Stockland plans to lift its dividend by just over 2 per cent this financial year, bar any "major disruption" to its markets.
Chairman Graham Bradley said the company would seek to lift its payment from 24c last financial year - which represented 93 per cent of the company's underlying profit - to 24.5c in full-year 2016.
That would bring the payment within a target range of paying the higher of 100 per cent of the trust taxable income or 80 to 90 per cent of underlying profit, he said in an address to shareholders at the annual general meeting., .
"We believe this is an appropriate new target because it should provide steadily growing returns to securityholders while still allowing us to retain a portion of earnings to invest in future growth."
Mr Bradley said the company, which yesterday reaffirmed earnings guidance growth of between 6 and 7.5 per cent per share, was confident the residential housing market would continue to be strong.
"Due to continued population growth and existing undersupply, supported by low mortgage interest rates which we believe will continue for some time into the future," he said.
Australia's largest listed residential developer, Stockland in August posted a net profit of $903 million, a 71.4 per cent increase on the previous year's $527m. Underlying earnings per share had come in at 25.9c, a 7.8 per cent increase over the year.
At 2.54pm (AEDT), Stockland shares were up 0.63 per cent to $4.005 against a benchmark rise of 0.01 per cent.