Mirvac Group (MGR) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Mirvac full year 2023 results briefing. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to turn the conference over to the Group CEO and Managing Director, Campbell Hanan, you may begin.

Thank you, and good morning, and welcome to Mirvac's results presentation for FY '23. Here with me today are Courtenay Smith, Richard Seddon, Scott Mosely and Stuart Penklis. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet. For us today, that's the Gadigal people of the Eora nation and I pay my respects to elders past and present. There have been a number of changes in the past 6 months, and we've had the opportunity to restructure our business and to position ourselves for success in the future. Courtenay Smith has taken on the added responsibility for capital allocation. Richard Seddon has been appointed CEO Investment, having previously led our industrial team; and Scott Mosely leads our Funds Management business. We've also brought together all of our asset creation capabilities under development led by Stu Penklis combining both our commercial mixed-use and residential portfolios. At our third quarter update in April, I outlined 5 main areas of focus that will deliver performance into the future. I'm exceptionally proud of the progress we've made to date. In the financial year, we established new ventures across build to rent in industrial, and we integrated the MWOF platform into our business, growing our third-party capital under management by around $7 billion. We sold $0.5 billion of noncore assets, improving the quality of our investment portfolio. We created approximately $700 million of new assets in industrial and build to rent, underpinned by strong pre-leasing success. We settle almost 2,300 residential lots while increasing our presales to $1.8 billion. And we've also expanded our focus on the living sector to include land lease and we'll be piloting our first community at Everleigh in Brisbane with other projects also in early-stage planning. What I'd really like to highlight is that we achieved this in an environment where raising capital has become incredibly challenged. It's a testament to the quality of our assets and the capability of our people that we have executed on what we said we're going to do. Importantly, we progress these initiatives while prudently managing our costs and retaining balance sheet flexibility. We're gearing comfortably within our target range and maintaining leadership and sustainability and culture, which will help future-proof the business against changing stakeholder expectations. Executing against our strategic priorities, we delivered operating EPS of $0.147 per share, in line with revised guidance. And pleasingly, we grew DPS by 3% to $0.105 per share. We now manage around $26 billion of assets for ourselves and our partners with our third-party capital under management up 64% to $17 billion, which Scott will talk to shortly. Whilst the softening in cap rates in our investment properties resulted in a 5% decrease in our NTA. Through our integrated model, we're able to better manage risk to our business, which is particularly important in the current rising cost environment. Over the past 10 years, our development platform has delivered 13 new assets across industrial, build to rent and office, creating over $1.3 billion of value and $145 million of new NOI for our security holders. But the real value is how these new assets, combined with our disciplined approach to disposing of lower quality older assets have contributed to a modern, sustainable low CapEx diversified investment portfolio. This portfolio has maintained high occupancy of 97% and has delivered over 200 basis points of consistent outperformance over the past 10 years. Our asset curation capability is also critical in driving superior investment performance for both the balance sheet and third-party capital partners. This capability, combined with the best-in-class governance framework, underpins the growth of recurring management fees across both asset and funds management. Leadership in ESG remains a critical area to ensure the success of the business into the future. We're starting from a position of strength, having achieved net positive carbon in Scope 1 and 2 emission, 9 years ahead of our target. We've maintained high energy and water ratings across our investment portfolio, and we have a highly engaged and diverse workforce. We've outlined our intention to be net positive Scope 1, 2 and 3 carbon and water and net zero waste by 2030. And we're pleased to be ranked #1 globally for gender equality by Equileap for the second year in a row. Our continued leadership across all of these areas will remain a key focus with our customers, capital partners and employees demanding strong environmental, social and governance performance. I'll now pass to our CFO, Courtenay Smith, to run through our financial results.

