FirstService Corp Q4 FY2025 Earnings Call

Welcome to the Fourth Quarter Investors Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. Legal requires us to advise that the discussion scheduled to take place today may contain forward-looking statements that involve known and unknown risks, and actual results may be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements contemplated in the forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning factors that could cause actual results to materially differ from those in the forward-looking statements is contained in the company's annual information form as filed with the Canadian Securities Administrators and in the company's annual report on Form 40-F as filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. Today is February 4, 2026. I would now like to turn the call over to Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Scott Patterson. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you, Tanya.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our fourth quarter and year-end conference call. Thank you for joining us today. Jeremy Rakusin is on the line with me, and we'll follow my overview comments with a more detailed review of our financial results for the quarter and the full year. We're pleased with how we closed out the year in an environment that continues to challenge us across several of our businesses. Our fourth quarter results in aggregate were modest relative to our expectations that we communicated at the end of Q3, with revenues up 1%, EBITDA flat with the year ago, and earnings per share up 2% to $1.37. For the year, we reported solid results that we're proud of in the face of tough macro headwinds. Revenues finished 5% up over the prior year, Consolidated EBITDA was up 10%, double the revenue growth, reflecting a 40 basis point improvement in margins. And earnings per share reflected further leverage, with year-over-year growth at 15%. Looking now at the separate divisions for the quarter. Revenues at FirstService Residential were up 8% in aggregate with organic growth at 5% matching our expectations and the results for Q3. The growth was broad-based across North America and generally reflects net contract wins versus losses. Looking forward, we expect organic growth to continue in the mid-single-digit range. There could be modest movement from quarter to quarter, with seasonality and fluctuation in ancillary services, but on average for 2026, we're expecting mid-single-digit organic growth similar to our full-year result for 2024 and 2025. We will face organic growth pressure early in the year relating to declines in certain amenity management services that we provide to some of our managed communities but primarily to multifamily rental and other commercial customers. These services include pool construction and renovation, which is being impacted by the same economic headwinds we're seeing in roofing and home services. It also includes contracts to provide custodian and front desk concierge labor. Several contracts primarily with multifamily apartment owners were not renewed at year-end. Some voluntary and a few involuntary, all primarily due to pricing. These cancellations will impact our revenue, but have little impact on profitability. We expect to be at the bottom end of our mid-single-digit range at 3% or 4% for Q1. This is unrelated to our core community management business which we believe will carry the division to mid-single-digit organic growth for the year. Moving on to FirstService Brands. Revenues for the quarter were down 3% in aggregate, and 7% organically, with organic growth at Century Fire more than offset by organic declines with our restoration brands and our roofing platform. Looking more closely at restoration, Paul Davis and First On-Site together recorded revenues that were flat sequentially compared to Q3 and down 13% versus the prior year. Somewhat