MAA, Mid-america Apartment Communities, Inc.
Read top to bottom, the owner's questions in the order an owner asks them: what the business is, whether the record holds, whether it survives and is any good, and what you would be paying. New to the questions? Start with the Method.
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, read from the numbers in its filings. The quantitative detail is in the sections below; the verdict is left to you.
- What it is
- A property business, read on funds from operations and net asset value rather than reported earnings.
- What moves the needle
- Occupancy, rents, and the cost of debt. Read on funds from operations and net asset value, because GAAP depreciation distorts the earnings.
- Is it a good business?
- Funds from operations per share have compounded about 6% a year across the record. The dividend takes 66% of FFO, and is covered. The quality and location of the properties, the lease terms and occupancy, and the cost of the debt are what the 10-K settles, and no single ratio captures them.
Every line here is arithmetic from the company's own filings, not a model's opinion, and each figure appears in full in the sections below.
The record, 2012–2025
realized figures from each filing, no estimates| 2012’12 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RevenueRevenue | $497M | $1.5B | $1.6B | $1.6B | $1.7B | $1.8B | $2.0B | $2.1B | $2.2B | $2.2B | $2.2B |
| Net incomeNet inc. | $105M | $328M | $223M | $354M | $255M | $534M | $637M | $553M | $528M | $447M | $390M |
| Funds from operationsFFO | $237M | $823M | $714M | $852M | $767M | $1.1B | $1.2B | $1.1B | $1.1B | $1.1B | $1.0B |
| FFO / shareFFO/sh | $2.09 | $7.24 | $6.27 | $7.46 | $6.70 | $9.29 | $10.22 | $9.59 | $9.54 | $9.13 | $8.76 |
| Dividend payout (FFO)Payout | 45% | 48% | 59% | 51% | 60% | 44% | 46% | 58% | 62% | 66% | — |
| Debt / assetsDebt/assets | 43% | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Total debtDebt | $1.2B | — | $475M | $626M | $485M | $365M | $364M | $360M | $360M | $360M | $360M |
| Dividends / shareDiv/sh | $0.95 | $3.48 | $3.69 | $3.84 | $3.99 | $4.09 | $4.67 | $5.59 | $5.88 | $6.05 | — |
| Book value / shareBVPS | $8.04 | $57.82 | $54.02 | $53.18 | $51.28 | $51.85 | $51.95 | $52.24 | $50.88 | $48.34 | $47.46 |
Owner’s Scorecard
Is it a good business?
- about $9.13 per shareNet income $447M + depreciation $623M
GAAP net income with property depreciation added back, because the buildings a REIT charges against earnings usually hold or grow their value. This, not net income, is what a REIT is actually priced on. It is an approximation here: where a filing reports gains on property sales, we remove them, the way the NAREIT definition does.
- CoveredDividends $709M ÷ FFO $1.1B
A REIT must distribute most of its taxable income, so a high payout is normal and the question is whether FFO covers it. Above 100%, the trust is funding the dividend with debt or asset sales, and a cut usually follows.
Is it sound?
- Not cleanly captured
This REIT tags its borrowings in a way the pipeline could not fully total, so we decline to show a leverage figure rather than a misleadingly low one. The debt schedule in the 10-K is where to read its true leverage.
- Strong(operating income + depreciation) ÷ interest $185M
How many times the property cash earnings cover the interest bill. Comfortable coverage is what lets a REIT refinance through a tight credit market instead of being forced to sell into one.
Solvent is not the same as cheap; growing is not the same as good. These are vital signs, not a verdict, the judgment is yours, and the filing is one click away.
Management & pay
Two questions Buffett actually asks about pay: is stock compensation, a real expense, whatever the income statement pretends, quietly large, and is the top wildly out of line with the floor. He's no populist about it; he just wants pay that's rational and earned, and comp committees that aren't lapdogs.
- Stock-based compensation$17M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% of revenue, equal to 13% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. And note the trap, the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.
What the price implies
price / FFOA REIT is priced on a multiple of its funds from operations (FFO), the cash it earns once the depreciation on its buildings is added back. Type today’s price; we show the multiple you would pay and the income and growth it implies. Nothing is stored.
