Jones Lang LaSalle


American Financial’s ’05 Revenue Jumps Nearly 63%
By Marita Thomas
Last updated: February 28, 2006 10:51am

JENKINTOWN, PA-Full-year 2005 revenue for American Financial Realty Trust shot up by $200.5 million, or 62.7%, over the year before, taking the total from continuing operations to $520.3 million on Dec. 31. As a result, the locally based financial specialty REIT paid out $132.1 million in 2005 dividends.

During a conference call, Nicholas Schorsch, president and CEO, said the company’s number of formulated price contracts increased from three to 16 during 2005 and included the acquisition of 300 bank branch properties. Under this program, the REIT agreed to buy bank branches, primarily vacated because of mergers and acquisitions.

Occupancy in AFR’s portfolio as of Dec. 31 was 86.3%, including the remaining vacant bank branches. Glenn Blumenthal, COO, noted, however, that "within 180 days of acquiring 135 vacant branches aggregating 433,000 sf for $106 million, it had sold 27 of them for an aggregate $16.3 million."

New leasing "exceeded company expectations" for the year, Schorsch said. The average rent is $29.89 per sf, which creates an annualized addition of approximately $9.4 million from rents. Referring to the company’s recent sale of five fully leased properties to Resnick Development for $301 million, Schorsch told analysts AFR planned to sell more fully leased assets along with its continuing disposition of non-core properties.