better than expectations, due to our pickup in claim activity during the quarter with our Canadian operations. We benefited in the prior year quarter from Hurricanes Helene and Milton, and generated about $60 million in revenue from the storms. Excluding these specific events, our restoration brands showed modest year-over-year growth. As I described on last quarter's call, revenues from named storms have on average exceeded 10% of our total restoration revenue since 2019. For 2025, revenues from named storms amounted to less than 2% of total restoration revenues. We finished the year down 4% in restoration, relative to an industry that we believe was down over 20%. Our platform investments and focus on day-to-day service delivery continue to drive gains in wallet share with key national accounts and overall market share. Looking forward, we expect to show growth for the full year 2026 assuming we return to historic average weather patterns. Our restoration brands have grown on average by 8% organically since 2019 and we expect that to continue on average going forward. Our backlog at year-end was down from the prior year, pointing to a revenue decline for Q1. However, we've seen an uptick in activity over the last week from the expansive winter storm. It's still very early, but based on activity levels, and the nature of the quick response mitigation work, we expect to show Q1 results that are modestly up over the prior year. Moving to our roofing segment. Revenues for the quarter were up a few percentage points as a result of tuck-under acquisitions made during the year. However, as expected, revenues were down organically by over 5%. The demand environment in roofing remains muted. New commercial construction outside of the data center and power is down significantly. On the reroof side, we continue to see tighter capital expenditure budgets amongst our customers and delays with some larger projects. As I noted last quarter, we're confident that our market position and relationships remain strong. Bid activity is solid, and our backlog has stabilized. Our expectation is that we will show modest organic growth this year with sequential improvement quarter to quarter. Looking to Q1, we expect revenues to be up mid-single-digit versus the prior year, and approximately flat organically. Now to our home service brands where revenues were up by 3% over the prior year, better than expectations, and a result we're proud of in an environment where consumer confidence remains depressed. The consumer index was down again in December, marking five months of sequential decline. As I said on the last few calls, our teams are doing more with less by incrementally improving lead to estimate ratios, close ratios, and average job size. Current economic and industry indicators do not suggest an improved environment through 2026. Our lead flow the last several weeks is flat to slightly down compared to the prior year. If this continues, our current conversion metrics would suggest that we will drive higher revenue year over year in the low to mid-single-digit range for Q1 2026. And I'll finish with Century Fire where we had a strong Q4 and finish to the year. Revenues were up over 10% versus the prior year with high single-digit organic growth. Century continues to experience solid growth on both sides of its business, that is installation, repair service and inspection. The growth is broad-based across almost all our branches at Century. We're benefiting on the installation side of our business from solid activity in multifamily and warehouse with some positive exposure to data center construction. Our backlog is strong, and activity levels remain buoyant. Looking forward, we expect another year of 10% growth or more spread evenly across the quarter. Let me now call on Jeremy to review our results in detail and provide a consolidated look forward. Thank you, Scott. Good morning, everyone.

