MID AMERICA APARTMENT COMMUNITIES INC
8-K, 2000-10-26
REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUSTS
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UNITED STATES
                       SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
                              WASHINGTON D.C. 20549



                                    FORM 8-K



                                 CURRENT REPORT



                     PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE
                         SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934


                                  October 25, 2000
                Date of Report (Date of earliest event reported)


                     MID-AMERICA APARTMENT COMMUNITIES, INC.
               (Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in Charter)



        TENNESSEE                   1-12762                 62-1543819
        ---------                   -------                 ----------
(State of Incorporation)    (Commission File Number)    (I.R.S. Employer
                                                      Identification Number)




                          6584 POPLAR AVENUE, SUITE 340
                            MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE 38138
                    (Address of principal executive offices)



                                 (901) 682-6600
               Registrant's telephone number, including area code





             (Former name or address, if changed since last report)
<PAGE>

Item 5.   Other Events

The following  comments  were issued to the public by the Company  regarding the
recent market activity:

October 25, 2000


     Since a peer company  announced at the end of September  that it was facing
several serious  issues,  the share price of MAA (NYSE) has dropped by 9%. Their
problems are their own; they did not speak (nor,  we are sure,  intend to speak)
for  Mid-America,  although  theirs  are  some of the same  issues  that we have
addressed and communicated in the past. Their issues:

     1) Tough market  conditions.  The  southeastern and Texas markets have been
     and will  continue to be demanding  and highly  competitive  - but there is
     nothing new about this. They also remain the highest job formation areas in
     the country,  which over long periods helps assure our continuing  success.
     We've been calling these markets  accurately,  on a quarterly  basis, for a
     long time and will be giving our next  update on November 2, with our third
     quarter earnings release (call information below).

     2)  Sharp  curtailment  in  their  new  development  pipeline;  development
     disappointing in some areas; development climate deteriorating;  and they'd
     be selling assets in part to fund  development.  We made a major cutback in
     our own pipeline over a year ago in view of the growing risks;  we have not
     been a contributor to  deterioration  of the development  climate.  We also
     announced in 1999 an asset sale plan to fund our  development  pipeline and
     which has  further  permitted  us to  repurchase  over 1.7  million  of our
     undervalued shares.

     3) Issues  pertaining  to  interest  rate  exposure  related  to their high
     proportion of variable rate date.  This issue is barely relevant to MAA. We
     dealt with it earlier,  sharply  reducing our variable rate exposure (9% of
     our debt is conventional  variable rate, and we have another 4% of tax-free
     variable rate debt).  Over the past year,  during a period in which the Fed
     Funds rate  increased  150 basis points,  our  aggregate  interest rate has
     increased only 15 b.p. to 7.15% as we  simultaneously  reduced our variable
     rate risk.

     4)  Slow  new  development  deliveries.  We also  dealt  with  this  issue,
     especially  in  1999,   announcing  on  a  regular   quarterly   basis  any
     difficulties  we faced  in  capturing  forecast  revenues  - for  differing
     reasons,  varying by property,  and including slow  construction  delivery,
     weather delays,  higher  concessions  than forecast,  and higher  marketing
     costs.  Most of those  such  issues are  behind  MAA now.  Our  development
     investment  will have added  materially to share value upon maturity of the
     present pipeline in 2003.

     We'll be  providing  detailed  MAA  particulars  in our November 2 earnings
release and in our November 3 telephone  conference  call:  10AM  Central  time;
888-843-8954, conference ID either Mid-America Apartment Communities or 2954342,
through  11/10/00.  The  replay  will  also  be  available  on our  web  site at
www.maac.net. Please join us.

<PAGE>


                                   SIGNATURES

Pursuant  to the  requirements  of the  Securities  Exchange  Act of  1934,  the
registrant  has duly  caused  this  report  to be  signed  on its  behalf by the
undersigned thereunto duly authorized.


                                         MID-AMERICA APARTMENT COMMUNITIES, INC.



Date:  October 26, 2000                           /s/ Simon R.C. Wadsworth
      -----------------                        ---------------------------------
                                                   Simon R.C. Wadsworth
                                                   Executive Vice President
                                                   (Principal Financial and
                                                    Accounting Officer)




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