Thanks, Campbell, and good morning, everyone. Turning to the financial results for FY '23. With the new leadership structure in place, we've updated our segment reporting and provided restated numbers prior to today. The new -- 3 new operating segments will now, we will now report on investment funds and developments. These segments are aligned to our strategic focus areas and support the growth of our business moving forward. Today, we present a solid set of financial results, in line with the revised market guidance we provided in April this year. We delivered earnings per security of $0.147 along with distributions per security of $0.105, which is up 3% on FY '22. Operating profit was $580 million, a 3% decline on the prior period. Within this result, investment EBIT grew $51 million, funds EBIT grew $18 million, and this was offset by a reduction in the contribution from development of $71 million. Within investments, we saw like-for-like NOI growth of 2%, a full year contribution from completed developments at 80 Ann Street in Brisbane and the locomotive workshop in Sydney. We had a positive impact from the recovery from COVID, mainly in retail, and these increases were partly offset by the impact of current and prior year noncore asset disposals. The increase in funds came from a $13 million growth in funds management income due to the onboarding of MWOF and a performance fee on switchyards, which was recognized in the first half. An $11 million increase in asset management income, also led by the impact of MWOF, but also included income from the management of newly completed development assets and increased leasing momentum in the office portfolio. These improvements were offset by increased costs with the establishment of a new leadership structure and the MWOF build-to-rent operating platforms. Our development result was down for the period. In commercial mixed-use, we recognized a profit on the sell-down of 34 Waterloo Road in the first half and successfully established the Mirvac Industrial venture in the second half, which was ceded by a 49% interest in the switchyard development. In residential, we saw a reduction in EBIT of $80 million driven by the prior year including the 50% sell-down of Smiths Lane and also a decline in settlement volumes in the current year. As previously indicated, this result was affected by weather and labor shortages and most of these deferred settlements are now expected in FY '24. The increase in management and administration expense for the development business reflects cost incurred in the next phase of investment in our ERP system rollout. Unallocated overheads saw a modest increase below inflation, and our net finance costs increased due to 2 things: firstly, a higher interest rate with our weighted average cost of debt for the 12 months, 4.7% compared to 3.4% in the prior year; and secondly, a higher average debt balance for the period, led by development spend, a delay in residential settlements and to delay in the completion of our asset disposal program for the year. The statutory result was impacted by devaluations in both our assets under development and our stabilized portfolio. We recorded a $42 million revaluation loss on our developments underway, driven mainly by a reduction at LIV Albert Fields due to increasing construction costs. Within the investment portfolio, cap rate expansion led to a 5.6% and 5.3% valuation decline on our office and retail portfolios, respectfully, versus June 2022, partially offset by a 6.2% gain in Industrial. Statutory loss includes one-off impacts relating to costs incurred on key transactions in the year, MWOF, MIV and build-to-rent. Costs related to asset sales, costs arising from organizational restructure and the write-off of costs on projects we will no longer be pursuing. Turning to our balance sheet position. We continue to apply a disciplined approach in managing capital and ensuring there is capacity for future growth. Our balance sheet gearing was 25.9% at year-end, well within our target band of 20% to 30%. We have over $1.3 billion in liquidity at year-end and there is significant headroom in our bank covenants. Both -- cost of debt at year-end was 5.4% and the weighted average cost of debt for the 12 months was 4.7%, a significant increase on FY '22 due to the lift in the base cash rate over the year. We maintain our A3 and A- credit ratings with Moody's and Fitch, a strong position that provides us with access to various debt sources at competitive pricing. Moving on to capital allocation. Despite challenging market conditions, we have completed $450 million of noncore asset disposal program and made good progress on the balance. We have signed contracts on 60 Margaret Street in the MetCentre. These contracts are in escrow awaiting the completion of the remaining conditions. We have exchanged contracts on 367 Collins Street, with the finalization conditional on capital. We remain committed to improving the quality of our portfolio while strengthening our balance sheet and recycling capital for development opportunities. So in addition to the already announced asset disposals, a further $400 million of noncore investment assets will be targeted for sale, timing of these sales, though will depend on market conditions. Combined with the deferral of $1.8 billion of office developments, our capital partnering initiatives and retained earnings, these disposals provide the balance sheet with flexibility to take advantage of future opportunities. We continue to hold the 70% to 80% target allocation towards passive investment comprised of modern, low CapEx assets that will deliver strong cash flows. Over time, we are looking to reduce our weighting to office, sharpening the focus on premium CBD assets, maintain exposure to retail, and we will increase weighting towards industrial living as both sectors are supported by strong fundamentals that we believe will deliver outperformance over time. With our active capital allocation, we will continue to be selective in launching new developments with a focus on capital-efficient structures, supported by third-party capital partners and de-risking through pre-commitments and presales. Thank you, and I'll now hand over to Richard.