Enter a price above to run it.
The justified multiple is 1 ÷ (discount rate − growth), a perpetuity on FFO. At an 8% discount and 3% growth, a REIT is worth about 20× FFO. Raise the discount rate and the multiple falls: the same interest-rate gravity that pulls on every yield asset.
FFO about $8.76 per share on 117M shares. A lens, not a target. FFO here adds back depreciation and removes property-sale gains, the NAREIT method; it does not net out maintenance capex (AFFO), occupancy or lease terms, which the 10-K does.
What the filing emphasizes, FY2025
read the 10-K →Each year a 10-K must name what could go wrong, in the company's own words. Here are the ones Graham and Buffett would stop on, each set against the figure from the same filings that bears on it, anchored to a period you can find in the record above. We point; the judgment is yours.
- Debt terms & refinancingMD&A
The fine print behind the debt. Covenants and near-term maturities decide who is really in control when a year goes badly.
“As of December 31, 2025, we had $879.2 million of combined unrestricted cash and cash equivalents and available capacity under our revolving credit facility.”
From the recordBalance sheet (TTM)$300M meaningful net debt · interest covered 0.7× - Litigation & contingenciesMD&A
Claims an owner inherits. Most disclosure is boilerplate; this fires only on an actual matter, a named suit, a settlement, a contingency, a number.
“For the years ended December 31, 2025 and 2024, in accordance with our accounting policies, we recognized $61.9 million and $8.0 million, respectively, of accrued legal settlements and legal defense costs.”
A judgment, not a number, weigh it against the filing yourself. - Regulation & policyMD&A
Rules that can rewrite the economics, tariffs, antitrust, data, export controls.
“We expect that our primary uses of cash will be to fund our ongoing operating needs, to fund our ongoing capital spending requirements, which relate primarily to our development, redevelopment and property repositioning activities, to repay maturing borrowings, to fund the future acquisition of asse…”
A judgment, not a number, weigh it against the filing yourself.
What changed, FY2025 vs FY2024
read the 10-K →Most of a 10-K is boilerplate carried over verbatim; the signal is in what's new. These lines appear this year and weren't there last, figure updates filtered out, so only the language shift remains.
- “Core FFO attributable to common shareholders and unitholders for the year ended December 31, 2025 was $1.0 billion, a decrease of $16.6 million as compared to the year ended December 31, 2024, primarily as a result of increases in property operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization,…”
- “During the year ended December 31, 2025, we experienced inflationary pressures that drove higher operating expenses, primarily in personnel, utilities, building repair and maintenance, marketing and office operations expenses. 39 Critical Accounting Estimates A critical accounting estimate is one th…”
- “We believe that the estimates and assumptions summarized below are most important to the portrayal of our financial condition and results of operations because they involve a significant level of estimation uncertainty and they have had, or are reasonably likely to have, a material impact on our fin…”
- “The decrease in cash outflows for development costs was primarily driven by decreased development activity during the year ended December 31, 2025 as compared to the year ended December 31, 2024.”
Classic text analysis over the filing itself, no model wrote a word of this, and every quote is the company's own.
Peers, Real estate
The same industry, side by side on the REIT lens, compare, don't rank by a single number.● marks best in the group.
| Company | Revenue | FFO margin | FFO / assets | Payout (FFO) | Debt / assets |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EQREquity Residential | $2.7B | — | — | — | 40% |
| SUISUN Communities, Inc | $2.3B | 83% | 15.3% | — | 59% |
| MAAMid-america Apartment Communities, Inc. | $2.2B | 48% | 8.9% | 66% | — |
| KIMKimco Realty Corporation | $2.1B | 52% | 5.7% | 64% | 39% |
| WPCW. P. Carey Inc. | $1.7B | 47% | 4.5% | 98% | 48% |
| GLPIGaming and Leisure Properties, Inc. | $1.6B | 69% | 8.6% | 79% | 56% |
| REGRegency Centers Corporation | $1.6B | 58% | 7.0% | 56% | 36% |
| ELSEquity Lifestyle Properties, Inc. | $1.5B | 40% | 10.6% | 64% | 58% |