Change is Coming – Always Improving

by on February 7, 2024 with No Comments

At MFG, our Mission Statement is to be “Always improving”. Over the past 15 months, we have been refining the process of how we can better deliver our investment platform to our clients. Utilizing partnerships and data collected over the years, we’ve come up with a solution that we believe will improve our investment platform and improve our clients overall experience with MFG.

What is Changing?

We are transitioning to an investment model platform. Working with your Portfolio Manager, it will be determined which model is appropriate for you. Once this has been determined, you will own one or more of the new MFG Investment Models – Aggressive, Growth, and/or Balanced. These new Model Funds are built using the best investment managers and strategies that our team has researched. The platform utilizes the same investment philosophies of delivering an institutional quality portfolio to our clients.

The Benefits to our Clients

1. Increased Performance

    – Via enhanced portfolio construction and efficient management capabilities

2. Time spent with your Portfolio Manager

   – Spend more time focusing on other value add areas of your financial lives – IE: financial planning, insurance analysis, tax work, etc.

3. Communication will be improved through detailed Quarterly Reports

   – These reports will include facts about the Model Fund, general market commentary and additional information that our PM Division finds relevant to our clients

 

When to Expect the Change – April 1st, 2024

We are very excited to be able to deliver this new and improved platform to our clients. There has been a lot of work put in by our team to get us to this point. As we approach April 1st, you can expect to receive multiple communication pieces from our team diving into deeper details on the upcoming changes. If you have any questions on the upcoming change and what it might look like for you personally, please don’t hesitate to reach out to your MFG Portfolio Manager.

We want to thank you for your continued trust and support of MFG. Without you, none of this would be possible.

Stay tuned.

 

PDF Version

Alignvest – Management Report

by on February 7, 2024 with No Comments
Management Report – December 31, 2023

We are pleased to send you Alignvest Student Housing Real Estate Investment Trust’s Q4 2023 Management Report. 2023 was a successful year for the REIT. We started the year with a flagship property acquisition in Halifax, which expanded our presence into Eastern Canada. Our entire portfolio has delivered strong operating performance, resulting in a 21.4% return to Class F shareholders (with DRIP participation). With the growth in NOI, our portfolio is valued at $961.8 million, an increase of over 15% over the year.

The macroeconomic environment was more stable in the second half of 2023, with inflation decreasing to 4.0% or below since May and the 5-year GoC bond yield dropping over 25% since the end of Q3. We spent much of 2023 focused on building our acquisition and investment pipeline to be ready when deals became actionable. In Q4, with a robust pipeline, we were able to re-open the REIT for subscriptions. We appreciate everyone’s patience with us as we needed more visibility on our ability to put capital to work before taking in additional cash from subscriptions.

In Q4, we completed our equity investment in the partnership that acquired 149 College Street, a 43,118 square foot building in Toronto, steps away from the University of Toronto. We also entered into a contract to acquire a student housing property in a market where we already have operations, with an expected closing date in Q1 2024. In addition, we are in due diligence on multiple additional opportunities.

Our 2024 pre-leasing season is off to a strong start. We are already almost 60% pre-leased at our privately-managed properties for September 2024 and are projecting a 15.1% gap-to-market on sitting rents when compared to budgeted September 2024 lease rates.

Over the past several weeks, the Canadian government has issued new rules and caps applicable to international students. In particular, the focus seems to be targeted to colleges, where we have no exposure. As we stated in our response (link below), we do not believe these changes will have a material impact on our portfolio.

We are expecting to deliver strong performance in 2024 given our market leading position and our strong business fundamentals.  With a strong acquisition pipeline in front of us, we are actively raising capital to pursue these opportunities. The future looks strong, and we are confident in our strategy and the corresponding returns for our investors.

 

Below is the link to our Q4 2023 Management Report.

 

Q4 2023 Management Report Our Response to Canada's Cap on International Students