Thank you, Courtenay, and good morning, everyone. It's been a busy 4 months since I started in my expanded role, and I'm looking forward to continuing to serve our security holders. As you heard from Campbell, over the last 10 years, we've actively transformed the quality of our investment portfolio, disposing over $4 billion of older assets and creating over $6 billion of brand-new, highly sustainable award-winning assets, which resonate with customer demand across build-to-rent, industrial and office. Our strategic focus is to continue to improve the cash flow resilience of our portfolio by lifting our exposure to structurally supported living sectors, including build-to-rent and land lease, industrial and high-quality offers. Our prime modern and sustainable office portfolio has demonstrated continued strong performance. NOI was up 7% on pcp to $395 million, benefiting from development completions at 80 Ann Street in Brisbane and the locomotive workshop in Sydney, with strong like-for-like growth of 3.3% and occupancy resilience at 95%. Leasing activity was up 44% on the previous year with deals across 62,000 square meters and gross leasing spreads of a healthy 3.5%. Net valuations were down 5.6% as a result of cap rates expanding 23 basis points to 5.3%. Looking ahead, we expect to see continued bifurcation of customer and capital demand towards high-quality sustainable assets. Our 99% prime grade portfolio with an average age of only 11 years and high sustainability credentials is exceptionally well placed. And as you can see on the charts on the right-hand side, this has supported strong relative performance over all time horizons. Following planned divestments of 60 Margaret and 367 Collins Street, nearly 50% of the portfolio will be premium grade, an improvement of around -- from around 30% in 2019 and materially higher than the broader market. Tenants are reaffirming the important role the office plays for their businesses, and this is supporting improving physical occupancy and increased leasing activity against the subdued supply outlook requiring higher economic rents due to elevated construction costs and softer cap rates. Our logistics portfolio continues to perform well. Like-for-like NOI was up 4.3% to $57 million with leasing across 17% of the portfolio over the year at gross leasing spreads of 15% and high occupancy of 100% maintained. Valuation gains of 6% were achieved despite a 44 basis point expansion to the weighted average cap rate of 4.6%, which was more than offset by strong market rental growth. Future NOI will be supported by development completions at Switchyard and Aspect, with Switchyard achieving partial completion in June is 96% pre-leased and the last stage to be completed in the first quarter of '24. Occupied demand has been robust with over 20% rental growth in Sydney, and whilst this high double-digit figure is expected to moderate, vacancy remains extremely tight at 0.8%, supply challenges persist, and we're seeing continued structural tailwinds from e-commerce and population growth. Turning to our retail business. We've continued to see strong sales growth, improved leasing activity and cash collection over the year. Moving annual turnover sales growth was up 17%, and pleasingly, we achieved positive re-leasing spreads of 0.5% with occupancy at 97.5%. NOI of $168 million included $19 million net COVID impact, including ECL release and cash collection, offsetting the impact of the sale of Stanhope, which settled in June and rolling off of income from Harbourside. Like-for-like growth was down minus 2%. However, excluding CBD assets, like-for-like would have been flat. Our planned divestment of MetCentre will reduce our CBD exposure to just 3%. Net valuations were down 5.3% due to cap rates expanding 24 basis points to 5.6%. And again, CBD assets were largely responsible for the decline. Our uniquely urban portfolio is supported by a more affluent customer with average personnel income 25% above the national average. This is the expected benefit of a strong pickup in population growth with the return of tourists and students positions us well as we work through elevated inflation and interest rates. Our build-to-rent portfolio continues to benefit from favorable market fundamentals, our 2 operational assets, LIV Indigo and LIV Munro are performing well with strong occupancy, leasing momentum and effective rental growth of 8%. The launch of our $1.8 billion build-to-rent venture brings aligned capital to our strong conviction in the sector, demonstrates institutional demand at our asset valuations and allows us to advance our growth ambitions by retaining a 44% interest in the fund. With significant demographic tailwinds, a restricted housing supply backdrop and build-to-rent providing a compelling affordability proposition, the outlook for this sector remains positive. I'll now hand over to Scott for an update on funds management.

Thanks, Rich, and good morning, everyone. In recognition of our expanded funds offering, we have reorganized our corporate structure to ensure that we have market-leading governance. The new structure has resonated well with our existing and our potential capital partners. Our third-party capital under management increased significantly during the financial year, growing by around $7 billion to $17.1 billion. Our ability to attract capital in the current market is testament to our deep operational expertise, our proven track record of creating assets to outperform through their life cycle and our commitment to our aligned outcomes with our partners. Our unique alignment model allows us to deliver shared value for our investors, whilst unlocking our extensive development pipeline. During the financial year, our funds under management strategy gathered momentum as we transitioned MWOF onto the platform and expanded our offering with the launch of 3 new ventures with Aligned Capital Partners across build-to-rent, industrial and office. We are proud to have launched one of Australia's first operational build-to-rent ventures with key cornerstone investors, including the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. The venture comprises Mirvac's operational build-to-rent assets LIV Indigo in Sydney and LIV Munro in Melbourne as well as 3 build-to-rent pipeline assets with around 2,200 lots in the secured pipeline and an expected end value of $1.8 billion. The venture supports our vision to increase our exposure to the sector and grow our portfolio to at least 5,000 apartments in the medium term with further opportunities now being assessed. Mirvac has retained a 44% co-investment and 100% of the management platform. We also launched the Mirvac Industrial venture with our existing partner, Australian Retirement Trust, expanding this relationship to approximately $1 billion. The venture was ceded by Switchyard in New South Wales, which provides 72,000 square meters of high-quality industrial space and is 96% leased. Mirvac and ART will assess opportunities to grow the venture, including by leveraging Mirvac's secured $2 billion industrial pipeline, with discussions on Aspect North well advanced. Earlier in the year, we completed the successful transition of the Mirvac Wholesale Office Fund, welcoming over 50 talented people to the platform without disruption to the fund's operations. We also completed our co-investment into the fund, which has reduced leverage and provided alignment and exposure to a modern, sustainable, high-quality portfolio with the fund maintaining benchmark outperformance over 1, 2, 3 and 5 years. Finally, we secured Japanese real estate company, Daibiru as our 50% partner at 7 Spencer Street, allowing us to commence development at our next-generation commercial office asset. Daibiru were attracted to Mirvac's asset creation and ownership alignment model and have also recently co-invested into MWOF. We look forward to exploring further opportunities to create shared value with our partners where we have a deep operational capability and high conviction, including in the living sectors. Our secured development pipeline will provide further capital partnering opportunities, delivering resilience in our earnings and an ability to invest through the cycle. I'll now hand over to Stuart to run through development.

