NYSE:CCS Century Communities Q4 2024 Earnings Report $52.01 -0.13 (-0.25%) Closing price 03:59 PM EasternExtended Trading$52.26 +0.25 (+0.47%) As of 04:12 PM Eastern Extended trading is trading that happens on electronic markets outside of regular trading hours. This is a fair market value extended hours price provided by Polygon.io. Learn more. ProfileEarnings HistoryForecast Century Communities EPS ResultsActual EPS$3.49Consensus EPS $3.16Beat/MissBeat by +$0.33One Year Ago EPSN/ACentury Communities Revenue ResultsActual RevenueN/AExpected Revenue$1.29 billionBeat/MissN/AYoY Revenue GrowthN/ACentury Communities Announcement DetailsQuarterQ4 2024Date1/29/2025TimeAfter Market ClosesConference Call DateWednesday, January 29, 2025Conference Call Time5:00PM ETUpcoming EarningsCentury Communities' Q2 2025 earnings is scheduled for Wednesday, July 23, 2025, with a conference call scheduled at 5:00 PM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Conference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptSlide DeckPress Release (8-K)Annual Report (10-K)Earnings HistoryCompany ProfileSlide DeckFull Screen Slide DeckPowered by Century Communities Q4 2024 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrJanuary 29, 2025 ShareLink copied to clipboard.PresentationSkip to Participants Operator00:00:03Greetings. Welcome to Century Communities 4th Quarter and Full Year 20 24 Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note that this event is being recorded. Operator00:00:31I would now like to turn the conference over to Tyler Langton, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations for Century Communities. Thank you. You may begin. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:00:40Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us today for Century Communities' earnings conference call for the Q4 and full year 2024. Before the call begins, I would like to remind everyone that certain statements made during this call may constitute forward looking statements. These statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described or implied in the forward looking statements. Certain of these risks and uncertainties can be found under the heading Risk Factors in the company's latest 10 ks as supplemented by our latest 10 Q and other SEC filings. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:01:18We undertake no duty to update our forward looking statements. Additionally, certain non GAAP financial measures will be discussed on this conference call. The company's presentation of this information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information presented in accordance with GAAP. Hosting the call today are Dale Francescon, Executive Chairman Rob Francescon, Chief Executive Officer and President and Scott Dickson, Chief Financial Officer. Following today's prepared remarks, we will open up the line for questions. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:01:51With that, I'll turn the call over to Dale. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:01:53Thank you, Tyler, and good afternoon, everyone. We are pleased with our Q4 and full year 2024 results and believe that Centuri is well positioned to drive continued growth and improved returns in 2025 and beyond. Our full year 2024 deliveries increased 15% year over year to a record 11,007 homes and our community count increased 28% year over year to a company record 322 communities. 4th quarter deliveries of 3,198 homes and home sales revenues of $1,200,000,000 were both quarterly records. Even with the volatility in mortgage rates that we saw this year and our continued use of elevated levels of incentives to drive sales, We increased our full year 2024 adjusted gross margin by 80 basis points to 23.3%. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:02:59We also reduced our SG and A as a percentage of home sales revenues by 40 basis points through leveraging our fixed costs and expect this metric to see further year over year improvement in 2025. For the full year, our adjusted net income increased by 36% year over year with our 4th quarter adjusted net income up 18%. While we are clearly focused on growth, both organic and through the 2 acquisitions we completed and fully integrated in 2024, we also continue to return capital to our shareholders by repurchasing over 3% of our shares that were outstanding at the beginning of 2024 and increasing our quarterly dividend by 13%. Our 4th quarter net new contracts of 2,467 increased by 5% year over year and increased by 4% sequentially, which compares to an average sequential decline in the Q4 of 6% from 2019 through 2023. For the full year, our net new contracts increased 21% year over year to 10,676 homes. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:04:27Within the quarter, our orders were the highest in November, potentially benefiting from the decline in mortgage rates over much of that month and at roughly equal levels in both October December. So far through January, our order activity has been in line with typical seasonal pace with improvement over the course of the month, but below the very strong rate we saw in January 2024. Our average sales price was approximately $390,000 for both the Q4 and full year 2024 and remains among the lowest of the publicly traded homeowners. While housing affordability has been impacted by the recent mortgage rate volatility, we firmly believe that there is strong underlying demand for new homes underpinned by solid demographic trends. Additionally, we continue to take steps to address the impacts that elevated mortgage rates are having on affordability and believe our actions are helping us maintain an appropriate sales pace in the current environment. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:05:38We built nearly 100 percent of our homes on a spec basis in the Q4 and for the full year. This business model along with our captive mortgage subsidiary allows us to reduce costs, maintain an appropriate supply of quick move in homes that entry level buyers are seeking and provide our homebuyers with certainty of financing at below market interest rates through buy downs and other rate incentives. In the Q4, 92% of our deliveries were priced below FHA limits and over 60% of the mortgages closed by our captive mortgage company Inspire Home Loans were for FHA, USDA or VA loans that typically carry interest rates and down payment requirements that are below those of conventional mortgages and help make homes more affordable. The FICO scores of our homebuyers remain healthy and consistent with levels from the 1st three quarters of 2024 and full year 2023. Before turning the call over to Rob, I want to briefly discuss the recent steps our Board of Directors took as part of our ongoing succession planning process. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:07:00Effective January 1st, I have moved to the Executive Chairman role from co Chief Executive Officer, while Rob has become Century's sole Chief Executive Officer. As part of this transition, we do not anticipate any immediate changes to either of our day to day responsibilities, but it is my plan to devote a higher percentage of time to corporate and strategic initiatives. In closing, I want to thank all of our team members for their hard work and dedication that drove significant improvements in our business in 2024 and that position Century for continued success in 2025 and beyond. I'll now turn the call over to Rob to discuss our operations and land position in more detail. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:07:50Thank you, Dale, and good afternoon, everyone. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:07:53Before turning to our operations, I wanted to add on to Dale's remarks about our succession planning here at Century. We are incredibly proud of both the national platform that we have built at Century over the past 10 plus years since going public, as well as the team that we have assembled to lead it. We view succession planning at both the corporate level and throughout our regions and divisions as an ongoing process to ensure that we always have a deep bench of leaders with the skills and experience needed to drive our future success. For the full year 2024, we started 11,789 homes, a 20% year over year increase, consistent with our 21% year over year increase in net orders. In the Q4, we managed our starts down to 19 65 homes given the number of homes started earlier in the year to maintain an appropriate level of spec home inventory. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:08:59We continue to be encouraged by the growth in our community count. We ended the 4th quarter with a community count of 322, the highest level in our company's history and up 28% on a year over year basis and 6% sequentially. We also continue to believe that our geographically balanced land portfolio that stretches across 17 states and over 45 markets provides us with greater opportunities for growth across our national footprint and mitigates risk from regional downturns. As an example, while there has been some concern recently about rising inventories in Florida and Texas, these two regions combined only accounted for 31% of our full year 2024 deliveries. While it is still early and also recognizing the 28% growth in our community count in 2024, we currently expect our year end 2025 community count to further increase in the mid to high single digit percentage range, which will support our plans to grow our deliveries annually by 10% or more over the next couple of years. