United Hampshire US REIT has announced a distributable income for the period 1 July 2020 to 30 September 2020 was US$7.4 million, 0.5% higher than the forecast made when it went IPO in March this year.
“This underscores the resilience of our portfolio, with a majority of the REIT’s tenants in essential services,” says Robert Schmitt, CEO of the REIT’s manager.
“Following the easing of lockdown measures, all our tenants have re-commenced business operations and our key grocery and home improvement tenants including BJ’s, Lowes, The Home Depot and Walmart have recorded 9.3% to 35.1% increases in sales year-on-year in 2Q 2020, continuing to perform extremely well during the COVID-19 pandemic,” he
The REIT’s assets are mainly leased to grocers and self-storage space operators. Occupancy for the former was 95% while that of the latter has enjoyed some improvement.
As at 30 September 2020, rent relief of US$0.6 million and rent deferral of US$1.0 million in aggregate were granted to assist tenants in bridging through the pandemic. A provision of US$0.2 million was made for rent relief currently under negotiation.
“Our tenants have successfully adapted to the new retail environment through the continued adoption of omni-channel strategies which have become even more relevant in the current environment,” says Schmitt.
“The physical stores remain a crucial element of the omni-channel strategy, allowing an in-store experience in addition to enabling tenants to fulfill online demand at lower fulfilment and delivery costs, and at faster delivery speed,” he adds.
United Hampshire US REIT’s portfolio is valued at US$599.2 million and has a total net lettable area of 3.17 million square feet across its 22 properties.