Thank you, Scott, and good morning all. Mirvac's core integrated development model continues to be a key competitive advantage. Our multi-sector development capability across commercial, mixed use and residential provides diversity and resilience of earnings through the cycles, driving efficient capital allocation and leveraging skills across the business. Over the past 10 years, our commercial and mixed-use development pipeline has delivered over $1.3 billion of returns to investors with the creation of 13 high-quality investment assets. Our residential pipeline has been a significant contributor to earnings and is well positioned to capitalize on the critical undersupply of housing in Australia in the coming years. We are renowned for our quality, and our reputation as a trusted developer was recently independently recognized with Mirvac becoming Australia's first company to receive a 5-star iCIRT rating. We continue to invest and focus on increasing our use of prefabrication and digitization to deliver more efficient, innovative and quality outcomes. Our commercial and mixed-use pipeline currently represents some $11.6 billion. Against the current environment, we are increasingly selective in our development activities with our committed capital focused on build-to-rent and industrial, with both sectors supported by strong market fundamentals. Our build-to-rent projects are progressing well. We completed LIV Munro in the first half of FY '23, progressed construction at LIV Aston and LIV Anura, and we've just commenced construction at LIV Albert Fields in Brunswick. In Industrial, we completed the first stage of Switchyards in June with the balance for completion in the first quarter of FY '24. We continue to attract strong pre-leasing interest across all of our industrial projects. Strong momentum has also continued across our mixed-use portfolio. At Harbourside, we've completed demolition with civil works well underway, while at Waterloo quarter, we have commenced early works on the southern precinct, consisting of both social housing and student accommodation. At Harbourside, we are proposing to launch our highly anticipated residential apartments in the second half of FY '24. Within our office pipeline, we've commenced main Works at 7 Spencer Street in Melbourne, following the sale of a 50% interest to Daibiru, while at 55 Pitt Street in Sydney, demolition is now complete with civil works well underway, along with the installation of our first tower crane. Timing of construction on the main tower is expected to be decided in the coming months and will be subject to tenant precommitment with strong engagement and a number of heads of agreement currently in place. We said at the half, the redevelopment of our pipeline also included approximately $1.8 billion in relation to our office assets at 90 Collins Street and 383 La Trobe Street in Melbourne, and 75 George Street in Parramatta, which as previously advised, redevelopment has been deferred with the strategy to re-lease in the short term. The ability to respond to the market and be flexible and even more selective in our deployment of capital is a key strength of our Mirvac integrated model. The combination of this model, together with our diversified sector focus means that we are better placed to manage and respond to market dynamics while delivering on our quality, financial and ESG commitments. Now moving to residential. FY '23 has been a challenging year, marked by 12 consecutive interest rate rises, sustained inclement weather, supply chain constraints and labor shortages. Despite this challenging environment, we were able to exceed our revised guidance by settling 2,298 lots with limited completed unsold stock at 30 June. Key settlements during the period came from Woodlea, Googong, Tullamore and Smiths Lane with an elevated skew towards MPC delivering a strong margin of 26%. Delays in our projects across Nine at Willoughby and the Langlee as a result of inclement weather has meant a substantial portion of settlements in FY '24 will come from apartments and built form projects, which is expected to result in a lower gross margin but higher EBIT per lot. The challenging external environment has been felt by all with pressures primarily driven by subcontracting insolvencies, impacting on project costs and delivery programs, further exacerbated by inclement weather. We have revised our forecast for the new year to reflect these conditions and expect some margin impact of between 1% to 2%. Sales activity was down in FY '23, impacted by interest rate rises, lower first home buyer activity and fewer project launches. Despite this, our presales balance lifted to $1.8 billion with continued demand from owner-occupiers. We achieved strong sales success at Isle and Charlton House in Brisbane and Green Square in Sydney, which are more than 85% presold and encouragingly saw a pickup in activity in the fourth quarter at projects that are nearing completion, such as the Langlee and Nine at Willoughby, as customers are now able to see the physical quality of the Mirvac product. Sales leads picked up in the second half of the year, returning to 10-year averages. The recent release of the Albertine in Melbourne, for example, generated over 1,100 leads within 8 weeks, and we have a strong pipeline of projects ready to take advantage of a deeply undersupplied market. Our commitment to delivering high-quality, well-located and thoughtfully designed homes with superior up-front amenity continues to drive demand and loyalty. While we acknowledge the momentum in the residential market has softened due to rising interest rates and inflation, we remain optimistic about the underlying fundamentals. Completions in the coming years are projected to be 50% lower than the 2017/2018 peak, which, coupled with the surge in demand driven by an estimated influx of over 1 million new residents over the next 3 years is expected to result in an acutely undersupplied market. This is further exacerbated by low vacancy rates at below 2% and strong rental growth with some of our projects having experienced over 38% growth since March 2020. The relative affordability of apartments compared to the established attached housing market also continues to position us well. We have a robust apartment pipeline and the ability to bring projects to market in response to demand. In the coming year, we'll continue to progress our apartment release program with major launches, including Prince & Parade and the Albertine in Melbourne and Harbourside in Sydney just to name a few. Our focus on premium well-located, larger, higher-spec apartments continues to attract persistent demand with 71% of our presales coming from upgrader and rightsize of buyers who are less sensitive to interest rate increases. There is much to be optimistic about FY '24. We have a robust development pipeline of approximately 23,000 lots and a strong and loyal customer base, supported by an expected improvement in market conditions. We are confident in our ability to navigate this next part of the cycle and capitalize on the opportunities that lie ahead. Thank you, and I'll now hand back to Campbell.