As you just heard for the fourth quarter, we delivered on our expectations provided on our Q3 call, which culminated in solid annual operating and financial performance. As we look back at our consolidated annual results for 2025, we are pleased with the growth we delivered on the earnings lines, notwithstanding the top-line headwinds we are facing throughout the year. I'll first walk through a summary of these financial metrics and then move on to reviews of our segmented divisional performance as well as our cash flow and balance sheet. Note that my upcoming comments on our adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EPS results, respectively, reflect adjustments to GAAP operating earnings and GAAP EPS, which are disclosed in this morning's release and are consistent with our approach in prior periods. During the fourth quarter, our consolidated revenues were $1.38 billion, up 1% versus the prior year period. Our adjusted EBITDA of $138 million was in line with Q4 2024, yielding a margin of 9.9%, slightly down from the 10.1% level during the prior year. Our Q4 adjusted EPS was $1.37, up from $1.34 in last year's fourth quarter. For the full year, consolidated revenues increased 5% to $5.5 billion and adjusted EBITDA came in at $563 million, up 10% over the prior year, and delivering a 10.2% margin, up 40 basis points compared to 9.8% in 2024. Adjusted EPS for the 2025 fiscal year was $5.75, up 15% versus 2024. This five, ten, and fifteen percent top to bottom line annual growth profile reflects the exceptional efforts of our operating leaders across every brand, as they emphasized efficient job execution in the face of market challenges and drove margin improvement wherever possible. Turning now to a segmented walk-through of our two divisions. For FirstService Residential, revenues during the fourth quarter were $563 million, up 8% and the division reported EBITDA of $51.5 million, a 12% increase over the prior year period. Our margin for the quarter was 9.1%, modestly up from the 8.8% in Q4 2024. The quarterly performance largely mirrored the full-year growth profile for the division. We closed out the year with annual revenues of $2.3 billion, up 7% over 2024, including 4% organic growth. Annual EBITDA increased 13% with our full-year margin at 9.8%, up 50 basis points over the 9.3% margin for 2024. In summary, the FirstService Residential division achieved key financial targets for the year, getting back to mid-single-digit annual organic top-line growth while also driving profitability to the upper end of our 9% to 10% annual margin band. Looking next at our FirstService Brands division, the fourth quarter included revenues of $820 million, down 3% compared to Q4 2024. And EBITDA came in at $88.5 million, down 12% year over year. These year-over-year decreases were due to declines in organic top-line performance and the related negative operating leverage at our restoration and roofing brands, partially offset by another strong quarter of organic growth and profitability at Century Fire Protection. The brands division margin during the quarter was 10.8%, down 110 basis points from 11.9% in the prior year quarter. For the full year, revenues were $3.2 billion and EBITDA came in at $354 million, both up 4% over the prior year. As a result, our full-year brands margin remained in line with the prior year at 11%. Finally, two remaining points to highlight regarding profitability below the operating division lines that contributed to the 15% annual EPS growth. First, we reported significantly lower corporate costs both during the current fourth quarter and annually for 2025 versus the comparable prior year periods. Most of the variance was attributable to the positive impact of noncash foreign exchange movements largely reversing the negative impacts we saw in 2024. Second, our annual interest costs were lower throughout all periods in 2025 compared to the prior year due to lower debt levels on our balance sheet and declining interest rates. I'll now summarize our cash flow and capital deployment. During Q4, operating cash flow was $155 million, a 33% increase over the prior year quarter. This contributed to annual cash flow from operations of more than $445 million which was up 56% versus 2024. Our capital expenditures during 2025 totaled $128 million, and we expect 2026 CapEx to be approximately $140 million, an increase proportionate to the collective growth of our businesses. Our acquisition spending during the year totaled $107 million as we remain selective and disciplined in a competitive acquisition environment. Finally, we announced yesterday an 11% dividend increase to $1.22 per share annually in US dollars, up from the prior $1.10. Beyond financing these capital outlays, our strong free cash flow contributed to further strengthening of our balance sheet throughout the year. At 2025 year-end, our leverage sits at 1.6 times net debt to adjusted EBITDA, down from two times at the prior year-end. With cash on hand and undrawn capacity within our bank revolving credit facility, aggregating to $970 million, we maintain significant liquidity to direct towards attractive investment opportunities as they emerge. Finally, in terms of our outlook, Scott has already provided detailed commentary on the top-line growth indicators for the individual brands. On a consolidated basis for the upcoming first quarter, we are forecasting revenue growth to be in the mid-single-digit range. In subsequent quarters throughout the year, we expect to see an uptick with high single-digit year-over-year increases in revenue primarily driven by organic growth. Any tuck-under acquisitions during the year will contribute further to this top-line growth profile. In terms of consolidated EBITDA for the first quarter, we expect to be roughly in line with Q1 2025. For the balance of the year, we anticipate EBITDA year-over-year growth in the high single digits at similar rates or slightly better than revenue growth. Consolidated EBITDA margin for the full year is expected to be relatively flat compared to the 10.2% annual margin we just reported for 2025. Operator, this concludes the prepared comments. Can now open up the call to questions. Thank you very much.

