And we also aim to reduce our capital employed in predevelopment assets by around half to reduce the drag on earnings and ROE from the holding costs associated with these sites. From 2026 onwards, following completion of our 2 on-site projects, we will scale back new office development to shift development activity to residential. Now that the pipeline there that we've been working on over the last few years is nearing the point of starting on site as we aim to establish a GBP 2 billion-plus residential platform by 2030. Now approximately half of this should come through development with the remainder being selective acquisitions, funded by reducing our capital employed in offices, which follows on from the GBP 2.2 billion of mature offices that we've sold since late 2020. All of this will enhance our near- and long-term income and EPS growth potential, positioning Landsec to drive long-term sustainable shareholder value creation. Over the past 4 years, we have consistently said that we would focus on areas where we have a sustainable or attainable competitive advantage and on preserving balance sheet strength. Although the external environment has changed materially, these principles remain true today and inform our view on the market opportunity for us. Looking ahead, we see a number of key macro trends, which will shape the environment we expect to be operating in for the foreseeable future. And our strategy is designed to benefit from each of these trends. Heightened geopolitical risk with more isolationist political policies and climate change will continue to drive costs and impact inflation over the medium term. Hence, our focus on income growth and rebalancing our portfolio mix towards areas with enhanced inflation-linked growth. Secondly, the normalization of interest rates after more than a decade of QE means the cost of capital will likely remain elevated. Hence, our aim to reduce non-yielding land where holding costs are high and our continued focus on driving further efficiencies. Demographic change means there is a growing shortage of homes, especially in urban areas with more political support and a more positive attitude towards renting among younger generations, supporting our ambition to capitalize on the sizable residential opportunity that we've created. And lastly, technological change means customer expectations in any sector are changing at an ever faster pace. This might, of course, provide interesting opportunities for specialists in relatively new sectors such as data centers, but it also means that it is critical to focus on places with lasting intrinsic value as these are more resilient and can adapt to evolving customer demands and hence, continue to grow. And our portfolio is built on precisely those sorts of places. In offices, customers remain focused on the very best space in terms of sustainability, connectivity and amenity. As there is limited supply of such space, our portfolio is virtually full, which continues to drive rental values higher. So our overall reversionary potential in office is now around 10% and growing, which bodes well for income growth in the coming years. In retail, we continue to see brands focusing on fewer, bigger, better stores, such as with NEXT, who shortly after our half year results, signed a new 133,000 square foot lease at Bluewater, effectively tripling their existing store space in the center. As a result, our retail portfolio is now close to being effectively full, again, driving rents higher. So uplifts on relettings and renewals continue to grow. And lastly, in residential, where our current capital employed is limited to a small number of sites, but where the potential to grow is sizable with a GBP 3 billion pipeline in London and Manchester, deliverable in multiple discrete phases over the next decade, but with a first start on site in 2026. This pipeline forms the basis for an attractive opportunity to establish a sizable residential platform. There is clear structural need for more homes as the U.K. population is expected to grow by 6 million people by 2035. This adds further to the existing demand supply imbalance as following years of undersupply, the more than 20% decline in planning approvals over just the last 3 years suggests that supply will be even more constrained in the near future. Over time, average residential rents are closely correlated to inflation via wage growth, much more so than average commercial rents, as shown here on the left. So given that we have created a pipeline that can deliver around 6,000 new homes in London and Manchester over the next decade, we have a valuable opportunity to invest significantly into this structural growth sector. Aside from the overall demand-supply balance, which, of course, holds for every tenure in the U.K. housing market, the outlook for the private rented market looks particularly attractive. This market has historically been dominated by small buy-to-let landlords, but rising energy efficiency costs and higher mortgage rates means that this market is shrinking. And that's at a time when demand for rented homes is growing, given the flexibility and value proposition on offer. And this is particularly the case for Gen Z consumers who, given the choice, are more than twice as likely to prefer renting as previous generations, as shown here on the top right. And Gen Z, of course, will become the main target customers for build-to-rent over the next 5 to 10 years. And following the rise in mortgage rates, it is on average now cheaper to rent than buy a house in terms of overall cost, as shown here bottom left. Hence, our pipeline offers an attractive opportunity to cater for the structural growth in demand in a sector with long-term inflation-linked rental growth. And that is why today, we set out our ambition to establish a GBP 2 billion plus residential-led platform by 2030, partly through the build-out of our high-quality pipeline and partly through selective acquisitions. And this will build on our 80-year track record of developing and shaping successful high-density urban places with increased political support to unlock the delivery of new homes in such places. And it also provides an opportunity to build scale in a high-growth but highly fragmented market, certainly relative to private rented markets, for example, in the U.S. or on the continent. Now while operating residential at scale is new for Landsec, we have significant experience within our leadership team, within our business in scaling U.K. living platforms and in delivering residential. And we have designed our new data and technology systems with residential in mind. So this will require relatively little incremental cost to set up. As we grow our residential platform, we initially plan to work with external operating partners to manage this efficiently, but we intend to in-source operations once we reach sufficient scale. In retail, the polarization between the best destinations and the rest of the market continues. The top 1% of all shopping destinations in the U.K. provide brands with access to 30% of all retail spend, and that's more than the bottom 90% of destinations combined, as the chart top left shows. It's therefore no surprise that this top 1% is where demand from brands is focused. Around 90% of all Apple stores, all Inditex stores, for example, are located in these places. And as 86% of our retail portfolio sits in that top 1%, it is very clear that we are focused where demand is strongest. This underlines the upside in our portfolio. And as the chart on the right here shows, our occupancy continues to grow even though vacancy in the overall market remains high. Retail sales across our portfolio are now ahead of pre-pandemic levels, yet rents are still more than 25% lower, values 60% lower. So we expect to see continued growth in like-for-like income over the next few years, translating into an attractive overall return on capital. And as we now own 7 of the top 30 shopping centers and outlets in the U.K., the unique data, insights and brand relationships this provides us with offers a strong foundation for further accretive growth. In office, take-up for Grade A space remains ahead of the long-run average, even though overall take-up is down slightly. Supply of this space remains limited, which is reflected in the strong demand for space across our portfolio that I alluded to earlier. Rental levels for the best space, therefore, continue to rise as the chart on the bottom left here shows. Indeed, recent evidence in Victoria, where roughly half our office portfolio is located, show rents have moved on 15% from the record rent that we ourselves set with our N2 development just 18 months ago, which, of course, bodes well for the leasing of our latest development there, 30 High, but also for future upside across existing assets in this area and beyond as we capitalize on the strong customer demand in the near future. That said, offices remain a cyclical sector. So with nearly 65% of our capital employed here currently, we plan to reduce this over time to fund our expansion into residential. Whilst office investments have been subdued over the past couple of years, we expect activity will start to pick up in 2025 as concerns around working from home have eased and confidence in income has grown. Yields for good quality assets here look attractive in a historical context. This should, therefore, tie in well with the timing of our planned residential investment, given that the first start on site is earmarked for 2026. Now of course, we can have all the right assets, all the right projects, but without the right people, the right platform, it's impossible to unlock their full potential. And that's why we've been working hard in recent years on transforming our operating platform. For example, by boosting our skills in areas such as residential and creative placemaking, which will enhance the value of our places; strengthening our customer orientation, which with leadership sourced from our customers' industries, provides greater insight in how to best service their needs, anticipate future trends and continue to enhance our income growth; and investing in data and technology. Some of these investments take time, such as replacing our legacy finance and lease admin systems with a new ERP system. But that went live just before Christmas on time and on budget, but it was the culmination of over 2 years of investment, testing and preparation. And this also allowed us to strengthen our data foundations through cleansing and reorganizing our data, shifting to modern agile applications and integrating them through a state-of-the-art cloud-based platform. All emerging technologies such as AI, rely on effective data access and data management, and this now forms the basis for significant operational efficiencies as well as more rapid and valuable insights. And because we started these initiatives a few years ago, we are already seeing the benefits come through with over GBP 6 million of annualized cost savings secured. All this leaves us well placed to deliver sustainable income and EPS growth and drive an attractive return on equity over time. The key objectives over the next 5 years, which underpin this are clear, and they build on our achievements since late 2020, as shown here. We will continue to invest in growing retail and increasingly residential, whilst we continue to realize value in offices and noncore assets as we have done over the past 4 years. We remain focused on driving like-for-like rental growth, but having rebuilt occupancy post COVID, we will move to lower overall risk and cyclicality over time. And having managed inflationary pressures on cost well, we will further improve our efficiency and leverage the strong platform that we've created to enhance growth. And with that, I will now hand over to Remco to talk through what all this means for capital allocation.

