ESS vs. AVB, EQR, MAA, SUI, UDR, ELS, CPT, AIV, UMH, and EQIX
Should you be buying Essex Property Trust stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Essex Property Trust include AvalonBay Communities (AVB), Equity Residential (EQR), Mid-America Apartment Communities (MAA), Sun Communities (SUI), UDR (UDR), Equity LifeStyle Properties (ELS), Camden Property Trust (CPT), Apartment Investment and Management (AIV), UMH Properties (UMH), and Equinix (EQIX). These companies are all part of the "real estate investment trusts" industry.
AvalonBay Communities (NYSE:AVB) and Essex Property Trust (NYSE:ESS) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, institutional ownership, risk, dividends, earnings, profitability, media sentiment, community ranking and analyst recommendations.
Essex Property Trust received 51 more outperform votes than AvalonBay Communities when rated by MarketBeat users. However, 61.02% of users gave AvalonBay Communities an outperform vote while only 56.71% of users gave Essex Property Trust an outperform vote.
In the previous week, AvalonBay Communities and AvalonBay Communities both had 11 articles in the media. AvalonBay Communities' average media sentiment score of 1.12 beat Essex Property Trust's score of 0.45 indicating that Essex Property Trust is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
AvalonBay Communities currently has a consensus price target of $207.76, indicating a potential upside of 0.63%. Essex Property Trust has a consensus price target of $262.15, indicating a potential downside of 8.58%. Given Essex Property Trust's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe AvalonBay Communities is more favorable than Essex Property Trust.
92.6% of AvalonBay Communities shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 96.5% of Essex Property Trust shares are held by institutional investors. 0.4% of AvalonBay Communities shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 3.8% of Essex Property Trust shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.
AvalonBay Communities has a beta of 0.96, indicating that its share price is 4% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Essex Property Trust has a beta of 0.86, indicating that its share price is 14% less volatile than the S&P 500.
AvalonBay Communities pays an annual dividend of $6.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.3%. Essex Property Trust pays an annual dividend of $9.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.4%. AvalonBay Communities pays out 101.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Essex Property Trust pays out 119.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Essex Property Trust has increased its dividend for 30 consecutive years. Essex Property Trust is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
AvalonBay Communities has a net margin of 34.05% compared to AvalonBay Communities' net margin of 31.18%. AvalonBay Communities' return on equity of 9.22% beat Essex Property Trust's return on equity.
AvalonBay Communities has higher revenue and earnings than Essex Property Trust. AvalonBay Communities is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Essex Property Trust, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Summary
Essex Property Trust beats AvalonBay Communities on 10 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding ESS and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
This chart shows the average media sentiment of NYSE and its competitors over the past 90 days as caculated by MarketBeat. The averaged score is equivalent to the following: Very Negative Sentiment <= -1.5, Negative Sentiment > -1.5 and <= -0.5, Neutral Sentiment > -0.5 and < 0.5, Positive Sentiment >= 0.5 and < 1.5, and Very Positive Sentiment >= 1.5.
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