Dive Brief:

• Multifamily real estate investment trust UDR said CFO Joseph Fisher will immediately take on the added role of chief investment officer, effective Jan. 1, according to a press release and a separate Securities and Exchange Commission filing Thursday.
• Fisher will relinquish the finance chief role he has held since 2017 once the Highlands Ranch, Colorado-based company finds a successor to take the reins, the company said, after which Fisher will retain the roles of president and CIO. Harry Alcock, the company’s previous CIO, retired from the position with plans to transition to a consulting role focused on transactions last year. 
• The company this week also promoted Michael Lacy, previously the company’s senior vice president – operations, to chief operating officer, according to the release. The COO role has been vacant since Jerry Davis stepped down to retire several years ago, according to a company spokesperson.

Dive Insight:

Both of the moves put veteran UDR executives in vacant positions. Lacy has worked at UDR for 18 years, starting out as a senior acquisitions analyst and working his way up to senior roles in pricing and business intelligence and property operations, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

Fisher, who has been with the firm for over eight years, previously worked as a co-head of the Americas and co-lead portfolio manager at RREEF Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management and holds an MBA from Northwestern University - Kellogg School of Management and a bachelor’s degree in business administration, finance, accounting and entrepreneurship from University of Iowa, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

“Joe’s transition and elevation to Chief Investment Officer represents a natural expansion of his integral role within the Company. When combined with Mike’s numerous years of operational excellence and expanded role as Chief Operating Officer, we have further aligned the execution of our value creation initiatives across the organization,” UDR’s chairman and CEO Tom Toomey said in a statement included in the release.

In his role as CFO and president, Fisher’s compensation totaled $4.85 million in 2023, compared to $8.19 million in 2022, according to the company’s proxy statement. 

Like many apartment owners, UDR has benefited from strong demand and in November it increased its projections for the remainder of the year, raising its same-store revenue growth guidance although it still faces pressure on new rents, CFO Dive sister publication Multifamily Dive previously reported. 

In an October 30 report, JPMorgan analysts led by Anthony Paolone noted that the “look-ahead” was mixed, with UDR’s raising of guidance seen as a positive, along with stock valuation being attractive at about a 7% discount to peers on an FFO/share multiple basis. But the report also noted that analysts think “the real deceleration is being seen in the company’s new lease rates, and most likely in the Sunbelt.” 

For the third quarter ended Sept. 30 the company, reported net income per diluted share of $0.06 compared to $0.10 in 3Q23 while revenue rose 1.2% year-over-year. Asked in an Oct. 30 earnings call about the company’s comparatively optimistic prospects for a 2025 recovery in the Sunbelt markets, Fisher said he expects pricing power to be helped by supply in the region coming down despite uncertainty related to other factors. 

“A lot of that's going to depend…on the wildcard out there, what takes place with jobs and wages, household formation, et cetera,” Fisher said, according to a transcript of the call in which he noted that there will start to be “a little bit more pricing power than we have this year…So it's bit by bit and works its way into same-store revenue growth, but we think we'll start to see the signs of it mid-second half.”