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SUMMARY OF SIGNIFICANT ACCOUNTING POLICIES (Policies) - 10Q
3 Months Ended
Mar. 31, 2017
SUMMARY OF SIGNIFICANT ACCOUNTING POLICIES  
Basis of Presentation

Basis of Presentation

 

The accompanying unaudited consolidated financial statements have been prepared pursuant to the rules and regulations of the SEC regarding interim financial reporting and, in the opinion of each of the Parent Company’s and Operating Partnership’s respective management, include all adjustments (consisting of normal recurring adjustments) necessary for a fair presentation of financial position, results of operations and cash flows for each respective company for the interim periods presented in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States (“GAAP”). Accordingly, readers of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q should refer to the Parent Company’s and the Operating Partnership’s audited financial statements prepared in accordance with GAAP, and the related notes thereto, for the year ended December 31, 2016, which are included in the Parent Company’s and the Operating Partnership’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2016. The results of operations for the three months ended March 31, 2017 and 2016 are not necessarily indicative of the results of operations to be expected for any future period or the full year.

 

The Company adopted Accounting Standard Update (“ASU“) No. 2015-02, Consolidation – Amendments to the Consolidation Analysis, as of January 1, 2016. The Company evaluated the application of this guidance and concluded that there were no changes to any previous conclusions with respect to consolidation accounting for any of its interests in less than wholly owned joint ventures. However, the Operating Partnership now meets the criteria as a variable interest entity. The Parent Company’s sole significant asset is its investment in the Operating Partnership. As a result, substantially all of the Parent Company’s assets and liabilities represent those assets and liabilities of the Operating Partnership. All of the Parent Company’s debt is an obligation of the Operating Partnership.

 

 

Reclassifications

Reclassifications

 

Certain amounts from the prior year have been reclassified to conform to current year presentation as described below.

 

During the first quarter of 2017, the Company adopted ASU No. 2016-09 - Compensation – Stock Compensation (Topic 718): Improvements to Employee Share-Based Payment Accounting, which requires retrospective application for the cash flow presentation of cash withheld upon restricted stock vesting and paid by the Company to a taxing authority to satisfy the employee’s related tax obligation. See “Recent Accounting Pronouncements” below. As a result of adopting the new guidance, $1.6 million of vested restricted shares that were withheld to satisfy employee tax obligations and paid to the taxing authorities, were reclassified from operating activities to financing activities within Company’s consolidated statements of cash flows for the three months ended March 31, 2016.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

   

In February 2017, as part of the new revenue standard, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (“FASB”) issued ASU No. 2017-05 – Other Income – Gains and Losses from the Derecognition of Nonfinancial Assets (Subtopic 610-20): Clarifying the Scope of Asset Derecognition Guidance, which focuses on recognizing gains and losses from the transfer of nonfinancial assets in contracts with non-customers. Specifically, the new guidance defines “in substance nonfinancial asset”, unifies guidance related to partial sales of nonfinancial assets, eliminates rules specifically addressing sales of real estate, removes exceptions to the financial asset derecognition model, and clarifies the accounting for contributions of nonfinancial assets to joint ventures. The new guidance is effective at the same time an entity adopts the new revenue standard. Upon adoption, the Company expects that the majority of its sale transactions will be treated as dispositions of nonfinancial assets rather than dispositions of a business given the FASB’s recently revised definition of a business (see ASU No. 2017-01 below). Additionally, in partial sale transactions where the Company sells a controlling interest in real estate but retains a noncontrolling interest, the Company will now fully recognize a gain or loss on the fair value measurement of the retained interest as the new guidance eliminates the partial profit recognition model.

 

In January 2017, the FASB issued ASU 2017-01 - Business Combinations (Topic 805): Clarifying the Definition of a Business, which changes the definition of a business to include an input and a substantive process that together significantly contribute to the ability to create outputs. A framework is provided to evaluate when an input and a substantive process are present.  The new guidance also narrows the definition of outputs, which are defined as the results of inputs and substantive processes that provide goods or services to customers, other revenue, or investment income. The standard is effective on January 1, 2018, however early adoption is permitted. Upon adoption of the new guidance, the Company expects that the majority of future property acquisitions will now be considered asset acquisitions, resulting in the capitalization of acquisition related costs incurred in connection with these transactions and the allocation of purchase price and acquisition related costs to the assets acquired based on their relative fair values.