Thank you, Mark, and good afternoon, everyone. As we set out on the next phase of our strategy, I will now take you through our views on driving value, return prospects, risks and how we translate all of this into our capital allocation decisions. As we look forward, our thinking on capital allocation and key strategic decisions is based on a view that, firstly, it is income growth, which drives long-term value growth. And secondly, in a higher nominal interest rate world, it is critical to have assets where the income is real rather than nominal. The 2 charts on this slide underline this. The chart on the left shows that in the long run, valuation yields in property have been broadly stable, irrespective of government bond yields, which is similar to equity markets where PE multiples have been broadly stable in the long run, too. This means that for both long-term value growth is driven by growing income, not increasing the multiple you put on that. The chart on the left also shows that there is little correlation between property yields and nominal interest rates as the more relevant comparison is the spread between property yields and real interest rates shown on the right. This shows that current property valuations are attractive in a normalized context provided the underlying rental income is real, i.e., rents are growing. This underpins our focus on sustainable income and EPS growth in terms of our strategy and capital allocation. In this, it is vital that we have a clear view on the risk return prospects of the different investment opportunities available to us. This slide sets out how we currently see. Retail investment continues to offer high income returns with rents growing from affordable rebased levels for the best-in-class assets in this market, which is seeing new supply there offerskedurns capital on the acquisition of Liverpool One before Christmas. In office, demand for the best space continues to drive ERP growth, although high incentives weigh on income and the risk return is higher. Returns from develop to compensate for higher exit yields and higher build costs, offices. So across our pipeline, returns for office and residential development are broadly similar. But at residential, the demand is less cyclical, the risked return is attractive. Now none of this is a static view. So we continue to monitor any changes to risks and returns, but ultimately, this informs the decisions that underpin our strategy. This slide is a reminder of the strategic implication of our focus on driving income and EPS growth Mark outlined earlier. So I will now take you through each of the key capital allocation decisions that flow from this in more detail. Starting with predevelopment assets, where we currently have GBP 0.7 billion of capital employed, making up 7% of our portfolio. Over the last 2 years, we've made significant progress in terms of unlocking development optionality through planning, even as recent as 2 weeks ago when we got resolution to grant consent for a new office block in the South Bank. However, with over GBP 2 billion of potential new office-led starts plus a sizable residential-led pipeline, the overall size of potential new development starts would now exceed our risk appetite. And as the holding cost of sitting on sites with little or no income to delay their delivery by a few years would be material, we will be pragmatic about value and look to release about half of our capital employed in this space over the next 1 to 3 years. This will likely be through a combination of disposals and potential partnerships focused on the 2 areas on the right of this slide, which includes some elements of strategic land, which is currently held at cost. This will drive a circa GBP 15 million saving in interest because of lower -- increase in earnings because of lower interest cost and improve our overall return on equity by around 25 to 50 basis points per year as it also reduces capitalized predevelopment spend. Over the next 1 to 3 years, we will also continue to grow our retail platform. We have already invested nearly GBP 1 billion in this space since 2021 at an attractive 8% yield. And there are opportunities to further leverage our platform value, although we remain very much focused on the top end of the market. The acquisition of Liverpool One 2 months ago is a prime example of this as this is one of the top retail destinations in the U.K. This acquisition provides an initial 7.5% income return with rents which are set to grow at an overall IRR of over 10%. As we said in November, we will also step up accretive CapEx in our existing portfolio, where we expect to invest around GBP 200 million over the next couple of years. This comprises a range of smaller projects with yields on cost of around 10% and IRRs in the mid-teens, which are highly accretive, which brings me to residential, where, as Mark highlighted, we see an attractive opportunity to establish a sizable residential platform in a structural growth market over the next 2 to 5 years, building on the opportunity we've created in our pipeline. Given the progress in terms of planning, securing vacant possession and renegotiating JV agreements, we now expect our first 2 projects to start on site in 2026 with the potential to invest around GBP 1 billion into our 3 key schemes by 2030 and a further GBP 2 billion beyond that date. Ungeared returns are expected to be in the low double digits with net yields on cost of circa 5%, which given that rental growth is highly correlated to inflation and captured annually provides an attractive real return. Whilst this pipeline forms a valuable base, we aim to accelerate the rebalancing of our portfolio and scale up of our residential platform via selective acquisitions as we see attractive opportunities emerging at returns which are accretive to part of our capital employed in offices. We're planning to host a Capital Markets event in the second half of the next financial year to provide you with more detail and insight in the timing of specific phases, costs, rents, et cetera, for our residential developments but for now, I'll provide you with a high-level overview of our key projects. Starting with Finchley Road in Zone 2, North London, where we have outlined consent for 1,800 homes and detailed consent for the first 600. We recently submitted a revised planning application for this first phase to include the latest Building Safety Act requirements and expect a decision on this in the second half of 2025. We have vacant possession for Phase 1 and demolition for this phase is now complete, which means we could start on site in 2026 with a potential first delivery in 2028. The indicative investment for the entire project will be over GBP 1 billion across multiple phases, subject to final scope planning and the design of later phases, and we anticipate a return in the low double digits and net yield on cost of close to 5%, which implies circa 15% to 20% profit on cost. Moving on to Mayfield, which will likely be our second project to start. Set around a new 6-acre park next to Manchester's main railway station, this project also has effective outline consent in the form of a strategic regeneration framework, and we have submitted a detailed planning application for Phase 1. This is well supported by local stakeholders, and we expect a planning decision in the second half of this year. We plan to start the development of a GBP 150 million office block this spring, which will unlock the delivery of the circa 1,700 homes in subsequent phases, so we could start on site with the first residential development towards the end of 2026. The overall investment in this is around GBP 1 billion, again, spread over multiple phases with returns and yields slightly above those in Central London but offering a comparable overall profit on cost. Just behind these 2 projects in terms of timing is a project in Lewisham. We've been through a number of iterations on this over the years. But late last year, we submitted the planning application for an outline consent for up to 2,800 homes, including a detailed application for the first phase of close to 600 homes. This followed extensive consultation with the local community. So we are delighted that our planning application has received 10x more letters of support from local stakeholders than objections, which is pretty unique for a project of this nature. Our proposals have also received very positive feedback from the local council with a planning decision again expected in the second half of this year. We have full flexibility to obtain vacant position for the first phase so demolition could start on 2026 or development start in 2027 and first delivery in 2029. Depending on the final scope, the indicative investment across the various distinct phases could be over GBP 1 billion, with a yield on cost slightly above Finchley Road but a similar IRR. Beyond these three projects, which are in an advanced stage of planning and preparation, we also secured 2 new opportunities last year that provide further long term optionality. In October, we took full control of MediaCity in Salford, Greater Manchester by buying out a minority JV partner. We have already started to see the upside from improving the asset management of the existing estate now that we have full control in the form of new leasing activity, well ahead of plan, but this also provides us with full control over the adjacent land, which has a planning allocation for up to 2,700 new homes. In addition, in spring, we acquired a small retail block adjacent to our St. David Shopping Center in Cardiff. In the short term, this provides a high income return and has potential to be repositioned for temporary F&B or leisure use. But in the medium term, this could provide potential for 250 new homes. Both sites are at an early stage, but we will now explore opportunities to unlock the delivery of these as this would also add more value to our existing assets in these locations. In order to facilitate the step-up in residential development from 2026 onwards, we plan to scale back new office-led development starts by at least half compared to the levels of office development we've had on site over the last 5 years. We're starting to see encouraging interest in our 2 on-site schemes in Victoria and Southbank, -- so we expect to start to see progress on pre-letting on these in the second half as both schemes get near completion due by the end of the next financial year. Beyond this, we will shift future development starts more towards residential, reflecting the more attractive risk return prospects I mentioned earlier. To fund our growth in retail and residential, we are planning to reduce our capital employed in offices and exit our residual assets in subscale sectors over time. We currently have GBP 6.5 billion of capital employed in office-led assets, which we aim to reduce by GBP 2 billion over the next 5 years, likely through a combination of individual asset sales and potential third-party capital. This follows our GBP 2.2 billion of office disposals over the last 4 years and is mostly earmarked for 2026 and beyond as this is when our residential development and investment will start to pick up. Over the past 4 years, we've also sold GBP 0.8 billion of noncore assets, and we are now planning to sell a residual GBP 0.8 billion of retail and leisure parks over the next 3 years to fund our planned investment in growing our retail platform. This will initially be focused on retail parks where yields are lower, and we have already captured near-term asset management upside, whereas there's more upside potential in leisure parks given their higher income yields, so these will likely follow at a later stage. Overall, this provides a clear plan in terms of capital recycling with significant growth in residential and retail funded by reducing our capital employed in offices and monetizing surplus land and noncore assets. Whilst headline rental yields in offices are higher than in residential, actual net effective income yields are broadly similar as tenant incentives reduce headline office rents by circa 20%, whereas lease incentives in residential are minimal. Taking into account the sale of low or non-yielding predevelopment assets, this means we expect a modest income pickup from capital recycling on top of the enhanced longer-term income growth is offers. Moreover, as the average yield of the assets we plan to recycle out of is not far off our marginal borrowing cost, we do not expect to see any material short-term fluctuations in EPS from disposing assets ahead of reinvesting proceeds. So to summarize, over the next few years, we will rebalance our portfolio to higher income and higher income growth. In executing our strategy, we will maintain a clear view on the risk return prospects of the investment opportunities in front of us. Whilst the cyclicality of our returns is set to reduce as the volatility in residential returns is much lower than in offices, as shown on the right. Delivering on this will therefore see us create significant value through driving long-term sustainable income and EPS growth from a best-in-class urban real estate platform. And with that, I will now hand over to Vanessa.

