Equity Residential Profit Rises; Lifts FY Guidance

(RTTNews) - Equity Residential (EQR), a real estate investment trust that develops multifamily properties, on Tuesday reported second-quarter funds from operations of $341.3 million or $0.90 per share compared with $ million or $0.77 per share last year.

Excluding items, normalized FFO for the quarter was $0.85 per share compared with $0.78 per share a year ago.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters estimated FFO of $0.85 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Net earnings for the quarter were $285.6 million or $0.78 per share compared with $111.7 million or $0.31 per share last year.

Revenues for the quarter were $679.1 million compared with $652.6 million in the prior year.

Analysts estimated revenues of $676.7 million for the quarter.

Same store revenue, which includes 97,580 apartment unit, increased 4.9% in the quarter, the company said.

"Fundamental apartment demand in the coastal, high density urban markets targeted by Equity Residential continues to benefit significantly from extremely favorable demographics, steady improvement in employment and changing lifestyles," said David Neithercut, Equity Residential's CEO.

For the third quarter, the company expects FFO of $0.86 to $0.90 per share and normalized FFO of $0.85 to $0.89 per share. Analysts expect FFO of $0.88 per share.

For the full year 2015, the company now expects FFO of $3.42 to 3.48 per share and normalized FFO of $3.39 to $3.45 per share. Earlier it expected expect FFO of $3.37 to 3.45 per share.

Analysts expect FFO of $3.43 per share.

The company now expects 2015 same store revenue to increase 4.75% to 5%, from prior guidance of 4.3% to 4.7%.