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Our first question will be coming from Frederic Bastien of Raymond James. Your line is open.

Hi. Good morning, Scott and Jeremy. I just want to talk about M&A. I mean, cracks appear to be showing in private equity with various reports suggesting that mid-market firms are holding on to investments they can't sell and then struggling to raise capital to buy businesses. Is that, you know, that in theory should be positive for strategic buyers like FirstService. From your perspective, are you seeing any change? Is the competitive landscape improving from, say, you know, where it was three, six, twelve months ago?

We haven't seen it yet, Frederic. It's definitely a slower market than, say, twelve months ago, particularly in roofing, but really across the board. We know of a number of opportunities that have been pulled or delayed until the environment improves. And there's no indication that multiples are trending higher or lower. They still remain high across the board. We haven't seen mid-market private equity deals come to the market yet. I'm just thinking about it. Really, we haven't seen it yet. I would say, Frederic.

Okay. Thanks for that. Now obviously, recognizing it's still tough out there, where do you see the best place to deploy future capital? Is it in newer platforms like roofing or restoration or, you know, or go back to the more long-dated franchises like California Closet? I know you bought, like, the twenty or so largest franchises in, you know, early probably ten years ago, five, ten years ago. Where do you stand on potentially consolidating the rest of the California Closet franchises?

Yeah. I mean, definitely, we want to own the major markets over time, particularly if they're underperforming. But that will be sort of one step at a time as those families are ready to sell. It's been a few years since we pulled in a California Closets franchise. But I think on average, we would expect to pull in one a year. And I think the same at Paul Davis too. It’s in the best interest of the brand. If there's an underperforming market, we will look to pull that franchise in and operate it. We would expect to see, you know, one or two of those a year as well. Otherwise, it would be tuck-unders within our existing platforms. That's our focus. I would say that we are being very patient in the current environment. Multiples are high, and there aren't many quality companies coming to market. So we are focused on picking our spots and finding the right partners. If there's a situation where the founder wants to exit that's not a great fit for us. We're focused on partnering and driving sustainable growth.

Thank you. I appreciate your comments. That's all I have. Our next question will be coming from Stephen MacLeod of BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thank you. Good morning, guys. Lots of great color on the call, so thank you. I just wanted to just focus on the margins a little bit. With respect to the outlook, would it be fair to say that the margin outlook in kind of both segments is sort of flattish through the year? Presumably, sounds like not much movement in the FSR margin, but maybe you'll see some headwinds in Q1. But on a full-year basis in brands, would you expect both segments to be sort of flattish year over year?

Yeah. Hi, Stephen. It's Jeremy. Correct. Full year both divisions, roughly in line, and hence the consolidated margin is also in line. You know, for the first quarter we expect residential margins to be roughly in line again, consistent with the full year, and a decline in brands margins in the first quarter. Hence the sort of flat EBITDA with a little bit of revenue growth in the first quarter. Right. So branch margin is declining and then picking up in sequential quarters as we see a commensurate uptick in revenue growth.

Okay. That's great. Thank you. And then just with respect to, you know, Scott, you talked about just the recent freeze that we saw through North America and, you know, potentially an uptick in activity. Is, I know it's early days, but is there any way to quantify what that could look like as the year progresses?

No. It's still very early and taking shape. Some of the areas are still frozen, so there is an opportunity when the thaw starts. But it's very hard to quantify at this point. We've based our expectations for Q1 on some of the activity. You know, as I said, we expect our revenues to be up modestly. Our backlog at year-end was down because we didn't have a carryover from Q4 storms, which was pointing to a soft Q1. We do think the activity will take us back to prior year modestly. But, mitigation work comes in, we respond and move on. For the most part, the jobs are smaller at this point, and the unknown is the reconstruction. Will there be any? Will we get the work, and how much revenue will it generate? This will evolve in the coming weeks and months, but it's still too early to really give you any more than that.

Yeah. Yeah. That's fair. I figured that would be the case. And would it be fair to assume that, in Q4, you had basically zero revenues from named storms relative to $60 million last year. Is that right?

Right. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

And then maybe just finally, just speaking of capital allocation, would you consider being active on the buyback given where the stock is and given the NCIB you have outstanding?

That is not something that we've discussed.

Okay. Would it be a board-level discussion, and it hasn't come up?

Okay. That's great. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.

And our next question will be coming from Stephen Sheldon of William Blair. Your line is open.

Hey, Scott and Jeremy. Thanks for taking my questions. First, just on kind of margins, great year-over-year margin trends in residential once again this quarter. And then full-year results came in closer to the high end of that 9% to 10% margin range you've historically talked about there. Can you unpack some of the levers driving that? Is that still mainly being driven by some of the offshoring and AI leverage and things like that in call center operations? And has your thinking on the margin trajectory over the next few years changed at all? I mean, you already talked about kind of flattish for 2026, but is there an opportunity down the road where you could potentially get the margin in residential into the double-digit range above 2%?