Thank you, Remco, and good afternoon. I will now provide more color on what all of this means for the returns that we expect to generate in the near and the medium term. At our half year results in November, we raised our EPS guidance on the back of higher like-for-like income growth and improved cost savings. Since then, we've continued to see strong operational outperformance versus the wider market. In retail, the sales and footfall growth over the Christmas trading quarter in our locations materially outperformed the U.K. national average. And in offices, we have seen 13% growth in utilization over the last 3 months, even though growth in the TfL tube traffic was only 1% over the same period. And we expanded on the high quality of our portfolio with the acquisition of Liverpool One in December at an attractive 7.5% income yield, and we're now progressing a select number of noncore disposals. This positive momentum since our half year results means that we now expect EPRA EPS for this year to be slightly ahead of our raised guidance at just over 50.1p. This provides a good starting point for further growth in the years ahead. So I'll now talk through each of the key areas of income and the EPS growth that Mark mentioned earlier, alongside the impact of the reallocation of capital and growth in the residential sector that Remco also set out. So starting with capturing reversion and driving like-for-like net rental income growth. In November, we said that we expected like-for-like growth of close to 4% for this year, up from our original guidance of around 2.8%, which we remain comfortable with. And over the past few sets of results, we have shown how the uplifts in relettings and renewals in retail have turned a corner. They're now up at 6% over passing rent. And as our portfolio is nearing full occupancy, we will soon start to lap the 5-year anniversary of deals that were signed during the COVID lockdowns. And so this growth will continue. And our office portfolio is now circa 10% reversionary. Given the growth in ERVs in recent years, this underpins future income growth here as well. In addition, around 10% of our income is turnover linked, and so we should benefit from inflation in the form of turnover growth. Moreover, we expect our gross to net margin to improve by circa 150 basis points on a like-for-like basis due to the cost efficiencies and the benefits from technology investment and process automation, as Mark mentioned earlier. Changes in our portfolio mix will naturally have an impact on our overall gross to net margin. But all combined, this means that we expect to deliver annual growth in like-for-like net rental income in the low to mid-single digits, which is a key driver of EPS growth in the next 1 to 3 years, and we will continue beyond that. In addition, we are seeing the benefits come through from our focus on improving efficiency over the past few years. And this partly reflects the investments in data and technology plus the changes that we've made to create a more agile organization. Overall, we expect our overhead costs to end up below GBP 65 million over the next 3 years, which would be a GBP 20 million saving versus 2023, and that's despite continued inflation since then. We've already delivered part of that in the last year in the form of organizational changes and procurement savings, which more than offset inflation. And we expect to deliver a further GBP 12 million of net savings by 2027. And that's despite the increase in national insurance and continued wage inflation. And our planned capital recycling will further enhance earnings and importantly, future income growth. Over the next 3 years, releasing about half of our current capital employed in predevelopment assets will add around GBP 15 million to earnings through reduced interest and capitalized costs. Over the next 2 to 5 years, we expect to see further positive impact from rebalancing our portfolio mix. New investments in retail, whether through CapEx or acquisition, is highly accretive. Headline yields in offices are higher than residential, although the tenant incentives in offices are typically 20%. So the actual net effective yields are well below these headline yields. Net yields in residential range from low 4s for prime investment assets in Central London to the mid-5s for development in major regional cities. And as incentives in residential are minimal, this means that on average, actual net effective income yields are similar to offices. However, subsequent like-for-like rental growth in residential is higher as rents are typically reset annually rather than through the 5-yearly rent reviews. So this, combined with a lower risk profile, means that it provides us with an attractive income stream. And our key focus in all of this is growing the net income returns. Operating costs vary significantly between the different asset classes. So for example, mature offices with long leases have very low operating costs, but limited room to create value, whereas more operational sectors with shorter leases, such as residential, have higher operating costs, but much more opportunity to drive income growth. And the chart on the right illustrates this, and it shows that there is a strong correlation between the lease length and the overall operational cost in real estate. This therefore, means that a lower EPRA cost ratio is not necessarily better than a higher one as the net return at the bottom line is actually what matters most. And our recent investments in data and technology systems have been made with residential in mind. So the incremental overhead cost of establishing a residential platform is relatively limited, also because we can also reallocate resources internally. Yet due to the difference in direct operating costs, for every GBP 1 billion of capital that we reallocate from office to residential, our EPRA cost ratio would increase by around 120 basis points. But this solely reflects the difference in the gross to net margins and our actual net income would be the same. And our future income growth would be better. And ultimately, this higher quality income is driving value. As we look forward, our strategy is expected to deliver compound growth in EPS over the next 5 years with circa 20% potential growth as is shown on this chart, resulting in higher income, higher future growth and a lower risk profile. This is despite the known headwinds of the anticipated lease expiry and then exit of Queen Anne Mansions, which will result in around GBP 20 million reduction in earnings, although the impact of this is spread over 4 financial years from financial year '27 onwards. This also includes the assumption that based on the current yield curve, our average interest costs will go up over time as we refinance the existing debt when it matures. Despite this, capturing the growing reversion in our portfolio and delivering low to mid-single-digit growth in like-for-like net rental income will deliver meaningful EPS growth, as shown on the left. And this is further enhanced by the strategic actions that we've outlined today shown on the right, and driven by the reduction in overheads that I explained earlier. The release of capital from predevelopment assets adds around GBP 15 million to earnings and rebalancing our portfolio mix through accretive capital recycling all contribute to the potential for EPRA EPS to grow from slightly over 50p this year to around 60p by 2030. And then further benefits from enhanced income in residential will flow beyond that. Based on our target dividend cover of 1.2x to 1.3x, this will drive continued growth in dividends, which going forward will be paid semiannually in line with our financial reporting cycle. And this provides the basis for delivering an attractive return on equity in the years ahead. Changes in valuation yields always have an impact on individual years. But as Remco mentioned earlier, in the long run, yields are broadly stable. This means long-term value growth is driven by income growth, both at the property level as well as the overall group level. With a current income return of 5.8% on NTA and a strategy that's focused on driving sustainable income and EPS growth, we are well positioned to deliver a strong return on equity. We are seeing continued ERV growth in offices, and we expect ERV growth in retail to pick up given the consistent leasing evidence. In addition, releasing capital from the predevelopment assets will improve our return on equity by circa 25 to 50 basis points, and that's due to the lower interest costs and the reduction in costs that are being capitalized ahead of project starts. Rebalancing our portfolio mix will further improve our return on equity and reduce the cyclicality of our returns over time. All this continues to be underpinned by our strong capital base, which remains a key priority. Our average debt maturity is long at 10 years, which provides visibility on interest costs. And we continue to target net debt to EBITDA of 8x or less. Following the acquisition of Liverpool One, we are just below this on a pro forma basis, but reducing our exposure to low or non-yielding predevelopment assets and reducing our overhead costs, all else equal, would reduce this number by 0.7x. We said in November that we expected our 35% LTV to go up slightly in the short term as we would look to capitalize on attractive acquisition opportunities. This has increased to 38% on a pro forma basis. But as we continue to progress a select number of noncore disposals, we expect LTV to reduce to the mid-30s in the near future. All this means that our balance sheet remains strong, whilst our credit profile will further improve as we recycle capital into less cyclical assets and we focus on investments with strong structural demand. As a result, the overall outlook for returns is positive. We continue to see growth, good operational momentum with EPS for this year expected to be slightly ahead of our raised guidance of 50.1p, and we expect EPS for the financial year '26 to see good progress towards the financial year '30 potential that I set out earlier. And beyond that, the 5-year outlook is also positive. Our existing 5.8% income return on NTA is high, and we expect growth in EPRA EPS over the next 5 years of around 20% by 2030. Our dividend is expected to grow in line with this and our return on equity outlook is attractive as income grows and yields have stabilized. So with that, I'll now hand you back to Mark.