 

In November 2016, the FASB issued ASU No. 2016-18 - Statement of Cash Flows (Topic 230): Restricted Cash, which requires the statement of cash flows to explain the change during the period in the total of cash, cash equivalents, and amounts generally described as restricted cash or restricted cash equivalents. The new guidance also requires entities to reconcile such total to amounts on the balance sheet and disclose the nature of the restrictions. The standard is effective on January 1, 2018, however early adoption is permitted. The standard requires the use of the retrospective transition method. The Company is in the process of evaluating the impact of this new guidance.

 

In August 2016, the FASB issued ASU No. 2016-15 – Statement of Cash Flows (Topic 230): Classification of Certain Cash Receipts and Cash Payments, which is intended to reduce diversity in practice in how certain transactions are classified in the statement of cash flows. The eight items that the ASU provides classification guidance on include (1) debt prepayment and extinguishment costs, (2) settlement of zero-coupon debt instruments, (3) contingent consideration payments made after a business combination, (4) proceeds from the settlement of insurance claims, (5) proceeds from the settlement of corporate-owned life insurance policies, including bank-owned life insurance policies, (6) distributions received from equity method investments, (7) beneficial interests in securitization transactions, and (8) separately identifiable cash flows and application of the predominance principle. The standard is effective on January 1, 2018, however early adoption is permitted. The standard requires the use of the retrospective transition method. The Company is in the process of evaluating the impact of this new guidance.

 

In March 2016, the FASB issued ASU No. 2016-09 - Compensation – Stock Compensation (Topic 718): Improvements to Employee Share-Based Payment Accounting, which is intended to simplify various aspects related to how share-based payments are accounted for and presented in the financial statements. The new guidance requires entities to make an entity-wide accounting policy election to either estimate the number of awards that are expected to vest or account for forfeitures when they occur. The Company has elected to account for forfeitures when they occur. In addition, the guidance allows employers to withhold shares to satisfy minimum statutory tax withholding requirements up to the employees’ maximum individual tax rate without causing the award to be classified as a liability. The guidance also stipulates that cash paid by an employer to a taxing authority when directly withholding shares for tax-withholding purposes should be classified as a financing activity on the statement of cash flows. The new standard became effective for the Company on January 1, 2017. The adoption of this guidance did not have a material impact on the Company’s consolidated financial position or results of operations.

 

In February 2016, the FASB issued ASU No. 2016-02 - Leases (Topic 842), which sets out the principles for the recognition, measurement, presentation and disclosure of leases for both parties to a contract (i.e. lessees and lessors). The new standard requires lessees to apply a dual approach, classifying leases as either financing or operating leases based on the principle of whether or not the lease is effectively a financed purchase by the lessee. This classification will determine whether lease expense is recognized based on an effective interest method or on a straight line basis over the term of the lease, respectively. A lessee is also required to record a right-of-use asset and a lease liability for all leases with a term of greater than 12 months regardless of their classification.  Leases with a term of 12 months or less will be accounted for similar to existing guidance for operating leases today. The new standard requires lessors to account for leases using an approach that is substantially equivalent to existing guidance for sales-type leases, direct financing leases and operating leases. The standard is effective on January 1, 2019, however early adoption is permitted.  The Company is currently assessing the impact of the adoption of the new standard on the Company’s consolidated financial statements and related disclosures. 

 

In May 2014, the FASB issued ASU No. 2014-09 - Revenue from Contracts with Customers (Topic 606), which requires an entity to recognize the amount of revenue to which it expects to be entitled for the transfer of promised goods or services to customers. The new guidance outlines a five-step process for customer contract revenue recognition that focuses on transfer of control as opposed to transfer of risk and rewards. The new guidance also requires enhanced disclosures regarding the nature, amount, timing, and uncertainty of revenues and cash flows from contracts with customers. In May 2016, the FASB issued ASU 2016-12 - Revenue from Contracts with Customers (Topic 606): Narrow-Scope Improvements and Practical Expedients, which amends ASU 2014-09 and is intended to address implementation issues that were raised by stakeholders. ASU 2016-12 provides practical expedients on collectability, noncash consideration, presentation of sales tax and contract modifications and completed contracts in transition. The Company is currently assessing the impact of the adoption of ASU No. 2014-09 and ASU No. 2016-12 on the Company’s consolidated financial statements and related disclosures. At this point in time, the Company does not believe the standards will have a material impact on its consolidated financial position or results of operations primarily because most of its revenue is derived from lease contracts, which are excluded from the scope of the new guidance. The Company’s property management fee revenue will be included in the scope of the new guidance, however, based on the Company’s initial assessment, it appears that revenue recognized under the new guidance will not differ materially from revenue recognized under existing guidance.