Thanks, Stu. Looking to the future, there's no shying away from the fact that current conditions will remain challenging with elevated interest rates, increased construction costs and labor shortages impacting the sector. While we are not immune to this, our business is well positioned to respond to these challenges, and we continue to focus on medium-term earnings growth. Subject to no material changes in market and delivery conditions, we provided operating EPS guidance for FY '24 of between $0.14 and $0.143 per share, and DPS guidance retained at $0.105 per share. This guidance assumes a lower income contribution from the investment portfolio due to assets sold or repositioned for development as well as no further material ECL benefit. Flat fund earnings as growth from the industrial and BTR ventures and the full year impact of MWOF will be offset by a prior performance fee, a stronger EBIT contribution from our residential business benefiting from higher settlement volumes, particularly from apartment projects delayed from FY '23 and a similar contribution from commercial and mixed-use subject to pre-leasing and capital partnering outcomes. Combined, we anticipate group EBIT growth for FY '24. However, we expect a higher net interest expense, driven by the increase in the average cost of debt above 4.7% and a higher release of COGS interest expense as significant apartment projects for each settlement. Our outlook is underpinned by our modern, high-quality, diversified investment portfolio, largely created by Mirvac with a track record of outperformance, and expanded funds management platform with deep growth opportunities and our in-house design and construction platform through which we can continue to unlock the considerable value in our development pipeline. We remain disciplined in our allocation of capital. And pleasingly, we are seeing strong tailwinds forming in the residential sector over the medium term with an acutely undersupplied market, strong migration trends and tight vacancy. We are confident that we have the pipeline, brand and track record to take advantage of these opportunities over the coming years. Thank you all for your interest. I'd now like to open the line for any questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Sholto Maconochie with Jefferies.

Just related to guidance, so probably a few with one question. But why did you remove the lot settlement target? I've never seen that been move before. Could you elaborate on that?

Look, we've taken a view with lot settlements. Obviously, there is a lot of moving elements in our results going into the next financial year. That being said, we do expect settlement to be at the higher end of our previous years. So certainly, in the 2,500 to 3,000 lot expectations.

Okay. And that's more driven by the apartment because it got a lot of stuff coming online and -- okay. And just on the guidance, we stick to your resi settled volumes picked up quite a lot if you look at the presales in the quarter. So does that give me the confidence in that number? Because if you look at the previous period in the second half?

You would have seen in the last quarter a significant pickup in sales. And to your point, we are obviously completing a number of built-form product in FY '24, which does give us the confidence to provide that range that Campbell just spoke to. We are certainly seeing a lot more foot traffic through our display centers. I think one of the projects that we get question or 2 of the projects we get questions about Langlee in Waverly and Willoughby in Green Square -- sorry, Willoughby at -- the Nine at Willoughby. Nine at Willoughby, for example, we had our first displays open this weekend. We had over 100 prospective buyers come through those displays. So people are certainly gravitating towards completed product, and we're seeing strong interest from owner occupiers both upgraders and rightsizes for completed product. And as I noted in my speech, we certainly don't have a whole lot of unsold inventory, and that is reflective of the shortage of supply in the market.

And then just finally, on the resi [indiscernible]. Basically, if you look at the Melbourne market, that's a big build market. Have you changed a bit in your dialogue with the government around higher land taxes and caps on rent? Does that impact investment into that market in Melbourne, given the uncertainty there? And what's your view on that?

No. Look, I think that if you look at our pipeline, we've got a very substantial pipeline in Victoria. We've got a number of re-leases that were in the process of rolling out. We are seeing continued strong demand in Victoria right across the board from that upgrade market, that right. So obviously, as I spoke to, the first homebuyer segment of the market has certainly been impacted. Sentiment has been impacted by the 12 consecutive interest rate rises, but we've got a strong pipeline there and a very robust pipeline that we will be releasing into what continues to be a very undersupplied market.

And maybe, Sholto, just to finish that out on the build-to-rent side. Obviously, very happy to see that withholding tax changes that have been announced in the build-to-rent sector, and that's certainly going to play a part in ensuring that capital continues to look at this sector. And certainly, a lot of language front of mind at the moment on what will happen with rent controls of -- and that's certainly something to watch. However, we're certainly encouraged by some of the commentary from government to date.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Richard Jones with JPMorgan.

Just in terms of the sales activity at Willoughby and Langlee, both projects due to complete this year, kind of 34% and 38% sold. Just interested in feedback on why you think those projects are selling, I would say, slower than expected? And while that gives you confidence to launch 6 apartment projects this year?