Vanessa, thank you very much. So what should you expect to see from us from this point? Well, firstly, over the next 1 to 3 years, we'll be focused on capturing the growing reversion in our existing portfolio to drive continued like-for-like income growth. And we will further reduce our cost base as we leverage the investments that we've made in our platform over the past few years. We'll be releasing capital from low or non-yielding predevelopment assets, and that will have a positive impact on both earnings and overall return on equity. And we will continue to invest in growing our retail platform as we leverage the market-leading position that we have created, whilst also exiting our remaining noncore assets. Over the next 2 to 5 years, we will then start our first residential development projects as we seek to build a GBP 2 billion plus residential platform through a combination of delivering our pipeline and selective acquisitions. And to fund this, we will start to reduce our capital employed in offices from 2026 onwards. And that should align with the start of our first residential schemes and a continued recovery in investment market activity. So to summarize, Landsec today is well placed as a result of the successful execution of our 2020 strategy. At a time when quality has never been more important for occupiers, we have established a best-in-class office and retail portfolio, both of which are focused on areas of strong customer demand. And we have created a GBP 3 billion residential pipeline, providing a valuable opportunity to grow in this attractive structural growth market, all of which is underpinned by our strong balance sheet, which remains a key priority. As we move to the next phase of our strategy, the opportunity to build on this success provides clear upside. Our portfolio is 97% full, so ERVs continue to grow across retail and offices. Office rents are already around 10% reversionary, but this ERV growth adds further upside to this. Whilst in retail, uplifts on relettings and renewals are now up to 6% and continuing to rise. In addition, our focus on cost efficiencies will see overhead reduced by over 15% versus the year to March 2024. And our capital recycling will drive material upside in income and income growth. All this is built on our focus on delivering sustainable income and EPS growth, and we see the potential to drive around 20% growth in earnings per share by financial year '30, which will drive continued growth in dividends. With an existing income return NTA of 5.8%, this compound growth in EPS will drive an attractive return on equity. So as we move to higher income, higher income growth and lower cyclicality, the delivery of this strategy will see Landsec drive significant shareholder value. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. I'm now going to open the floor to questions. We are recording the session here. So if I could ask you just to -- when you raise your hand, wait for a handheld mic, that means we'll capture the question. And depending on the quality of the question and more importantly, the quality of the answer, it may well make it through to our website later on today. Thank you.

