National Storage Affiliates Trust Posts Strong Q4 Results, Eyes Bright Future Amid Challenging Market Conditions
National Storage Affiliates Trust (NSA) has reported a strong fourth quarter of 2024, capping off a productive year of strategic positioning for the company's next phase of growth. In a recent conference call, NSA's President and CEO, Dave Cramer, outlined several key accomplishments in 2024, including the internalization of the Pro structure, which involved consolidating its brands from 12 to 7, onboarding approximately 250 properties and over 380 employees to its corporate platform, and deploying $150 million of growth capital in a newly formed joint venture.
According to Cramer, NSA finished the year with several significant accomplishments, including the consolidation of its web domains, putting all of its stores onto nsastorage.com, and converting all of its stores to a single new property management system. The company also sold 40 noncore facilities to third parties for over $270 million and used proceeds to pay down debt and purchased $65 million of properties, in addition to repurchasing $275 million of common shares.
In his remarks, Cramer acknowledged the challenging operating conditions due to elevated supply and muted transitory demand from historically low home sales. However, he expressed optimism about the medium-term outlook for the self-storage sector and NSA in particular, citing several positive factors. These include being near a bottom in the housing market, which should result in an eventual recovery that benefits NSA, as well as pent-up demand created by severing around the lowest levels of housing turnover in the past 40 years.
Cramer also highlighted the company's markets having a higher average percentage of homeowners versus renters, making its portfolio more sensitive to changes in the overall level of housing turnover. Furthermore, supply is expected to decline substantially over the next few years, with rentable square feet as a percentage of stock going down from 3.5% in 2024 to 2% by 2027, which is well below the long-term national average according to Yardi.
NSA's year-over-year comparisons are expected to become noticeably easier in the back half of the year, which combined with these anticipated improvements in supply-demand variables will likely drive healthy momentum into 2026 and beyond. With its strategic positioning complete, NSA can now focus on maximizing the performance of its existing portfolio using its consolidated operating platforms and upgraded marketing tools.
As Cramer noted, this will directly impact shareholders' returns as the company no longer shares the upside with its PROs. The strong Q4 results and optimistic outlook make National Storage Affiliates Trust an exciting company to watch in 2025.