Yes. Look, I think it goes back to comments we've made over probably the last few presentations. Where we have projects where we have completed previous stages, people obviously have confidence buying, more confidence buying off the plan. And I draw attention to Green Square where we're sitting at 88% presold. FORME, we're now 100% sold. Quay up in Brisbane, 100% sold. They're joining Tower 93% sold. And more recently, the Charlton at BRC, we were 94% sold. So where we have completed product and people can physically walk through it, they're definitely more confident buying off the plan. It is really the Langlee and Willoughby really examples of where we need completed product for those -- that particular type of buyer, which are largely dominated by upgraders and rightsizes, having completed product and being able to walk them through for them to have an appreciation of that Mirvac point of difference, and we're starting to now obviously see those sales come through on those projects as they need completion.

Okay. And just comment on what that means for the new project launches you're planning?

Yes. So obviously, from an apartment perspective, we're anticipating to launch 7 new projects in FY '24. And what we are seeing is an uptick in lead generation as a result of the lack of supply in those particular markets, particularly in Eastern Seaboard markets. There is such a shortage of supply of apartment product coming through in '24 and '25. And we're going to be well positioned to be able to capitalize on that with projects such as the Albertine in Melbourne and in the first half of next calendar year, the launch of Harbourside here in Sydney.

Our next question comes from the line of David Pobucky with Macquarie Group. David, are you there? Our next question comes from the line of Lauren Berry with Morgan Stanley.

Can you please give a bit more color on 55 Pitt Street? Says in the presentation, you've got a number of HOAs on hand. Can you talk about the demand for leasing, and also what's going to drive your decision to kick off, please?

Well, look, I'd start with that. Overarching, I think the pleasing thing we're seeing in office markets in Australia is a return of volume of leasing. And that's certainly well ahead of what we saw last year. And that's an exciting element. I think as larger corporate Australia is more comfortable in making long-term decisions, which it hasn't been prepared to do in prior years. Demand, I'll hand to Richard to go through the demand side, but we're really quite surprised by the amount of interest, particularly as labor markets remain tight, focus on amenity, focus on good quality and location. And I think if there's anything that's becoming really apparent in office markets now, the power of location is playing a fundamentally more important role than it probably has in the prior 3 or 4 years. But Richard, do you want to maybe give some color on demand itself?

Look, I think I'd just expand on that point that the level of interest we're having from occupiers has been really, really encouraging and certainly reaffirms Campbell's point around the level of leasing volumes we're seeing across the portfolio. So we're very encouraged about that activity.

And Lauren, just to your point about, we've got a decision to make in the next 3 or 4 months. So we need to get to a level of comfort around the level of precommitment and probably just as importantly, just what the demand in the market is telling us around the quality of the product as they get to understand the product better. So that's something we'll probably talk to you a little bit more in the next quarterly update.

Would you be prepared to kick off with just HOAs? Or are you looking to actually lock in rent -- leases?

Look, historically, we'd look to lock in with Fields agreements for lease.

Our next question comes from the line of Suraj Nebhani with Citi.

Just wanted to clarify the comment on asset sales that Courtenay made in her prepared remarks. So 60 Margaret, I think Courtenay you are saying contracts are signed, was it 367 Collins contracts exchange. I just wanted to confirm the difference there? And I guess, at what stage these asset sales are in at the moment?

Do you want to take that?

Yes. Thanks, Suraj. So I did say, so the status of the 2 of them, 60 Margaret, we have signed contracts, they're not yet exchanged because there are conditions that are being worked through. Once those conditions are met, which we expect to happen in the next 2 weeks, those contracts should exchange and then settlement will occur. There's some conditions like [indiscernible] that need to play out. So we're in good shape with that and very close to finalizing it. On 367 Collins, we do have an exchange contract in terms agreed with the purchaser. That purchaser is just finalizing their raising of capital to close that deal, and that's not far away. We're working with those guys over the next couple of weeks. So they're both in good shape. Yes, potentially not as far through as we would have hoped. But actually, there's been good discussion, and we expect to close both of them out within the next 2 weeks to 4 weeks and would be targeting settlement of them by the end of this calendar year.

And just taking on asset sales. Just wanted to clarify, the $1.2 billion number, have you provided a split for that between what type of assets will be sold anywhere in the top?

Yes. In the presentation, there is a table, but the $1.2 billion, $800 million of it is 60 Margaret and 367, so a deferral from the '23 program into '24. And there's an additional $400 million that we're targeting. We haven't named those assets, but we have indicated they will be in the office portfolio as we continue to trim the tail of that portfolio.

Our next question comes from the line of Alexander Prineas with Morningstar.

Just a question on LIV Munro, I think it opened in November [indiscernible] assumptions you had, but given how the rental market, can you sort of point on why that is so close to 100% lease and very low vacancy rate?

Look, I might take that question, and thanks for the question, Alexander, look, the lessons we've learned, you got to understand the build-to-rent, it's a sector in its infancy in Australia at the moment. So certainly, there's not a lot of lessons learned from the industry at this point. Our expectation probably set through LIV Indigo at Sydney Olympic Park was that we'd see stabilization of occupancy over about a period of 18 months. So we're sort of halfway through that period now 63% add leased. So we certainly buoyed by the speed. Remembering also that people can only move, we can only move a certain number of people in every day and every week, so we certainly want the experience for our renters to be a good one, the first day they move into our projects. So look, we think we're on track. We certainly had a real fly through December and January. This time of year is traditionally a little slower. And certainly, we tend to see more increased activities through the end of the calendar year.