It's Paul May from Barclays. Just a couple of questions. One on the sources and then the uses of capital. You mentioned about selling the office portfolio at the moment. Just wondered how you expect to extract current value given where yields are in that portfolio versus buyers' funding costs and opportunity cost? And given the transaction volume is pretty subdued, particularly for large assets, just wondered how you plan to extract the full value or the current value on those assets? And then the second one, the whole presentation strategy is focused on income and cash flow growth, but the majority of funding is going into low-income residential development. Just wondered how do you plan to differentiate yourselves versus others who I don't think anyone has successfully delivered an income-focused residential platform. in the past, it's always been capital. And the yield on cost that you mentioned at 5% is not particularly attractive from an income-focused strategy. Just wonder how you plan to answer that.

Thank you, Paul. So why don't I take the first question about the recycling of capital over time out of our office portfolio, and I'll ask Remco to talk a little bit more about the income returns on residential. So the first thing I would say with respect to the office sales is that as we've been very clear here, 2026 is when we need to start deploying capital into our residential program. So we're certainly not anticipating moving into a significant disposal program right now. As you correctly flagged and as obviously, we talked in our own presentation, investment volumes over the past couple of years have been very, very low. I think for last year, they were the lowest they've been since the late 1990s. We are, however, seeing clear signs of activity, I think, returning to the market. And this is really then all about how that capital comes back into the market and what sort of opportunities it's looking at. Now what happens in most cycles and what I think is happening now is that the capital that's coming in first is inevitably looking at the higher return value-add type opportunities and starting to move into core plus. Now when I look at our portfolio, you'll know that we sold the likes of 21 Moorfields, the Deloitte headquarters at New Street Square, the Mitsui headquarters at New Ludgate over recent years. That was very much core income. Now since we've sold the sort of the majority of the core assets in our portfolio, a lot more of what we have remaining is our multi-let portfolio, very high-quality assets, but more multi-let and therefore, more coal plus in nature. So I think the type of product, the type of asset we have is going to be playing well into where that liquidity is going to start to return. You then talked about achieving sort of maximum value. And I think there's an important thing here to look at both sides of the equation. So it's not just about maximizing value from what we sell. It's about the relative value we get from what we sell versus the relative value of what we achieve on where we are investing those assets. And so the fact that Remco showed the source and application of sort of funds on that slide showing if you adjust for tenant incentives to the P&L yield, the true income yield that's reflected in our numbers, in our reported numbers, you're actually looking at numbers that are very close in terms of the net income return through the P&L. And we're moving from a portfolio that is more difficult to capture growth in on an annualized basis, the longer lease, higher incentives you've got to recover into a portfolio with a comparable starting yield where you can capture growth annually, that leasing which is diversified across a wider number of occupiers. So I think it's more about the relative return of the 2 rather than are we going to get best return out of office right now compared to, say, 3 or 4 years' time. So I think it's a combination of those factors that give us confidence that this is the right strategy, but also an executable strategy. And if we take the residential income part of that specifically, I might just ask Remco to add a few thoughts on that.

