Equity Residential (EQR) Competitors

Equity Residential (NYSE:EQR) and AvalonBay Communities (NYSE:AVB) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, media sentiment, community ranking, earnings, dividends, profitability, analyst recommendations, valuation and risk.

Is EQR or AVB a better dividend stock?

Equity Residential pays an annual dividend of $2.70 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.7%. AvalonBay Communities pays an annual dividend of $6.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. Equity Residential pays out 110.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. AvalonBay Communities pays out 93.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.

Do analysts recommend EQR or AVB?

Equity Residential presently has a consensus price target of $77.25, suggesting a potential upside of 4.50%. AvalonBay Communities has a consensus price target of $226.88, suggesting a potential downside of 0.55%. Given Equity Residential's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Equity Residential is more favorable than AvalonBay Communities.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Equity Residential	0 Sell rating(s)	11 Hold rating(s)	8 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.42
AvalonBay Communities	0 Sell rating(s)	11 Hold rating(s)	7 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.39

Does the MarketBeat Community favor EQR or AVB?

AvalonBay Communities received 169 more outperform votes than Equity Residential when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 60.45% of users gave AvalonBay Communities an outperform vote while only 47.67% of users gave Equity Residential an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Equity Residential	Outperform Votes 502 47.67%	Underperform Votes 551 52.33%
AvalonBay Communities	Outperform Votes 671 60.45%	Underperform Votes 439 39.55%

Which has better valuation and earnings, EQR or AVB?

AvalonBay Communities has higher revenue and earnings than Equity Residential. Equity Residential is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than AvalonBay Communities, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Equity Residential	$2.87B	9.76	$835.44M	$2.44	30.30
AvalonBay Communities	$2.88B	11.28	$928.83M	$7.31	31.21

Does the media refer more to EQR or AVB?

In the previous week, AvalonBay Communities had 3 more articles in the media than Equity Residential. MarketBeat recorded 18 mentions for AvalonBay Communities and 15 mentions for Equity Residential. Equity Residential's average media sentiment score of 0.80 beat AvalonBay Communities' score of 0.44 indicating that Equity Residential is being referred to more favorably in the media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Equity Residential	8 Very Positive mention(s)	2 Positive mention(s)	3 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
AvalonBay Communities	9 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	4 Neutral mention(s)	3 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral

Do insiders and institutionals believe in EQR or AVB?

92.7% of Equity Residential shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.6% of AvalonBay Communities shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of Equity Residential shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.4% of AvalonBay Communities shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Is EQR or AVB more profitable?

AvalonBay Communities has a net margin of 36.20% compared to Equity Residential's net margin of 31.57%. AvalonBay Communities' return on equity of 8.84% beat Equity Residential's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Equity Residential	31.57%	8.31%	4.61%
AvalonBay Communities	36.20%	8.84%	4.98%

Which has more risk and volatility, EQR or AVB?

Equity Residential has a beta of 0.9, suggesting that its stock price is 10% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, AvalonBay Communities has a beta of 0.97, suggesting that its stock price is 3% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

AvalonBay Communities beats Equity Residential on 13 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.