And just on the Q4 balance in residential sales, does that continue to...

Sorry, you dropped out just a little bit at the end. Could you just repeat that question?

Yes. The Q4 balance in residential sales, does that continue to rely on August, that stronger condition?

Stu, do you want to take that?

Yes. We've, we probably saw a little bit of a slowdown in July, again, but it certainly picked up again as we moved into August. And I would say that, that pickup is predominantly been more so elevated in the apartments segment of the business.

Our next question comes from the line of Tom Bodor with UBS.

I just wanted to pick up on your comments about commercial and mixed-use expectations for '24 within guidance being similar to last year. You said subject to leasing and capital demand, if I'm not mistaken. I just be interested to understand if you expect any profits from 55 Pitt kicking off?

Yes. Look, we do. And so look, the key contributors for FY '24, we have aspect in the industrial side. We have 55 Pitt Street and 7 Spencer Street. There's also a tail of profit coming out of Switchyards in the industrial side due to the fact that the building wasn't 100% complete as at 30 June. They're going to be the main contributors for the year, but the 2 larger ones will be 55 Pitt and Aspect.

Fantastic. And then just right on the build-to-rent. The cap rate was previously disclosed, I think, on LIV Indigo at 4%. And then it's sort of not there for this year. Just be interested to understand where cap rates have moved on those assets in the last 6 months?

Look, the cap rates really haven't moved so much, predominantly because we've seen such good rental growth, and I think if you look in the pack in some detail over the next couple of days, you'll see that we saw positive re-leasing spreads of close to 8%. So that certainly kept cap rates tight. But from memory, I think we've seen a slight slippage of 10 to 12 basis points.

Okay. Sorry, did you mean valuations haven't moved? Or the...

The valuations largely haven't moved because of rent growth offsetting a very slight softening in cap rate.

Our next question comes from the line of Ben Brayshaw with Barrenjoey.

I was wondering if you could provide some color just on active invested capital and the trajectory of that over the course of FY '24. And if you could clarify as well, these deployment within commercial over the last 6 months for invested capital as well.

Yes. Thanks, Ben. So active invested capital is sitting around $3.6 billion for -- as at June. We expect it to stay there probably kind of hold a little bit below that point. That includes both the residential book and the commercial mixed-use book, trying to probably manage resi around in the long term around $2 billion of that and commercial mixed-use would be the balance. And that depends on, I guess, decisions to deploy more on progressing 55 Pitt Street and Harbourside and those things that will come into in the next sort of 3 to 6 months in decision-making. But you can kind of probably target around that number in the medium term, which will deliver the earnings that Campbell's talked about in guidance for FY '24 and set us up into '25 and '26 for that matter.

And just on the deployment of the additional $1 billion over the last 6 months within commercial, could you just clarify the key moving part there?

Really, what that is, is actually the bulk of it or half of it, at least, is the transition of what had been iPark, which was in passive capital. We moved into active capital. So we talked to you about that off-line about that change, which is not really any new capital. It's just allocation to active. And then the additional deployment is into projects like in the industrial projects we've talked about, some into 55 Pitt Street, 7 Spencer Street is underway and Harbourside is underway.

We have a follow-up from the line of Richard Jones with JPMorgan.

Yes, thanks for the follow-up, So I just wanted to question the profitability of the funds business. It only made $5 million in EBIT in the second half. You're guiding to a similar result next year, which is $20 million off a base of $17 billion of fund. It seems very low profitability. Is that going to improve?

Do you want to take that, Scott?

Yes. Thanks, Richard. I would say a couple of things. The first half versus second half skew, as has been mentioned, is really largely as a result of the performance fee that we delivered in the first half. And then in the second half, we have stood up the funds management platform, and we've launched a few vehicles which have not yet stabilized and reached their scale. I think the important thing is that the platform is now well set up. We've got great momentum in the business. And we've -- we're transitioning from a business where we have got a variety of different managed vehicles, some of which are single asset vehicles and have performed largely a funding function for the business, which has served the business really well and got us to where we are today. But now we're launching vehicles where we've got co-invested capital, and we've got a growth mandate in those vehicles. And as they reach scale and stabilization, you'll see an improvement in the results, yes.

Our next question comes from the line of [ Colin Whitley ] with Macquarie Group.

Question from me, just in terms of FY '24 guidance, the conscious that the moving parts, not speak to any particular settlement number, but can you just provide the pieces we should be thinking about in terms of other commercial development profit? Any thoughts on expenses throughout the year or interest rate? And anything to be thinking about on like-for-like NOI across the subjects as well, please?

Look, why don't I kick off and then hand to Courtenay. I guess the two moving pieces which may not be considered at this point is what our average cost of debt is today considering the debt balance that we have. And I think that, that will give a good sense of where the interest expense line needs to be. And the other one would be just the increased returns coming out of our development business will probably have a more significant tax payment coming as a result of that as well. Courtenay, do you want to add to that?