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:10:14Turning to costs. We had continued success in controlling our costs in the 4th quarter with our direct construction costs on the homes we started roughly flat on a sequential basis. For the full year 2024, our direct construction costs declined by 2% on a year over year basis. Our finished lot costs in the 4th quarter increased by roughly 2% on a sequential basis. During the Q4, our cycle times modestly improved on a sequential basis and are averaging approximately 4 months. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:10:50As expected, our incentives on closed homes increased in the 4th quarter to roughly 800 basis points, up from approximately 700 basis points in the 3rd quarter. As we discussed on our Q3 earnings call, our incentives on new orders in the 3rd quarter increased as mortgage rates moved higher and the higher incentives on these sales flowed through to our deliveries in the 4th quarter. Our incentives on new orders in the 4th quarter increased to approximately 900 basis points as we look to maintain our sales pace as mortgage rates remained elevated in the seasonally slower months of the 4th quarter. We expect mortgage rates and their impact on our incentive levels to be the largest driver of any changes to our gross margins in the near term given our success in controlling direct construction and finished lot costs. Turning to land, we ended the 4th quarter with over 80,000 owned and controlled lots. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:11:52The Century Complete's total lot count increased by 20% versus the prior year period and accounted for 25% of our total lot count. As a reminder, Century Complete only acquires finished lots and the growth in its lot count in 2024 demonstrates the team's continued success in sourcing capital efficient finished lots in attractive locations throughout the Southeast, Florida, Midwest and Arizona. Additionally, at the end of the Q4, our consolidated controlled lots accounted for 56% of our total lot count. While Scott will provide more details about our guidance for 2025 in his remarks, I wanted to briefly talk about our growth outlook for 2025 and beyond. We expect our full year 2025 deliveries to increase by approximately 10% on a year over year basis at the midpoint of our guidance and barring any changes to the homebuilding environment have the ability to grow our deliveries at least another 10% in 2026 as well. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:13:02This growth in 2025 is based on increases in our lot count and community count and does not assume any meaningful changes from our full year 2024 absorption pace of 3.2 times or current mortgage rates. Additionally, as we have discussed in the past, we expect this delivery growth to come from increasing our share primarily within our existing markets and to benefit margins and returns as we leverage the investments we have made at both the corporate level and throughout our markets at the local level. As Dale mentioned, we achieved a number of records in 2024 including community count, deliveries and book value per share and are excited by the potential we have to set new records in the years ahead. I'll now turn the call over to Scott to discuss our financial results in more detail. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:13:57Thank you, Rob. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:13:58In the Q4 of 2024, pre tax income was $135,200,000 and net income was $102,700,000 or $3.20 per diluted share, a 13% year over year increase. Adjusted net income was $112,000,000 or $3.49 per diluted share, an 18% year over year increase. EBITDA for the quarter was $160,200,000 and adjusted EBITDA was 172,600,000 dollars respective increases of 10% 17% both the year ago levels. Home sales revenue for the Q4 was $1,200,000,000 a quarterly record for the company and up 5% versus the prior year quarter on both higher deliveries and average sales price. Our 4th quarter average sales price was $389,800 increased by 4% on a year over year basis. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:14:59Our deliveries of 2,198 homes in the 4th quarter were a quarterly record for the company and our full year 2024 deliveries increased 15% on a year over year basis to 11,007 homes, also a company record. For the year, we saw growth across all our regions with the West, Texas and Southeast all posting growth rates of over 20%. For the Q1 2025, we expect our deliveries to decline on a sequential basis due to typical seasonality and be similar to Q1 2024 levels. As a reminder, the Q1 typically represents the low point for our deliveries during the year with the Q4 being the strongest. Starting in the Q2 2025, we expect our deliveries to increase on a sequential basis over the remaining quarters of the year with each quarter up on a year over year basis as well. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:15:59At quarter end, our backlog of sold homes was 850 units valued at 351,200,000 dollars with an average price of $413,100 While the average price of our 4th quarter backlog was above the average sales price for our 4th quarter deliveries, this difference is largely due to mix, including the percentage of Century Complete Homes. In the 4th quarter, adjusted homebuilding gross margin percentage was 22.9% compared to 23.6% in the prior quarter. The sequential change is primarily driven by a higher level of incentives on closed homes. Homebuilding gross margin was 20.6% versus 21.7% in the prior quarter. Additionally, purchase price accounting reduced our Q4 2024 gross margin by 30 basis points, which was in line with the reduction in the Q3. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:16:57We expect purchase price accounting to have a similar impact on our homebuilding gross margins in the first half of twenty twenty five. For the Q1 of twenty twenty five, we expect our homebuilding gross margin to ease on a sequential basis. Both our direct construction and finished lot costs should be roughly flat lot costs should be roughly flat quarter over quarter as we continue to successfully manage our costs. However, as Rob detailed in his remarks, our incentives on orders in the Q4 of 2024 were approximately 100 basis points higher in our incentives on deliveries as we focused on maintaining an appropriate sales pace in the seasonally slower Q4. Additionally, our Q1 homebuilding operating margin should see some impact from reduced operating leverage in the quarter that typically represents the low point for our deliveries. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:17:51SG and A as a percent of home sales revenue was 11.5% in the 4th quarter and 12% for the full year 2024. For 2025, we expect our SG and A as a percent of home sales revenues to decline on a year over year basis as we continue to leverage the investments we have made both at the corporate level and in our divisions that should support the delivery growth we expect over the next couple of years. Revenues from Financial Services were $26,200,000 in the 4th quarter and the business contributed $7,900,000 in pretax income. Other income in the quarter was $13,300,000 dollars with this income predominantly driven by the sale of a project within our Century Living business. As a reminder, Century Living is engaged in the development, construction and management of multifamily rental properties. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:18:44Our tax rate was 24% in the 4th quarter and 24.1% for the full year 2024. We expect our full year tax rate for 2025 to be in the range of 25% to 26% with the increase primarily driven by a reduced number of homes expected to qualify for $45 credit. Our 4th quarter net homebuilding debt to net capital ratio improved to 27.4% compared to the Q3 2024 levels of 32.1%. Our homebuilding debt to capital ratio also decreased to 30.3% at quarter end compared to the 3rd quarter levels of 35.8%. During the quarter, we maintained our quarterly cash dividend of $0.26 per share and repurchased approximately 400,000 shares of our common stock for 30,700,000 dollars For the full year 2024, we paid cash dividend totaling $1.04 per share and repurchased over 1,000,000 shares of our common stock or over 3% of our shares that were outstanding at the beginning of the year were $83,800,000 Through our dividend and share repurchases, we returned over $115,000,000 to our shareholders in 2024. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:20:05We grew our book value per share to a record $84.65 a 13% year over year increase and ended the quarter with $2,600,000,000 in stockholders' equity and $918,000,000 of liquidity. During the Q4, we entered into a new credit agreement, which increased the capacity of our senior unsecured credit facility to $900,000,000 up from $800,000,000 and extended maturity to November 2028 from April of 2026. Additionally, we have no senior debt maturities until June of 2027, providing us ample flexibility with our leverage management. Now turning to guidance. Given the growth in our lock count and community count in 2024, we expect our full year 2025 deliveries to be in the range of 11,700 to 12,400 homes and our home sales revenue to be in the range of $4,500,000,000 to $4,800,000,000 In closing, we are excited by our outlook for 2025. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:21:10We expect to grow our deliveries by approximately 10% year over year at the midpoint of our guidance. Additionally, as Rob mentioned, we expect our delivery growth to come from increasing our share primarily within our existing markets and to positively affect margins and returns as we leverage the investments we have made at both the corporate level and throughout our markets at the local level. While affordability for new homes has been impacted by the recent mortgage rate volatility, we firmly believe that there is strong underlying demand for affordable new homes. With that, I'll open the line for questions. Operator? Operator00:21:50Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. And our first question today will come from Carl Reichardt with BTIG. Please go ahead. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:22:23Thanks. Hey, guys. Nice to talk to you. Thank you for taking my question. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:22:27Hey, Karl. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:22:28Hey, Karl. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:22:29Hey. Just to start with just on if we look at the business between Communities and Complete, can you talk about perhaps any differences in either traffic levels or the incentives you need to offer between those two product types, if there's any significant difference? And how do you expect that mix to look in 2025 in terms of delivery volume? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:22:49Yes. Carl, great question. When we step back and look at the differences between the brands, I don't know that we're seeing significantly different levels of incentives, maybe slightly more on the mortgage financing side within Century Complete as compared to our core Century brand. But we're really not significant. In terms of mix of how it's coming through our P and L and our operations going forward, and we're really trying to grow both of those brands. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:23:21We certainly see opportunities in all of our markets from a lot position standpoint. I think you can see that in our current owned and under controlled lots. So we'd anticipate both brands really to grow in those significant differences in mix that we're anticipating rolling through 20 25's P and L. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:23:45And then could you tell me if you have it, what percentage of your homes that you both sold and closed this particular quarter? And as you go next year, whether or not you're expecting I would assume you're expecting that percentage to increase over time as well, but I'd be curious as to what that number was. Thanks, Scott. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:24:08Yes, absolutely. For Q4, the number was slightly above 60% that were sold and closed within the quarter. I think since we have been on really the 100% spec model for quite some period of time, we've seen that number in the high 50s to even in a couple of quarters in the high 60s. We would anticipate really no significant changes going forward given our cycle times. At this point have really stabilized. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:24:39And we've been pretty consistent with our spec model over the last year or 2, yes. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:24:45Appreciate it. Thanks. I'll get back in queue. Operator00:24:53And your next question today will come from Jay McCanless with Wedbush. Please go ahead. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:24:59Hey, good afternoon, everyone. First question I had, could you talk about what incentive levels you guys are putting on orders in the current quarter? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:11Right now, it's consistent with what we were seeing in Q4, which is around 900 basis points. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:25:25Okay. And then, I think you answered this in the prepared comments, but just want to double check it. In terms of that growth of 10%, roughly in unit volumes, you guys are still thinking about the same level of sales absorption that you saw in 2024 is how you're thinking about for 'twenty five? Okay. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:47Yes. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:48So that's basically 3.2 times roughly. And so we're looking at that being stagnant. So it's really from community count. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:26:03And then I guess I like the fact you guys have said you're going to try and grow inside the footprint, but you have done a couple of acquisitions this year, maybe expanding your footprint a little bit. What are you seeing on the M and A front of their potential to do more deals? And what are you hearing on that front in terms of possibilities to expand the business? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:26:25Sure. Well, so the 2 acquisitions we did in 'twenty four were both within the footprint, one in Nashville, one in Houston. And it just got us deeper and larger in both of those markets, which has been our strategy all along. And that's really what we're looking for on a go forward basis. Regarding 25 M and A, as we've continued to do M and A through our entire public homebuilding career and to grow the Company. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:26:54We're always looking at deals. We've got like I'm sure a lot of people very stringent underwriting criteria and we'll just see how that goes this year. But we do look at M and A deals as you saw we did 2 last year TBD on what ends up coming through this year. Operator00:27:17And your next question today will come from Alan Ratner with Zelman and Associates. Please go ahead. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:27:23Hey, guys. Good afternoon. Thanks for all the detail so far. First question, I'd like to just drill in a little bit to the pace versus price strategy right now, recognizing that your guidance implies pretty flattish absorptions for 'twenty five. 4th quarter, your absorptions were down 15%. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:27:45January, it sounds like they were down year over year. I know the comps get maybe a little bit easier as the year goes on. But at what point and this isn't with incentives up more recently. So at what point of the year, is it in the spring, after the spring, if you're still trending lower on a year on year basis for absorptions, do you either get more aggressive on incentives or are there other adjustments that you would consider, maybe outright base price adjustments in order to solve for that flat absorption rate? Or is it more balanced between a certain margin target and sales? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:28:23Yes, Alan. I think what you're seeing is some of the benefits here of the spec model where we've been able to really ensure that we're rightsizing the amount of inventory that we have on the ground for what we see as the current demand at obviously a community submarket as well as a division level. And so that's some of the moderation in the starts that you saw come across here during the Q4. I think generally speaking, we're very bullish in terms of the demand that is out there and our ability to provide affordable housing where in markets that we continue to see the demand. So, I think we're very bullish on the swing selling season and we'll make those adjustments from a pace perspective as we move through. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:29:19In terms of levers that we have, really the cost side, as you're well aware, has been fairly stable throughout this entire year. We have seen some sequential decreases in direct costs throughout the year, which certainly have helped. Our land from a finished lot cost perspective has remained relatively stable. And as we look out next year, we really only see, I'll call it, normal wind inflation of 3% to 5% coming through. Some of the other items that we've done are just continuing to moderate on the square footage size. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:29:56Our overall square footage came down year over year this year about 2%. So, we have some ability to continue to solve for that affordability at the community level. And Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:09that's something Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:09that we'll obviously continue to do as we get into the spring selling season. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:30:15Great. I appreciate all the moving pieces there and the comments. Second question, there's been a fair amount of headlines over the last few weeks with some of the ICE raids and crackdowns and deportation rhetoric out there about what impact, if any, that could have on construction labor. I know many builders pre election were pretty complacent or I guess not expecting there to be a dramatic impact. But I'm just curious over the last few weeks whether you've seen any impact to your job sites or have heard any rumblings about any impact that could unfold from this? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:52Well, all this is still early on unfolding. We have not to answer your question, we have not seen any impacts to date. But again, this is early on the unfolding. I mean, we can speculate on how we think that would affect us as well as potentially tariffs. But at this point, we're controlling what we can control. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:31:14We have not seen anything on the ground or in our cost structure that needs us to react in a certain way. And so, it's just wait and see. But right now, we're not seeing anything that is negative to the business. Operator00:31:36And your next question today will come from Michael Rehaut with JPMorgan. Please go ahead. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:31:42Hi, thanks. Good afternoon, everyone. I have a couple of kind of fundamental oriented questions and then a couple of model oriented questions, if that's okay. Bigger picture, would love just to get a sense around relative strength across your regions, across your markets. You had mentioned that Florida and Texas account for roughly 30% of your closings or revenue. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:32:12Just wanted to get a sense if you could kind of rank order where you feel your different markets and perhaps doing better than corporate average, in line or worse and how those markets are trending currently? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:32:30Yes. Michael, I'll give some color. Broadly speaking, I think one of the benefits that we've always looked for in terms of the national platform that we have is really one of our primary abilities to provide diversification, and we are seeing that. So generally speaking, the West for us I think has been a strong from an absorption in demand perspective. Mountain has continued to move upward and we're seeing some underlying fundamentals there that continue to make us excited and optimistic about 2025. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:33:11As you noted, Texas is a little bit of a smaller piece of our footprint. We obviously have seen some of the rising supply there. When you dig back through those numbers in a little bit more detail, the supply at our price point in terms of months of supply is certainly on the lower range within that market overall. And I think that gives us comfort and some optimism going into 2025, and are both items that long term that we're very optimistic on. Generally speaking, from a supply standpoint, we're seeing our markets generally in kind of the 2 to 4, maybe high 4s from a month of supply. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:33:53And we think that's an overall healthy environment for us to start into 2025 on. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:34:01Okay. So are you seeing kind of outside of maybe the foreign Texas regions, again, a little more granular, any markets across your footprint stand out more positively or negatively? Or is it more just kind of more similar than not, I guess? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:34:19I Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:34:20mean, I think within the regions, we're generally seeing some consistent themes. I don't know what I'd necessarily call out any one market within those regions. If I would, Southern California for us, which is Orange County, was certainly a little bit of a stronger market this year from a demand perspective as well as Phoenix, which is in our mountain. In Southeast, Atlanta continues to be a very strong market for us. And so those are probably the individual markets that I would call out. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:34:51Okay. Thanks. Also on the you kind of laid out your expectation for 10% or better volume growth this year or next. I was wondering as we get through as we move through 2025 and even looking at 'twenty six, if the ASP might change at all, obviously, you guys remain pretty focused on affordability. I think in the past in 2024, your ASP was up nearly 4%. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:35:24So anything that we should expect in terms of that number maybe remaining where it is, maybe even going down a little bit, just further addressing the affordability challenge in the country? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:35:37Yes. For 'twenty for 'twenty five, if you play with the numbers, really the implied guide is effectively flat to slightly down on ASP. But the reality is that affordability is the name of the game and so that is what we are focused on every single day here as management. I think that guide incorporates obviously the continued use of incentive levels and primarily on the mortgage incentive side. I think longer term, as we get into 'twenty six and in future periods, I think Keshi would tell us that we absolutely should continue to see some appreciation coming through on that top line ASP number. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:36:20Okay. That's helpful. And then just a couple of modeling questions, if I could real quick. The $13,000,000 in other income, you said that was mostly due to a sale of a project. What was the actual contribution to that line? Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:36:36In other words, what would that line have been without that gain? Would it have been 0 or $1,000,000 or $2,000,000 plus or minus? Just trying to get the exact number there. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:36:46Yes, sure. Absolutely. There's a handful of things going through that other income line here this quarter. The primary driver is the disposal of 1 of our communities on Century Living. The gain on that was around $20,000,000 There's a handful of offsets that generally run through that line, including some write off of feasibility costs, some other expenses that ran through that line item here as well to get to that total $13,000,000 Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:37:17Okay. And then just one last one. You highlighted the share repurchase of 1,000,000 shares during the year. Your fully diluted share count though is roughly unchanged. So just want to understand the strategy there. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:37:31Are we still kind of looking to effectively just offset share creep through equity awards or whatnot? Or going looking forward, are you trying to reduce the share count? In the past couple of years, it's gone down by roughly $1,000,000 a year. So this year, it was more flat. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:38:02I think we're we haven't really changed and that is we've said we're going to make sure that the share count does not creep up. In terms of bringing it down, that's really opportunistic. When we look at when we purchase shares towards the end of the year, there were shares purchased, so you don't see the full benefit of that. But generally, our strategy is the same. I mean, we're focused on growth. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:38:27We're focused on making sure that our share count doesn't increase. And as we have opportunistic buying opportunities, then we'll step into the market. Operator00:38:43Your next question is a follow-up from Carl Reichardt of BTIG. Please go ahead. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:38:49So just to be sure about this, the guide for deliveries for 'twenty five does not presume any additional acquisitions beyond what Anglia and others will contribute that you've already made, correct? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:00Correct. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:39:01Okay. Just want to be sure about that. And then Scott, just to go back to Mike's question on the other income. So the you had inventory impairments of $6,800,000 That's where you're putting option walkaways plus any impairments to DIRTT, right? And then feasibility on early stage options, those go in the other expense line. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:39:23Is that how you guys do it? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:26That's correct. Our impairment line item would be that you see on the face financial statements would be anything that is owned in either owned and in some sort of stage of development or owned in an active community. If it's pre acquisition cost, it Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:43will go through the other. Operator00:39:51This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Dale for any closing remarks. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:39:57Thanks, operator. To everyone on the call, thank you for your time today and interest in Century Communities. We're very pleased with the strong growth across a range of metrics that we saw in 2024 and are excited by our outlook for 2025 and beyond.Read moreParticipantsExecutivesTyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor RelationsDale FrancesconExecutive ChairmanRobert FrancesconCEO & PresidentScott DixonCFOAnalystsCarl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIGJay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush SecuritiesAlan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLCMichael RehautExecutive Director at JP MorganPowered by Key Takeaways Century Communities delivered a record 11,007 homes in 2024, up 15% year-over-year, and achieved record Q4 home sales revenues of $1.2 billion. The company’s community count rose by 28% to a company-high 322 communities, supporting a 21% increase in net new contracts for the full year. Despite mortgage rate volatility and elevated incentives (approximately 800–900 basis points in Q4), Century expanded its adjusted gross margin by 80 bps to 23.3% and reduced SG&A by 40 bps. For 2025, Century guides to 10% delivery growth with 11,700–12,400 homes and $4.5–$4.8 billion in sales, driven by a mid-to-high single-digit increase in community count and stable absorption at 3.2 times. The company strengthened its balance sheet by extending its credit facility to $900 million, improving the homebuilding debt-to-capital ratio to 27.4%, repurchasing over 3% of shares, and raising the quarterly dividend by 13%. AI Generated. May Contain Errors.Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallCentury Communities Q4 202400:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2xTranscript SectionsPresentationParticipants Earnings DocumentsSlide DeckPress Release(8-K)Annual report(10-K) Century Communities Earnings HeadlinesCentury Communities Reveals 7 Outdoor Living Trends for Summer 2025May 20 at 2:24 PM | prnewswire.comCentury Communities Inc (CCS) Announces Groundbreaking of Katy Reserve in West Houston | CCS ...May 19 at 3:22 PM | gurufocus.comTrump Predicts Dollar DownfallREAD THIS VERY CAREFULLY: If you have $100,000 or more saved for retirement, this may make you VERY angry... This is what President Trump said: "Our currency is crashing and will soon no longer be the world standard, which will be our greatest defeat, frankly, in 200 years." Why Would He Say This?May 22, 2025 | Augusta Precious Metals (Ad)Century Communities Announces Katy Reserve Groundbreaking in the West Houston MetroMay 19 at 2:30 PM | gurufocus.comCentury Communities Announces Katy Reserve Groundbreaking in the West Houston MetroMay 19 at 1:55 PM | prnewswire.comAnalysts Set Century Communities, Inc. (NYSE:CCS) Price Target at $101.33May 15, 2025 | americanbankingnews.comSee More Century Communities Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Century Communities? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Century Communities and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About Century CommunitiesCentury Communities (NYSE:CCS), together with its subsidiaries, engages in the design, development, construction, marketing, and sale of single-family attached and detached homes. It is also involved in the entitlement and development of the underlying land; and provision of mortgage, title, and insurance services to its homebuyers. The company offers homes under the Century Communities and Century Complete brands. It sells homes through its sales representatives, retail studios, and internet, as well as through independent real estate brokers in 18 states in the United States. Century Communities, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Greenwood Village, Colorado.View Century Communities ProfileRead more More Earnings Resources from MarketBeat Earnings Tools Today's Earnings Tomorrow's Earnings Next Week's Earnings Upcoming Earnings Calls Earnings Newsletter Earnings Call Transcripts Earnings Beats & Misses Corporate Guidance Earnings Screener Earnings By Country U.S. Earnings Reports Canadian Earnings Reports U.K. Earnings Reports Latest Articles Alibaba's Earnings Just Changed Everything for the StockCisco Stock Eyes New Highs in 2025 on AI, Earnings, UpgradesSymbotic Gets Big Earnings Lift: Is the Stock Investable Again?D-Wave Pushes Back on Short Seller Case With Strong EarningsAppLovin Surges on Earnings: What's Next for This Tech Standout?Can Shopify Stock Make a Comeback After an Earnings Sell-Off?Rocket Lab: Earnings Miss But Neutron Momentum Holds Upcoming Earnings PDD (5/27/2025)AutoZone (5/27/2025)Bank of Nova Scotia (5/27/2025)NVIDIA (5/28/2025)Synopsys (5/28/2025)Bank of Montreal (5/28/2025)Salesforce (5/28/2025)Costco Wholesale (5/29/2025)Marvell Technology (5/29/2025)Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (5/29/2025) Get 30 Days of MarketBeat All Access for Free Sign up for MarketBeat All Access to gain access to MarketBeat's full suite of research tools. 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PresentationSkip to Participants Operator00:00:03Greetings. Welcome to Century Communities 4th Quarter and Full Year 20 24 Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note that this event is being recorded. Operator00:00:31I would now like to turn the conference over to Tyler Langton, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations for Century Communities. Thank you. You may begin. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:00:40Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us today for Century Communities' earnings conference call for the Q4 and full year 2024. Before the call begins, I would like to remind everyone that certain statements made during this call may constitute forward looking statements. These statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described or implied in the forward looking statements. Certain of these risks and uncertainties can be found under the heading Risk Factors in the company's latest 10 ks as supplemented by our latest 10 Q and other SEC filings. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:01:18We undertake no duty to update our forward looking statements. Additionally, certain non GAAP financial measures will be discussed on this conference call. The company's presentation of this information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information presented in accordance with GAAP. Hosting the call today are Dale Francescon, Executive Chairman Rob Francescon, Chief Executive Officer and President and Scott Dickson, Chief Financial Officer. Following today's prepared remarks, we will open up the line for questions. Tyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor Relations at Century Communities00:01:51With that, I'll turn the call over to Dale. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:01:53Thank you, Tyler, and good afternoon, everyone. We are pleased with our Q4 and full year 2024 results and believe that Centuri is well positioned to drive continued growth and improved returns in 2025 and beyond. Our full year 2024 deliveries increased 15% year over year to a record 11,007 homes and our community count increased 28% year over year to a company record 322 communities. 4th quarter deliveries of 3,198 homes and home sales revenues of $1,200,000,000 were both quarterly records. Even with the volatility in mortgage rates that we saw this year and our continued use of elevated levels of incentives to drive sales, We increased our full year 2024 adjusted gross margin by 80 basis points to 23.3%. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:02:59We also reduced our SG and A as a percentage of home sales revenues by 40 basis points through leveraging our fixed costs and expect this metric to see further year over year improvement in 2025. For the full year, our adjusted net income increased by 36% year over year with our 4th quarter adjusted net income up 18%. While we are clearly focused on growth, both organic and through the 2 acquisitions we completed and fully integrated in 2024, we also continue to return capital to our shareholders by repurchasing over 3% of our shares that were outstanding at the beginning of 2024 and increasing our quarterly dividend by 13%. Our 4th quarter net new contracts of 2,467 increased by 5% year over year and increased by 4% sequentially, which compares to an average sequential decline in the Q4 of 6% from 2019 through 2023. For the full year, our net new contracts increased 21% year over year to 10,676 homes. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:04:27Within the quarter, our orders were the highest in November, potentially benefiting from the decline in mortgage rates over much of that month and at roughly equal levels in both October December. So far through January, our order activity has been in line with typical seasonal pace with improvement over the course of the month, but below the very strong rate we saw in January 2024. Our average sales price was approximately $390,000 for both the Q4 and full year 2024 and remains among the lowest of the publicly traded homeowners. While housing affordability has been impacted by the recent mortgage rate volatility, we firmly believe that there is strong underlying demand for new homes underpinned by solid demographic trends. Additionally, we continue to take steps to address the impacts that elevated mortgage rates are having on affordability and believe our actions are helping us maintain an appropriate sales pace in the current environment. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:05:38We built nearly 100 percent of our homes on a spec basis in the Q4 and for the full year. This business model along with our captive mortgage subsidiary allows us to reduce costs, maintain an appropriate supply of quick move in homes that entry level buyers are seeking and provide our homebuyers with certainty of financing at below market interest rates through buy downs and other rate incentives. In the Q4, 92% of our deliveries were priced below FHA limits and over 60% of the mortgages closed by our captive mortgage company Inspire Home Loans were for FHA, USDA or VA loans that typically carry interest rates and down payment requirements that are below those of conventional mortgages and help make homes more affordable. The FICO scores of our homebuyers remain healthy and consistent with levels from the 1st three quarters of 2024 and full year 2023. Before turning the call over to Rob, I want to briefly discuss the recent steps our Board of Directors took as part of our ongoing succession planning process. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:07:00Effective January 1st, I have moved to the Executive Chairman role from co Chief Executive Officer, while Rob has become Century's sole Chief Executive Officer. As part of this transition, we do not anticipate any immediate changes to either of our day to day responsibilities, but it is my plan to devote a higher percentage of time to corporate and strategic initiatives. In closing, I want to thank all of our team members for their hard work and dedication that drove significant improvements in our business in 2024 and that position Century for continued success in 2025 and beyond. I'll now turn the call over to Rob to discuss our operations and land position in more detail. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:07:50Thank you, Dale, and good afternoon, everyone. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:07:53Before turning to our operations, I wanted to add on to Dale's remarks about our succession planning here at Century. We are incredibly proud of both the national platform that we have built at Century over the past 10 plus years since going public, as well as the team that we have assembled to lead it. We view succession planning at both the corporate level and throughout our regions and divisions as an ongoing process to ensure that we always have a deep bench of leaders with the skills and experience needed to drive our future success. For the full year 2024, we started 11,789 homes, a 20% year over year increase, consistent with our 21% year over year increase in net orders. In the Q4, we managed our starts down to 19 65 homes given the number of homes started earlier in the year to maintain an appropriate level of spec home inventory. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:08:59We continue to be encouraged by the growth in our community count. We ended the 4th quarter with a community count of 322, the highest level in our company's history and up 28% on a year over year basis and 6% sequentially. We also continue to believe that our geographically balanced land portfolio that stretches across 17 states and over 45 markets provides us with greater opportunities for growth across our national footprint and mitigates risk from regional downturns. As an example, while there has been some concern recently about rising inventories in Florida and Texas, these two regions combined only accounted for 31% of our full year 2024 deliveries. While it is still early and also recognizing the 28% growth in our community count in 2024, we currently expect our year end 2025 community count to further increase in the mid to high single digit percentage range, which will support our plans to grow our deliveries annually by 10% or more over the next couple of years. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:10:14Turning to costs. We had continued success in controlling our costs in the 4th quarter with our direct construction costs on the homes we started roughly flat on a sequential basis. For the full year 2024, our direct construction costs declined by 2% on a year over year basis. Our finished lot costs in the 4th quarter increased by roughly 2% on a sequential basis. During the Q4, our cycle times modestly improved on a sequential basis and are averaging approximately 4 months. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:10:50As expected, our incentives on closed homes increased in the 4th quarter to roughly 800 basis points, up from approximately 700 basis points in the 3rd quarter. As we discussed on our Q3 earnings call, our incentives on new orders in the 3rd quarter increased as mortgage rates moved higher and the higher incentives on these sales flowed through to our deliveries in the 4th quarter. Our incentives on new orders in the 4th quarter increased to approximately 900 basis points as we look to maintain our sales pace as mortgage rates remained elevated in the seasonally slower months of the 4th quarter. We expect mortgage rates and their impact on our incentive levels to be the largest driver of any changes to our gross margins in the near term given our success in controlling direct construction and finished lot costs. Turning to land, we ended the 4th quarter with over 80,000 owned and controlled lots. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:11:52The Century Complete's total lot count increased by 20% versus the prior year period and accounted for 25% of our total lot count. As a reminder, Century Complete only acquires finished lots and the growth in its lot count in 2024 demonstrates the team's continued success in sourcing capital efficient finished lots in attractive locations throughout the Southeast, Florida, Midwest and Arizona. Additionally, at the end of the Q4, our consolidated controlled lots accounted for 56% of our total lot count. While Scott will provide more details about our guidance for 2025 in his remarks, I wanted to briefly talk about our growth outlook for 2025 and beyond. We expect our full year 2025 deliveries to increase by approximately 10% on a year over year basis at the midpoint of our guidance and barring any changes to the homebuilding environment have the ability to grow our deliveries at least another 10% in 2026 as well. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:13:02This growth in 2025 is based on increases in our lot count and community count and does not assume any meaningful changes from our full year 2024 absorption pace of 3.2 times or current mortgage rates. Additionally, as we have discussed in the past, we expect this delivery growth to come from increasing our share primarily within our existing markets and to benefit margins and returns as we leverage the investments we have made at both the corporate level and throughout our markets at the local level. As Dale mentioned, we achieved a number of records in 2024 including community count, deliveries and book value per share and are excited by the potential we have to set new records in the years ahead. I'll now turn the call over to Scott to discuss our financial results in more detail. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:13:57Thank you, Rob. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:13:58In the Q4 of 2024, pre tax income was $135,200,000 and net income was $102,700,000 or $3.20 per diluted share, a 13% year over year increase. Adjusted net income was $112,000,000 or $3.49 per diluted share, an 18% year over year increase. EBITDA for the quarter was $160,200,000 and adjusted EBITDA was 172,600,000 dollars respective increases of 10% 17% both the year ago levels. Home sales revenue for the Q4 was $1,200,000,000 a quarterly record for the company and up 5% versus the prior year quarter on both higher deliveries and average sales price. Our 4th quarter average sales price was $389,800 increased by 4% on a year over year basis. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:14:59Our deliveries of 2,198 homes in the 4th quarter were a quarterly record for the company and our full year 2024 deliveries increased 15% on a year over year basis to 11,007 homes, also a company record. For the year, we saw growth across all our regions with the West, Texas and Southeast all posting growth rates of over 20%. For the Q1 2025, we expect our deliveries to decline on a sequential basis due to typical seasonality and be similar to Q1 2024 levels. As a reminder, the Q1 typically represents the low point for our deliveries during the year with the Q4 being the strongest. Starting in the Q2 2025, we expect our deliveries to increase on a sequential basis over the remaining quarters of the year with each quarter up on a year over year basis as well. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:15:59At quarter end, our backlog of sold homes was 850 units valued at 351,200,000 dollars with an average price of $413,100 While the average price of our 4th quarter backlog was above the average sales price for our 4th quarter deliveries, this difference is largely due to mix, including the percentage of Century Complete Homes. In the 4th quarter, adjusted homebuilding gross margin percentage was 22.9% compared to 23.6% in the prior quarter. The sequential change is primarily driven by a higher level of incentives on closed homes. Homebuilding gross margin was 20.6% versus 21.7% in the prior quarter. Additionally, purchase price accounting reduced our Q4 2024 gross margin by 30 basis points, which was in line with the reduction in the Q3. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:16:57We expect purchase price accounting to have a similar impact on our homebuilding gross margins in the first half of twenty twenty five. For the Q1 of twenty twenty five, we expect our homebuilding gross margin to ease on a sequential basis. Both our direct construction and finished lot costs should be roughly flat lot costs should be roughly flat quarter over quarter as we continue to successfully manage our costs. However, as Rob detailed in his remarks, our incentives on orders in the Q4 of 2024 were approximately 100 basis points higher in our incentives on deliveries as we focused on maintaining an appropriate sales pace in the seasonally slower Q4. Additionally, our Q1 homebuilding operating margin should see some impact from reduced operating leverage in the quarter that typically represents the low point for our deliveries. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:17:51SG and A as a percent of home sales revenue was 11.5% in the 4th quarter and 12% for the full year 2024. For 2025, we expect our SG and A as a percent of home sales revenues to decline on a year over year basis as we continue to leverage the investments we have made both at the corporate level and in our divisions that should support the delivery growth we expect over the next couple of years. Revenues from Financial Services were $26,200,000 in the 4th quarter and the business contributed $7,900,000 in pretax income. Other income in the quarter was $13,300,000 dollars with this income predominantly driven by the sale of a project within our Century Living business. As a reminder, Century Living is engaged in the development, construction and management of multifamily rental properties. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:18:44Our tax rate was 24% in the 4th quarter and 24.1% for the full year 2024. We expect our full year tax rate for 2025 to be in the range of 25% to 26% with the increase primarily driven by a reduced number of homes expected to qualify for $45 credit. Our 4th quarter net homebuilding debt to net capital ratio improved to 27.4% compared to the Q3 2024 levels of 32.1%. Our homebuilding debt to capital ratio also decreased to 30.3% at quarter end compared to the 3rd quarter levels of 35.8%. During the quarter, we maintained our quarterly cash dividend of $0.26 per share and repurchased approximately 400,000 shares of our common stock for 30,700,000 dollars For the full year 2024, we paid cash dividend totaling $1.04 per share and repurchased over 1,000,000 shares of our common stock or over 3% of our shares that were outstanding at the beginning of the year were $83,800,000 Through our dividend and share repurchases, we returned over $115,000,000 to our shareholders in 2024. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:20:05We grew our book value per share to a record $84.65 a 13% year over year increase and ended the quarter with $2,600,000,000 in stockholders' equity and $918,000,000 of liquidity. During the Q4, we entered into a new credit agreement, which increased the capacity of our senior unsecured credit facility to $900,000,000 up from $800,000,000 and extended maturity to November 2028 from April of 2026. Additionally, we have no senior debt maturities until June of 2027, providing us ample flexibility with our leverage management. Now turning to guidance. Given the growth in our lock count and community count in 2024, we expect our full year 2025 deliveries to be in the range of 11,700 to 12,400 homes and our home sales revenue to be in the range of $4,500,000,000 to $4,800,000,000 In closing, we are excited by our outlook for 2025. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:21:10We expect to grow our deliveries by approximately 10% year over year at the midpoint of our guidance. Additionally, as Rob mentioned, we expect our delivery growth to come from increasing our share primarily within our existing markets and to positively affect margins and returns as we leverage the investments we have made at both the corporate level and throughout our markets at the local level. While affordability for new homes has been impacted by the recent mortgage rate volatility, we firmly believe that there is strong underlying demand for affordable new homes. With that, I'll open the line for questions. Operator? Operator00:21:50Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. And our first question today will come from Carl Reichardt with BTIG. Please go ahead. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:22:23Thanks. Hey, guys. Nice to talk to you. Thank you for taking my question. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:22:27Hey, Karl. Robert FrancesconCEO & President at Century Communities00:22:28Hey, Karl. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:22:29Hey. Just to start with just on if we look at the business between Communities and Complete, can you talk about perhaps any differences in either traffic levels or the incentives you need to offer between those two product types, if there's any significant difference? And how do you expect that mix to look in 2025 in terms of delivery volume? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:22:49Yes. Carl, great question. When we step back and look at the differences between the brands, I don't know that we're seeing significantly different levels of incentives, maybe slightly more on the mortgage financing side within Century Complete as compared to our core Century brand. But we're really not significant. In terms of mix of how it's coming through our P and L and our operations going forward, and we're really trying to grow both of those brands. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:23:21We certainly see opportunities in all of our markets from a lot position standpoint. I think you can see that in our current owned and under controlled lots. So we'd anticipate both brands really to grow in those significant differences in mix that we're anticipating rolling through 20 25's P and L. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:23:45And then could you tell me if you have it, what percentage of your homes that you both sold and closed this particular quarter? And as you go next year, whether or not you're expecting I would assume you're expecting that percentage to increase over time as well, but I'd be curious as to what that number was. Thanks, Scott. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:24:08Yes, absolutely. For Q4, the number was slightly above 60% that were sold and closed within the quarter. I think since we have been on really the 100% spec model for quite some period of time, we've seen that number in the high 50s to even in a couple of quarters in the high 60s. We would anticipate really no significant changes going forward given our cycle times. At this point have really stabilized. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:24:39And we've been pretty consistent with our spec model over the last year or 2, yes. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:24:45Appreciate it. Thanks. I'll get back in queue. Operator00:24:53And your next question today will come from Jay McCanless with Wedbush. Please go ahead. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:24:59Hey, good afternoon, everyone. First question I had, could you talk about what incentive levels you guys are putting on orders in the current quarter? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:11Right now, it's consistent with what we were seeing in Q4, which is around 900 basis points. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:25:25Okay. And then, I think you answered this in the prepared comments, but just want to double check it. In terms of that growth of 10%, roughly in unit volumes, you guys are still thinking about the same level of sales absorption that you saw in 2024 is how you're thinking about for 'twenty five? Okay. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:47Yes. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:25:48So that's basically 3.2 times roughly. And so we're looking at that being stagnant. So it's really from community count. Jay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush Securities00:26:03And then I guess I like the fact you guys have said you're going to try and grow inside the footprint, but you have done a couple of acquisitions this year, maybe expanding your footprint a little bit. What are you seeing on the M and A front of their potential to do more deals? And what are you hearing on that front in terms of possibilities to expand the business? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:26:25Sure. Well, so the 2 acquisitions we did in 'twenty four were both within the footprint, one in Nashville, one in Houston. And it just got us deeper and larger in both of those markets, which has been our strategy all along. And that's really what we're looking for on a go forward basis. Regarding 25 M and A, as we've continued to do M and A through our entire public homebuilding career and to grow the Company. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:26:54We're always looking at deals. We've got like I'm sure a lot of people very stringent underwriting criteria and we'll just see how that goes this year. But we do look at M and A deals as you saw we did 2 last year TBD on what ends up coming through this year. Operator00:27:17And your next question today will come from Alan Ratner with Zelman and Associates. Please go ahead. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:27:23Hey, guys. Good afternoon. Thanks for all the detail so far. First question, I'd like to just drill in a little bit to the pace versus price strategy right now, recognizing that your guidance implies pretty flattish absorptions for 'twenty five. 4th quarter, your absorptions were down 15%. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:27:45January, it sounds like they were down year over year. I know the comps get maybe a little bit easier as the year goes on. But at what point and this isn't with incentives up more recently. So at what point of the year, is it in the spring, after the spring, if you're still trending lower on a year on year basis for absorptions, do you either get more aggressive on incentives or are there other adjustments that you would consider, maybe outright base price adjustments in order to solve for that flat absorption rate? Or is it more balanced between a certain margin target and sales? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:28:23Yes, Alan. I think what you're seeing is some of the benefits here of the spec model where we've been able to really ensure that we're rightsizing the amount of inventory that we have on the ground for what we see as the current demand at obviously a community submarket as well as a division level. And so that's some of the moderation in the starts that you saw come across here during the Q4. I think generally speaking, we're very bullish in terms of the demand that is out there and our ability to provide affordable housing where in markets that we continue to see the demand. So, I think we're very bullish on the swing selling season and we'll make those adjustments from a pace perspective as we move through. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:29:19In terms of levers that we have, really the cost side, as you're well aware, has been fairly stable throughout this entire year. We have seen some sequential decreases in direct costs throughout the year, which certainly have helped. Our land from a finished lot cost perspective has remained relatively stable. And as we look out next year, we really only see, I'll call it, normal wind inflation of 3% to 5% coming through. Some of the other items that we've done are just continuing to moderate on the square footage size. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:29:56Our overall square footage came down year over year this year about 2%. So, we have some ability to continue to solve for that affordability at the community level. And Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:09that's something Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:09that we'll obviously continue to do as we get into the spring selling season. Alan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLC00:30:15Great. I appreciate all the moving pieces there and the comments. Second question, there's been a fair amount of headlines over the last few weeks with some of the ICE raids and crackdowns and deportation rhetoric out there about what impact, if any, that could have on construction labor. I know many builders pre election were pretty complacent or I guess not expecting there to be a dramatic impact. But I'm just curious over the last few weeks whether you've seen any impact to your job sites or have heard any rumblings about any impact that could unfold from this? Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:30:52Well, all this is still early on unfolding. We have not to answer your question, we have not seen any impacts to date. But again, this is early on the unfolding. I mean, we can speculate on how we think that would affect us as well as potentially tariffs. But at this point, we're controlling what we can control. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:31:14We have not seen anything on the ground or in our cost structure that needs us to react in a certain way. And so, it's just wait and see. But right now, we're not seeing anything that is negative to the business. Operator00:31:36And your next question today will come from Michael Rehaut with JPMorgan. Please go ahead. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:31:42Hi, thanks. Good afternoon, everyone. I have a couple of kind of fundamental oriented questions and then a couple of model oriented questions, if that's okay. Bigger picture, would love just to get a sense around relative strength across your regions, across your markets. You had mentioned that Florida and Texas account for roughly 30% of your closings or revenue. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:32:12Just wanted to get a sense if you could kind of rank order where you feel your different markets and perhaps doing better than corporate average, in line or worse and how those markets are trending currently? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:32:30Yes. Michael, I'll give some color. Broadly speaking, I think one of the benefits that we've always looked for in terms of the national platform that we have is really one of our primary abilities to provide diversification, and we are seeing that. So generally speaking, the West for us I think has been a strong from an absorption in demand perspective. Mountain has continued to move upward and we're seeing some underlying fundamentals there that continue to make us excited and optimistic about 2025. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:33:11As you noted, Texas is a little bit of a smaller piece of our footprint. We obviously have seen some of the rising supply there. When you dig back through those numbers in a little bit more detail, the supply at our price point in terms of months of supply is certainly on the lower range within that market overall. And I think that gives us comfort and some optimism going into 2025, and are both items that long term that we're very optimistic on. Generally speaking, from a supply standpoint, we're seeing our markets generally in kind of the 2 to 4, maybe high 4s from a month of supply. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:33:53And we think that's an overall healthy environment for us to start into 2025 on. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:34:01Okay. So are you seeing kind of outside of maybe the foreign Texas regions, again, a little more granular, any markets across your footprint stand out more positively or negatively? Or is it more just kind of more similar than not, I guess? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:34:19I Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:34:20mean, I think within the regions, we're generally seeing some consistent themes. I don't know what I'd necessarily call out any one market within those regions. If I would, Southern California for us, which is Orange County, was certainly a little bit of a stronger market this year from a demand perspective as well as Phoenix, which is in our mountain. In Southeast, Atlanta continues to be a very strong market for us. And so those are probably the individual markets that I would call out. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:34:51Okay. Thanks. Also on the you kind of laid out your expectation for 10% or better volume growth this year or next. I was wondering as we get through as we move through 2025 and even looking at 'twenty six, if the ASP might change at all, obviously, you guys remain pretty focused on affordability. I think in the past in 2024, your ASP was up nearly 4%. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:35:24So anything that we should expect in terms of that number maybe remaining where it is, maybe even going down a little bit, just further addressing the affordability challenge in the country? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:35:37Yes. For 'twenty for 'twenty five, if you play with the numbers, really the implied guide is effectively flat to slightly down on ASP. But the reality is that affordability is the name of the game and so that is what we are focused on every single day here as management. I think that guide incorporates obviously the continued use of incentive levels and primarily on the mortgage incentive side. I think longer term, as we get into 'twenty six and in future periods, I think Keshi would tell us that we absolutely should continue to see some appreciation coming through on that top line ASP number. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:36:20Okay. That's helpful. And then just a couple of modeling questions, if I could real quick. The $13,000,000 in other income, you said that was mostly due to a sale of a project. What was the actual contribution to that line? Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:36:36In other words, what would that line have been without that gain? Would it have been 0 or $1,000,000 or $2,000,000 plus or minus? Just trying to get the exact number there. Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:36:46Yes, sure. Absolutely. There's a handful of things going through that other income line here this quarter. The primary driver is the disposal of 1 of our communities on Century Living. The gain on that was around $20,000,000 There's a handful of offsets that generally run through that line, including some write off of feasibility costs, some other expenses that ran through that line item here as well to get to that total $13,000,000 Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:37:17Okay. And then just one last one. You highlighted the share repurchase of 1,000,000 shares during the year. Your fully diluted share count though is roughly unchanged. So just want to understand the strategy there. Michael RehautExecutive Director at JP Morgan00:37:31Are we still kind of looking to effectively just offset share creep through equity awards or whatnot? Or going looking forward, are you trying to reduce the share count? In the past couple of years, it's gone down by roughly $1,000,000 a year. So this year, it was more flat. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:38:02I think we're we haven't really changed and that is we've said we're going to make sure that the share count does not creep up. In terms of bringing it down, that's really opportunistic. When we look at when we purchase shares towards the end of the year, there were shares purchased, so you don't see the full benefit of that. But generally, our strategy is the same. I mean, we're focused on growth. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:38:27We're focused on making sure that our share count doesn't increase. And as we have opportunistic buying opportunities, then we'll step into the market. Operator00:38:43Your next question is a follow-up from Carl Reichardt of BTIG. Please go ahead. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:38:49So just to be sure about this, the guide for deliveries for 'twenty five does not presume any additional acquisitions beyond what Anglia and others will contribute that you've already made, correct? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:00Correct. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:39:01Okay. Just want to be sure about that. And then Scott, just to go back to Mike's question on the other income. So the you had inventory impairments of $6,800,000 That's where you're putting option walkaways plus any impairments to DIRTT, right? And then feasibility on early stage options, those go in the other expense line. Carl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIG00:39:23Is that how you guys do it? Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:26That's correct. Our impairment line item would be that you see on the face financial statements would be anything that is owned in either owned and in some sort of stage of development or owned in an active community. If it's pre acquisition cost, it Scott DixonCFO at Century Communities00:39:43will go through the other. Operator00:39:51This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Dale for any closing remarks. Dale FrancesconExecutive Chairman at Century Communities00:39:57Thanks, operator. To everyone on the call, thank you for your time today and interest in Century Communities. We're very pleased with the strong growth across a range of metrics that we saw in 2024 and are excited by our outlook for 2025 and beyond.Read moreParticipantsExecutivesTyler LangtonSenior Vice President, Investor RelationsDale FrancesconExecutive ChairmanRobert FrancesconCEO & PresidentScott DixonCFOAnalystsCarl ReichardtManaging Director - Equity Research at BTIGJay McCanlessSVP - Equity Research at Wedbush SecuritiesAlan RatnerManaging Director at Zelman Partners LLCMichael RehautExecutive Director at JP MorganPowered by