Yes. So I think, Mark, you already alluded to part of it. I think it's looking at where we see net income returns on a net effective basis in terms of P&L. And as we set out the fact that in residential, you don't have the same type of incentives that you have in offices means that the net effective income return that we record through our P&L and earnings is actually broadly similar. But what is more important, which I started my first slide with at the beginning is that in a world where nominal interest rates are higher and inflation is likely to remain elevated, we believe it is very important to have income which is real and which is growing. And the ability to capture income growth in residential on an annual basis much more aligned to inflation over time than certainly in offices where you're reliant on 5-year rent review cycles, we believe makes it a much more valuable real income stream, which is ultimately more attractive and ultimately something that is going to drive and underpin income growth and EPS growth across the portfolio on a more sustained basis than you can achieve in offices.

I think it's why it was so important for us to set out here that this isn't a strategy of waiting whilst we rotate capital and at some point, income starts growing. It's really important that people appreciate the 2 strands, one that's right now and one that starts in a couple of years' time. And those combined strands deliver that 20% or so growth in EPS between now and 2030 that we've indicated. So there are multiple aspects to that, one element of which is the rotation of capital into that more real growth, structural growth sector.

Sorry, just one quick follow-up, if I could, on that. Does that mean you're prepared to take should we say, value losses versus book on office disposals in order to rotate that capital into better opportunities where you see better growth in the future?

We provided the relative value of where we're taking capital from and the returns that we're foregoing versus the returns that we would deploy capital into. I think that's one of the things that is clear when you say we're focusing on earnings growth, not just a total return or protecting a valuation. So it will be the relative value of the 2. And if that leads to an outcome which is slightly different to where the book value is. And I don't think we're pointing to significant differences here. But if that points to something that's slightly different, if it's the right strategy, that's what will drive the decision. Could I ask you perhaps to pass the microphone back -- sorry, forward first, and then we'll go back to Alan.

Hemant Kotak from Kolytics. Just a follow-up really on the growth side. So one of the slides showed that renting is cheaper at the moment given where interest rates are. If interest rates do fall, would you reassess your view on rental growth? And would that change how you approach things going forward?

Yes. So I mean, I think our view on rental growth and you look at that chart that we included on there that showed essentially perfect correlation between residential rents over the last 20-plus years and inflation. I think is that demand-supply imbalance, which ultimately is going to have an impact on what the long-term run for growth is for rental growth in residential. So I think in terms of where rates move to and the relative impact on values and return prospects in different sectors, that, of course, is something we'll always take into account as Remco alluded to on our sort of risk and return slide. But if we look at the ability to deliver real growth relative to where inflation is, our confidence in residential particularly based on that track record is where it's highest. If we could maybe just pass that back a second.

Alan Carter from Stifel. If, heaven forbid, core plus office investment buyers don't come back next year, can you just explain on the development of the residential, which I noticed you keep referring to Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, what the planning situation is in regard to being able to pause those developments going forward?

Absolutely. I mean there are 3 projects that benefit from a -- either benefit from or very close to securing an outline consent. In order to be able to proceed with a commitment to develop, you need a detailed consent. We have those for the first phases at a couple of those projects or close to securing on the second one. If we were not to proceed at all within, I think, typically a 3-year period of that planning conditions being settled, then at some point, those planning conditions planning applications would lapse. However, you've got the use, the scale and massing all of the principles that are approved. So I think in reality, that's a relatively low risk. But for the avoidance of doubt, and I think you sort of alluded to it, we're only committing to new developments when we're comfortable we've got the balance sheet capacity and the development risk capacity to take them forward. I think it's also worth noting that chunking them up into small phases, which is a really important element because you talk about GBP 1 billion project, it sounds like you've got to wait a very, very long time to get income from it. The first phase of our first project, we're indicating is roughly a 2-year program. So putting capital in and then starting to generate income from that is a 2- to 3-year time frame. Putting that into office, for example, is more like a 3, 4, maybe slightly longer time frame. So I think we do see the capital turn into income and income growth more rapidly through those smaller lot sizes in each phase. Perhaps come over to this side. I've got one coming that way.

It's Zachary Gage from UBS. A couple of questions. First one, sort of building on what Paul touched on, but thinking more about the low yield, no-yield development sites that you plan to sell. I think everyone would probably accept those are probably quite difficult assets to sell. development returns are quite difficult to generate. And these are obviously the sites that you've earmarked as being less accretive to value. So a similar question, sort of what level of discount to book value would you consider coming out of those assets to support the strategy and obviously to help EPS growth? And then in terms of the EPS trajectory in that sort of line to -- do you see that being sort of relatively linear or quite lumpy? And in particular, I'm thinking about potential impact of selling some of the high-yielding leisure assets and sort of the J-curve associated with setting up the residential platform when that moves in-house and obviously, the developments, which will also be relatively lumpy as well.

Cool. Thank you. So why don't I cover the development or predevelopment sites and then ask Vanessa just to talk to give a bit more color on the EPS trajectory. We obviously, I think, included some commentary on '25 and '26 within the RNS that we issued earlier. So just as a brief reminder of the slide that Remco was talking to, we've got 3 types of predevelopment sites in broad terms across the portfolio, about GBP 240 million invested in residential sites in the main, that's the 3 sites we're taking forward. So not relevant in this context. About GBP 360 million in office, which is much more relevant and then about GBP 100 million in other, of which a decent chunk is strat land. So our GBP 300 million estimate comes really from the second and third buckets there. I think Remco quite deliberately used the phrase pragmatic around value. So we're certainly not holding out so we must get a certain value. Ultimately, these are very high-quality projects, very well progressed in terms of planning, et cetera. But as you say, there is pressure on returns. So we'll have to see where the market gets to with that, but we're not holding out slavishly for a book value within that. They are, however, we think, very attractive projects to bring forward. Countering that, the GBP 100 million that we referred to in the third bucket is essentially strat land and sites and those are carried at cost. And so if I take, for example, a project that we have close to Stansted Airport, where we secured an allocation for single-family homes a year or so ago, about 1,500 units, that's carried at cost. in a market where you've got a government politically that's looking to find single land ownerships that can deliver large-scale, large numbers of homes this side of an election. So I think we've got a little bit of a balance within that, that it's not simply everything carried at a value that may be difficult to attain in a market where people are weary on development returns. I think we've got an opportunity to balance that off over that 1- to 3-year period through the strat land component there. Vanessa, on earnings trajectory.

