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Medalist Diversified REIT Announces Letter to Shareholders
RICHMOND, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Medalist Diversified REIT, Inc. (NASDAQ: MDRR) (the “Company” or “Medalist”), a Virginia-based real estate investment trust
About this update from Medalist Diversified, Inc.
[{"type":"text","content":" RICHMOND, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--\nMedalist Diversified REIT, Inc. (NASDAQ: MDRR) (the “Company” or “Medalist”), a Virginia-based real estate investment trust that specializes in acquiring, owning and managing commercial real estate in the Southeast region of the US, today issued a Letter to Shareholders from its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Thomas E. Messier.\n\nDear Fellow Shareholders:\n\nI am proud of our team’s accomplishments in 2021 as we clearly demonstrated the strength of our model. Our focus on secondary and tertiary markets in the Southeastern US and our strategy to continually improve the position of our portfolio were key drivers behind our ability to successfully emerge from the challenges of the early days of COVID.\n\nWe ended 2021 by declaring our third consecutive quarterly common stock dividend in the wake of the pandemic and announcing a 500,000-share common stock buyback program, both strong signals of the conviction that our Board and management have in the Company’s strategy.\n\nPortfolio Update\n\nIn September, we completed the sale of our Hampton Inn property in Greensboro, North Carolina, generating net proceeds of approximately $1.7 million. As announced in the second quarter of 2021, the long-term contract for 100 percent rental of all 148-rooms at our remaining hotel property, the Clemson Best Western in South Carolina, was extended through May 2022.\n\nOur total square footage of retail and flex properties grew to 764,940 square feet in 2021, up 92 percent from 397,874 square feet at the end of 2020. This expansion includes the May 2021 acquisition of Lancer Center, a 178,626 square foot property in Lancaster, South Carolina with anchor tenants that include Big Lots, Harbor Freight, KJ’s Grocery, and Babcock Furniture. Lancer Center’s diverse workforce tenancy is a great example of our acquisition targeting strategy, and we believe this is an important driver behind our ability to immediately generate positive and sustainable cash flow from additions to our portfolio.\n\nIn August, we acquired Greenbrier Business Center, a flex Industrial center consisting of three buildings totaling approximately 89,290 square feet of gross leasable space in Chesapeake, Virginia. As with Lancer, Greenbrier has a diverse workforce tenancy, consistent with our strategy, that we were able to translate into i...