Yeah. It's Stephen. Jeremy again. The progression, we've done a lot of the heavy lifting in those areas. In fact, they started in '24 and really started to play out on the margin improvement in '25. We're starting to lap those now. You know? So a lot of the, and you saw the margin start to taper. Towards the back end of the year, which is indicative that we've squeezed a lot of the low-hanging fruit. The team's always working on related initiatives to the ones you just called out, as well as others. Again, we don't see much for '26. But in terms of going above 10%, yeah, that's an opportunity over a multiyear time horizon for sure, and we'll continue to evaluate the team's progress in that and then know, call out the opportunities as we see them coming through.

Got it. That's helpful. And then wanted to ask about just the roofing side. And I guess from your view, I get the new construction piece, you know, that's something that you can look at permits and starts with either that's, you know, it's been very weak, and not a lot of pickup that we're expecting here over the next year or two. But I guess on the reroofing side, you know, what could it take for that to pick up? You know, I guess the question would really be, how long can commercial properties wait and push out reroofing as I would assume that can only be delayed for so long before owner or manager takes on bigger risks related to it with a bigger loss potential. So I guess, how long can rerouting really stay kind of depressed? Thanks.

Certainly, it can't be deferred for long, Steven. We do think the market has stabilized. Our backlog has certainly stabilized and it's heavily weighted towards reroof as you would expect. You know, historically, we've been two-thirds reroof and one-third new construction, and so we're very much focused on the reroof side of that. The overall market has shrunk certainly but our momentum in reroof has stabilized. As I said, we expect to grow this year and look for sequential improvement quarter to quarter. Generally, we feel optimistic. We're bidding work and we feel good about our market position and believe in our leadership, locally. Branch to branch. Certainly, we will continue to invest in the platform this year and hopefully in further tuck-under acquisitions. We're feeling optimistic that we'll start to see quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year growth from here.

Very helpful. Thank you.

And our next question will be coming from Erin Kyle of CIBC. Your line is open.

Hi, good morning, and thanks for taking the questions. I just want to stick on the roofing segment here. Maybe start with more of a macro question. Your views as it relates to the new construction cycle in the U.S. And the question is kind of on the basis of, you know, if new construction remains depressed here as it's looking to be, do you anticipate competition in, like, the reroof segment just intensifying further than it's already been? I know you mentioned it's stabilizing, but add to speak to just competition in that space would be helpful.

Yeah. I mean, the competition has intensified. Certainly, there are fewer opportunities and more companies bidding, and it has compressed gross margins. We don't expect that to alleviate in the near term until there is an uptick in the new construction market. I don't know that I can give you more than that, Erin.

No. That's helpful there. Maybe I'll switch gears on M&A as well. You mentioned it in response to your previous question. For 2026, is roofing still a focus area for tuck-in M&A? More broadly, if we think about your commercial maintenance businesses that you currently operate in, what is the appetite for another large platform deal in an adjacent space or any larger M&A?

I think we're focused primarily on tuck-unders right now and certainly roofing is an area where we're committed. Again, you know, I said we're picking our spots. We're very patient, and it's about the leadership and the partnership. We're open-minded to larger acquisitions, and I think it would be in adjacency, and I'm not sure it would be a platform per our description, which would be sort of a separate operating team. It's more likely to be within restoration or within roofing or within fire. But we're open-minded certainly, but also cautious around valuation and in a market that's still, in our mind, overheated.

Thank you. That's helpful. I will pass the line.

And our next question will be coming from the line of Tim James of TD Cowen. Your line is open.