Yes, the earnings trajectory point, Zach, the phasing of that, I would expect not to be necessarily over lumpy. I would say fairly balanced over that period with a few caveats to that point, which I think I mentioned around QAM, so the Queen Anne Mansions asset where really that's from financial year '27 onwards over a 4-year period. But if you look at the first strand the first sort of 3 bars within that chart where we're looking at the reversion and the like-for-like growth and then the offsetting against the interest expense as we see that interest expense over time over that 5-year period aligned to really where we've got maturities coming through. That's fairly well balanced and fairly even. So I would say that what we've assumed and looked at here is more the opportunity around the like-for-like growth and the reversion coming through in the first sort of 1 to 3 years. And we haven't necessarily factored in all of the growth around residential because some of that falls after the time period that we've kind of cut off here just given the nature of when that completes.

Yes. I mean, I guess to follow up on that, I'm thinking also on disposals and potential lag between selling, say, something like the leisure portfolio, which is quite high yielding, that money then going into development and even when that development completes being much lower yielding, and obviously, we had the point at the half year results where you sold out of the high-yielding hotel portfolio and it took a little while to recycle that capital. I guess what I'm asking is, do you foresee a similar situation in some of the future years where you're selling high-yield assets or when you're bringing the residential platform in-house, I assume there will be some increase in cost at that point in time before the income fully comes on stream that would make the profile, I guess, more from '27 on a little bit more lumpy and have some of those years where maybe earnings are flat or on that?

So 2 or 3 points. If we just look at the timing of the disposals, if you look at what we've done this year with the acquisition of Liverpool One ahead of retail park disposals, that helps to balance the offset with that. If you look at what we're looking to sell initially, it will be -- we'll be looking at some of those predevelopment so no or low-yielding assets. So that the net impact of that offset with interest is actually positive to earnings. And the other point I would just say, particularly around residential is what we have been doing is we've been going through anyway modernizing our systems and upgrading the platform that we operate today that has been designed with residential in mind. So there's not a big uplift in cost or really any significant uplift in cost with that. It's more the direct cost of operating residential, the direct -- the gross to net mix, which I think I addressed through the presentation that we've just had.

And just to pick up on the capital recycling point because I mean, I recall at our full year results last year, we're very clear we sold the hotel portfolio. Earnings will go backwards slightly before recovering. Everyone was very grumpy about that. Ultimately, through rental growth across the course of the year, cost savings and then deploying into Liverpool, we've more than offset that position. The difference there, of course, is you're selling a GBP 400 million portfolio and recycling into a GBP 500 million asset. Those are 2 big, quite lumpy deals. I would expect across the bulk of what we're selling, you're looking at smaller lot sizes and where the lot sizes are a bit bigger, the yields are much closer to the marginal cost of debt. So we think this is pretty manageable over that period of time, and that's why we've gone as far as we have in terms of giving the detail in the earnings bridge that Vanessa talked through. We got a question in the middle at the back there. It will be in a second.

Adam Shapton from Green Street. I want to start with a big picture question about the strategy review. Can you comment on to what extent did you and the Board discuss a change in the strategy of, let's say, the REIT wrapper. So I would characterize this as a sector selection and maybe investment style strategy change, but there's still development risk, clearly, and you're still -- you're moving from an office-led diversified REIT to a equally diversified between 3 sectors REIT. Was there a discussion between you and the Board on something more dramatic, so removing development from the picture, for example, or drastically reducing that? Or dare I say it, a REIT that we shouldn't expect in 5 years, there'll be a strategy review of this kind that's a pivot away from this one in the start we've had versus 2020? And I'll let you answer that, and then I have a different question as well.

Yes. I mean we've certainly over the course, not just through this review, but over the last 18 to 24 months, have been looking very carefully at the development risks and returns that are on offer. We know we've seen a lot of cost inflation. We know where pockets of that have been within the supply chain where capacity has become constrained. We know that there's quite a lot of risk that in the past will have been borne by contractors and covered through insurance policies that are now either costly or impossible to cover. So there's more risk being left with developers. And there's more cost going through that means if you want to achieve a sensible return on development in our view and looking at the office portfolio that we had in front of us, we felt that you had to put quite a bit of growth in to be comfortable with that. And actually, the returns look very comparable to residential development. So we certainly have absolutely objectively looked at development, and we've not gone through this in terms of let's just keep developing. By the beginning of next year, we will have got to a position where effectively there will be virtually 0 development commitment. What we're signaling at this point is that our expectation is we will rotate towards residential at that point, and those projects are in good shape. They are materially lower risk in development terms. There's much less M&E in them, which is where a lot of the inflation risk is set, and I probably add to that facades as well is something that's driven a lot of cost up. You've got a much more diversified leasing risk. You've got much clearly -- more clearly correlated upside. It's challenging to move simply into residential with all of the attractions that, that has through an investment strategy. There isn't really that much of that product out there, particularly of the sort of newest generation Post-building Safety Act. So we think there's a significant opportunity to build over time, scale and competitive advantage there. And that's what's driven us towards that sector and seeing the appeal in that rather than say we just have to keep developing. But we've looked at everything here. And I think moving for a business that has been doing the scale of office development fairly regularly for a good number of decades, I think to move materially towards a sector that we think, and we've worked very hard to create the opportunity in recent years. We think that's reasonably significant, but it's building on the strength and capability within the business. But we have absolutely thought and looked at all different aspects as part of this rather than just trying to tweak things around the edges to essentially end up doing the same thing.

