COPT Defense Properties Annual report pursuant to Section 13 and 15(d)

Annual report pursuant to Section 13 and 15(d)

Organization

Organization

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2014

Organization, Consolidation and Presentation of Financial Statements [Abstract]

Corporate Office Properties Trust (“COPT”) and subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) is a fully-integrated and self-managed real estate investment trust (“REIT”). Corporate Office Properties, L.P. (“COPLP”) and subsidiaries (collectively, the “Operating Partnership”) is the entity through which COPT, the sole general partner of COPLP, conducts almost all of its operations and owns almost all of its assets. Unless otherwise expressly stated or the context otherwise requires, “we”, “us” and “our” as used herein refer to each of the Company and the Operating Partnership. We focus primarily on serving the specialized requirements of United States Government agencies and their contractors, most of whom are engaged in national security and information technology related activities. We generally acquire, develop, manage and lease office and data center properties concentrated in large office parks located near knowledge-based government demand drivers and/or in targeted markets or submarkets in the Greater Washington, DC/Baltimore region. As of December 31, 2014, our properties included the following (all references to number of properties, square footage, acres and megawatts are unaudited):


•	173 operating office properties totaling 16.8 million square feet (excluding two properties serving as collateral for a nonrecourse mortgage loan in default, as discussed further in Note 11);


•	13 office properties under, or contractually committed for, construction or redevelopment that we estimate will total approximately 1.6 million square feet upon completion;


•	1,464 acres of land we control that we believe are potentially developable into approximately 18.3 million square feet; and


•	a partially operational, wholesale data center which upon completion and stabilization is expected to have a critical load of 19.25 megawatts.

COPLP owns real estate both directly and through subsidiary partnerships and limited liability companies (“LLCs”). In addition to owning real estate, COPLP also owns subsidiaries that provide real estate services such as property management and construction and development services primarily for our properties but also for third parties. Some of these services are performed by a taxable REIT subsidiary (“TRS”).

Equity interests in COPLP are in the form of common and preferred units. As of December 31, 2014, COPT owned 96.0% of the outstanding COPLP common units (“common units”) and 95.5% of the outstanding COPLP preferred units (“preferred units”); the remaining common and preferred units in COPLP were owned by third parties. Common units in COPLP not owned by COPT carry certain redemption rights. The number of common units in COPLP owned by COPT is equivalent to the number of outstanding common shares of beneficial interest (“common shares”) of COPT, and the entitlement of all COPLP common units to quarterly distributions and payments in liquidation is substantially the same as those of COPT common shareholders. Similarly, in the case of each series of preferred units in COPLP held by COPT, there is a series of preferred shares of beneficial interest (“preferred shares”) in COPT that is equivalent in number and carries substantially the same terms as such series of COPLP preferred units. COPT’s common shares are publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) under the ticker symbol “OFC”.

Because COPLP is managed by COPT, and COPT conducts substantially all of its operations through COPLP, we refer to COPT’s executive officers as COPLP’s executive officers, and although, as a partnership, COPLP does not have a board of trustees, we refer to COPT’s Board of Trustees as COPLP’s Board of Trustees.