Thank you for the time. My first question, going back to M&A for a minute, appreciate the comments on the competitiveness in that market. Can you talk about if valuations do remain high, whether it's through '26 into '27, does that change your approach at all? What I'm thinking about rather simplistically is do you change the risk profile of the businesses you buy or do you pay higher valuations? How do you approach it as multiples, and as the competition for M&A remains relatively elevated?

We would approach it the same way we did this past year. As Jeremy said, we allocated over $100 million on tuck-unders. These are solid good add-ons with great leadership that fills white space for us or adds to our service line. These are at valuations that we were comfortable with. In most cases, we could differentiate ourselves from private equity and increasingly we're seeing opportunities to do that. With families and owners that want to be in a family where they're not resold. They want a forever owner. We're seeing more opportunities like that. We're not going to change our risk profile unless the returns change to hit our hurdle rates. We'll continue to work hard, and if, you know, I think that in 2026, it may well be a capital allocation year similar to '25 and we're comfortable with that.

Okay. That's helpful. And then, is there any sort of silver lining here potentially in the roofing business with, you know, you talked about it being very competitive and gross margin pressure. Are you seeing any silver lining that may be shaking out some businesses to look for a sale opportunity, or is it too early to see that yet in the marketplace?

No. I think that's true. There are opportunities that they're reluctant to transact because their revenue and EBITDA may be down from previous years. But the market's not going to change dramatically in '26 certainly. So we are seeing opportunities where the seller comes to grips with a lower valuation based on results that are lower than the past few years.

And as a reminder, to ask a question, please press 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Our next question will be coming from Daryl Young of Stifel. Your line is open.

Hey, good morning, everyone. Just wanted to circle back on margins for a second. I might have expected to see more margin expansion as opposed to the guidance for flattish this year. Just given the operating efficiencies you've had. I wonder if possibly you're toggling between the price volume equation and some of your end markets and maybe giving away some price in order to keep the growth going. Is that the right way to think about it, or is there something else going on that's keeping margins lower for longer?

Daryl, I assume you're talking more on the brand segment?

Well, even within residential as well.

Okay. Well, I'll touch on brands. You know, Scott touched on it in roofing. The competitive environment, a lot of our competitors that were accustomed to getting a lot of new construction work are migrating to reroofs and putting pressure on bidding and gross margin. So we're going to see roofing margins, notwithstanding the uptick in the top line through the year, experience a compression on margins in that business. That will be offset in the brand segment by better margins year-over-year in '26 for restoration. Again, a function of higher normalized activity levels, higher revenue growth, and so forth. That's really the puts and takes for the most part in the year in brands. And then at residential, we don't get a lot of pricing in that business. It's a very high variable cost business. So growing revenues and EBITDA in lockstep is the typical path. We happen to garner a lot of efficiencies in '25 in the areas we've spoken about through the year and starting to lap that now. Again, I mentioned it earlier; we'll continue to look at other opportunities for efficiencies. But I, you know, I wouldn't be baking in a lot of that into the baseline model for 2026.

Got it. Okay. Thanks. And then you touched on data centers in one of your remarks. Are these projects getting big enough and fast enough that you could potentially have a cross-sell or a go-to-market approach between, say, Century Fire and roofing and maybe even restoration where you create national account strategies across all your divisions? To tackle the data center build-out?

No. We're not approaching it that way, Darryl. Century has long-term relationships with a few large general contractors that are involved in the new construction of warehouses and also engaged in data center construction. So Century is benefiting from the data center boom, but definitely picking their spots and being cautious about balancing this work and these customers with their other day-to-day customers. I don't see us tilting more to data centers than the current mix reflects. Roofing doesn't have the same relationships, and I think we're very cautious about really leaning in on sustainable growth rather than focusing on durable. We've seen a few of our competitors jump in and it consumes them and they let down their day-to-day service. We're approaching it in a different way and only at Century Fire at this point.

Good context. Thanks very much. That's it for me.

And this concludes today's program. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.