Sure. Second question, just on the relationship between earnings and leverage. So EPS appears to be much more of an end rather than an output. I just wanted to maybe get you to say on record that your commitment is to debt EBITDA below the LTV target you set out here because as your portfolio becomes inverted comes lower risk, we see from lots of listed companies, the temptation is to add a bit of debt because the market will tolerate it to help earnings. So there's a full sort of -- in the context of that 60p target, the commitment to the balance sheet metrics you set out is very firm.

I definitely heard it at least 3 times and saw on at least 3 different slides that there was net debt to EBITDA of less than 8x. So I don't think we could be any more clearly on the record than we've already said. Question at the front here. Anyone wants to disable the microphones before he gets it, that would be fine.

Marcus Phayre-Mudge, Columbia Threadneedle. First of all, Mark, I wasn't offered a badge, which I think was a message. So I think not really wanted is the answer. Anyway, but I'll ask my question. Anyway, thank you very much for letting me in. Next 1 to 3 years, obviously, I'm a long-term investor, but paid on a shorter time frame. Quite interested in your thoughts. You sort of slightly lost over retail. By the way, great stuff in Liverpool. Would you consider more of those? I mean, as part -- I know we're making this transition to residential, but in between now and then, is there an opportunity to -- you've got a skill base here. You've built a team that's engaging with all your retailers, et cetera. Is that something you'd like to still do a bit of?

Yes. I think the final bullet, I think, on our next 1- to 3-year strand of activity was to continue to seek to grow our GBP 3 billion plus retail portfolio. We, of course, had the Liverpool transaction that you saw just before Christmas. That was a transaction that was a long time in the making. And that's a reflection of the fact that these deals tend to be complex and the assets of the right quality are few and far between. I think we will see other opportunities. I think we will be keen to pursue those other opportunities. And the way we've tried to think in broad terms around the recycling of capital is the remaining noncore assets, about GBP 800 million or so, would likely fund rotation into more retail, partly through CapEx in existing estate, which will be, we think, highly accretive, partly through looking to add to the portfolio. The rotation out of office, the GBP 2 billion that we've indicated there in broad terms would fund the GBP 2 billion that goes into residential. So it's still absolutely something that we would be hopeful of doing. But as Liverpool shows, to do the right quality of deals takes time. And ultimately, quality, as I said in the presentation, has never been more important to occupiers. We won't compromise on that. One on the end here and then we'll come a row back.

Okay. Ventsi Iliev from Kempen. Two quick questions from me. First one, how do you think about bringing private capital to accelerate the residential pipeline? And second, you also mentioned selective acquisitions. What sort of total returns are you looking at for those?

So I'll perhaps talk a little bit to private capital and then perhaps ask Remco to elaborate a little bit on how we would think about returns on selective acquisitions. So with respect to residential specifically, where I think your private capital question was, what we've set out here is an objective to establish a GBP 2 billion plus portfolio by around 2030. Now that's a stopping point on the journey. That's not the end in itself, but that's the time frame we've put on that. That is something that we would expect and feel we have the balance sheet capacity to fund entirely by ourselves. Now of course, longer term, scale is an important factor in driving operational performance and earnings performance from a residential portfolio. So I could see over time, the potential to work with partners. If we were to choose to have opportunities to grow more rapidly, that may mean we choose to bring private capital in, but it's not a core part of the strategy we've set out today. We felt it's very important for us to set out something which is more in our own -- sort of our own control, if you like, through having something that we could demonstrate the funding of through capital rotation on balance sheet. And then with respect to the sort of total return indications on retail investment, Remco?

Yes. We would expect the overall return on residential investment or residential acquisitions to be broadly in line with the kind of the return expectations that I set out on office investment on one of my slides. but with significantly lower risk to those returns and with higher like-for-like income growth on an annualized basis baked into those returns. So that's what I alluded to earlier in my presentation when we said, well, if we currently look at what is happening in the market, we see opportunities emerging, which would be accretive to returns of what part of our current capital employed in offices is expected to be. And as I said, with a lower risk associated with that.

If you wouldn't mind passing the microphone back.

It's Tom Musson at HSBC. I guess just in your minds, where is perhaps the biggest risk to the execution of this strategy from here? Is it liquidity in investment markets or on development execution, perhaps in planning or sort of financial risk on debt costs impacting earnings growth? I just wonder, I guess, which bit of the strategy in your minds is the risk most asymmetric, I suppose?

I think one of the things that we like about this strategy is that I don't see any one particular element to this, which is sort of absolutely pivotal around which everything else sort of hangs. But if you were to look at where we are today, we're certainly anticipating but not relying on a quick recovery in investment markets within the London office space. As I mentioned to the question earlier, we think where our portfolio is positioned relative to where and how that capital come back into the market, we think that is reasonably well placed, but we're not relying on that during 2025. The reason we split the 2 strands of activity, 1 to 3 years and 2 to 5 is I think there's a lot of stuff that's in that 1- to 3-year time frame, which has already been locked in, in many ways, the momentum we're seeing in the leasing across the portfolio, the cost efficiencies, the fact that there was effectively the full refinancing of the revolving credit facilities of the business in October of last year means in terms of on the near term, the known headwinds we've set out in that earnings. I don't think there are other things that we're worried about could fall one way or the other and knock us too far, of course. But ultimately, it's a capital rotation strategy, and that relies on investment market liquidity, both on the sell side and the buy side. But after 2 very lean years, we are seeing the evidence of that reemerging, and we're not reliant on that reemerging to a significant scale and in any event, not really before 2026. Any final questions here? Just pick up the microphone just in case we want it on the website, you never know.

No, no. Very unlikely. So it just occurred to me. On your forecasting on your returns for the resi portfolio, is your build cost inflation, are you matching that with your rental growth inflation? I mean I'm just looking at -- just thinking about risk and on the cost versus the returns. Are you assuming, therefore, that as you go through this, that rents are growing at the same rate as you?

In broad terms, yes. And for the more developed or more advanced developments that we have, we're working with contractors on detailed designs. We've got decent costs to give us a sense. And that does give us, I think, confidence that the inflation in that part of the market compared to what we have seen and are seeing in the commercial world is less pressured. So -- but in broad terms, yes, I think we're looking at the 2 being broadly the same. Okay. Well, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for taking the time to attend this afternoon. I do hope you have the opportunity to stay with us for a little while afterwards and enjoy the hospitality of our kind host, Deutsche Numis. But ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much.