Yes. I think, Campbell, covered it, but maybe just to help with the commercial mixed-use earnings. So we have, Campbell indicated that it's largely in line with where we are with '22, which is what we expect. There's probably a couple of -- there's a lot of moving parts in that, but we have very good line of sight over the balance of Switchyard earnings built-to-rent. We've got DM and CM fees coming -- construction management and development management fees coming in there. We do have a vehicle with a setup of the Mirvac Industrial Venture, which will better take out -- proposed take out for Aspect North and also Aspect South. So they are working through planning, but those 2 assets are opportunities to sell into that vehicle this year. And then on top of that, there is where we get to on leasing and capital on 55 Pitt Street and actually Harbourside is the other one to think about. Stu mentioned that we will likely be launching presales in the second half of this financial year. And depending on where those presales get to, we may look to bring into a partner to the bigger project, but there's a bit to play out in that. So yes, a lot of moving parts, but there's good line of sight, particularly over the industrial platform and the selling of those assets into these already established vehicle. And then the other moving parts are in probably the bigger 55 Pitt Street and Harbourside. I think Campbell's picked up interest weighted average cost of debt. We think that we're largely at the top of our cost of debt position at June. I think I said it was 5.4%, depending where rate rises go, all those sorts of things, but we think we're at the edge of that. Gearing, we're at the midpoint of the range today through the asset sales and managing the residential settlements coming back in, that gearing will come back down toward the end -- the low end of the range, again, we expect toward the end of the year, but that will happen through the course of the year. So we'll carry a little bit of debt at that higher cost of debt. And with the apartment settlements completing, the other thing I'd just get you to think about in that interest line is as apartments settle, we have a release of interest off the balance sheet that also sits in that interest line. So there is a higher proportion of apartments settling this year. So hopefully, that answers your question. But across the board, we expect investment income to be down because of asset sales, ECL coming off tumble, I'd also call out, we've talked about funds. We've talked about commercial mixed use and net interest is the other big one. The costs, we expect to be largely flat. They'll move 2% or 3% just with wages and other things.

That's really helpful. And just to confirm, particularly around 55 Pitt Street, but more broadly on commercial development, anything that's not sort of committed with a potential sell-down lag if nothing in guidance for any those sort of items that the fair assumption?

Sorry, I missed that question.

Just in terms of anything that's uncommitted in the development pipeline, the 55 Pitt Street just given the size of it. There's nothing associated with that in terms of profits going into the guidance number.

There's -- so we've considered where we may get to on Pitt Street and Harbourside in all of those different moving parts, so they may contribute to those earnings, but we can get there. We focus on industrial pipeline and those other things that I talked about, balance of Switchyard, et cetera. But Pitt Street, depending on where it gets to, with leasing, it is in good shape. You've heard that today and capital partners, we expect to come in. And then Harbourside is the other one. They aren't committed yet as projects for us, but if they are, they may contribute earnings in that commercial mixed use line in '24.

Our next question comes from the line of James Druce with CLSA.

Do you guys have a price for 367 Collins now that it's exchanged? I might have missed it.

Look, we do, if you actually look in the accounts, you'll see that we've got both those assets as assets held for sale. So that will give you a good view of where they sit from a pricing perspective.

Okay. That's clear. And then did Stuart sound on the call that you expect margins to be down 1% to 2% for the resi business into '24?

Yes. So because of the built form contribution and the skewed built form in '24, it will be towards the low end of our through cycle target of 18% to 22%, and there will be some impact on particularly those Sydney projects where we expect between 1% to 2% impact on gross margin because of inclement weather and some of the challenges we've had around insolvency of subcontractors.

So low end of '18 to '22. Okay. That's clear. And then just one for maybe Campbell, but just looking at the long-term incentives, it looks like you've sort of changed how -- you're looking to change those from sort of a ROIC measured to a relative ROE. I thought the old metrics were pretty good, but can you just explain how that sort of helps obviously going forward will help the shareholders.

Look, -- and look, certainly, I think that's a decision for the Board in terms of how that works. What I would say though is that we think return on equity is a good measure because it takes statutory profit. And I think one of the things that we often forget in this business is there is an impact of statutory results, and this will sharpen our focus on the statutory outcome of our results. So that's important going forward, particularly from a development perspective. But we will still ensure that we have caps on that element around maintaining gearing at appropriate levels and ensuring that we still have ROIC sitting above our weighted average cost of capital. So it's -- from our perspective, it's a little bit of both -- best of both worlds.

Okay. Have you increased your WACC? I think you're sort of talking about it [indiscernible]?

Yes. The WACC has increased over the last 12 months, the risk-free rate has gone up and our cost of debt has gone up. So we've reflected that in our WACC. So all of the hurdles, all the business and different asset classes have shifted during the year. So the hurdle has got a little bit higher, but all the projects and assets are still performing well against that. But obviously, it's a much more difficult market than it was 2 years ago.

Okay. Where are we on that one? Or is that something that you will not share?

We don't disclose our WACC, but you can, I can rest assured it's gone up.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm showing no further questions in the queue. I would now like to turn the call back to Campbell for closing remarks.

Well, thank you, everyone, for joining us today, and we certainly look forward to spending time with many of you in coming weeks. And maybe just to close for anyone who is a soccer fan out there with the Matildas playing tonight, go Matildas. So, thank you all.