As you saw from our results yesterday, we remained on track to generate an anticipated 12% growth in AFFO per share this year.
We expect to be at the high end of our long-term growth target in 2022, with 8% AFFO per share growth.
Being driven in large part by our expectation at tower core leasing activity will be approximately 50% higher in 2022 than our trailing 5-year average.
And we increased our annualized common stock dividend by approximately 11% to $5.88 per share, marking the second consecutive year of dividend growth that meaningfully exceeds our long-term target.
Our significant out-performance in 2021 combined with our forecast for 2022 enabled us to raise our dividend 11%, well above our stated goal for the second year in a row.
Since we established our common stock dividend in 2014, we have grown dividends per share at a compounded annual growth rate of 9% with growth ranging from 7% to 11% in each year.
Further to the point, our core value proposition, since we began operating more than 25 years ago has centered around our ability to provide our customers with access to mission-critical infrastructure at a lower cost, because we can share that infrastructure across multiple operators.
To-date, we have invested nearly $10 billion in towers, small cells and fiber assets located in low-income areas.
As a way of quantifying how our business model minimizes the use of natural resources, our business in it's just one ton of CO2 per $1 billion of enterprise value, which is 90 times more efficient than the average company in the S&P 500 based on industry estimates.
I believe our strategy and unmatched portfolio of more than 40,000 towers and approximately 80,000 route miles of fiber concentrated in the top U.S. market, have positioned Crown Castle to capitalize both on the current environment and to grow our cash flows and dividends per share in the near term and for years to come.
To execute on this strategy, we are providing our customers with access to our 40,000 towers and 80,000 route miles of fiber help them build out their 5G wireless networks.
With that in mind, we have invested nearly $40 billion in towers, small cells and fiber assets in the top market that are all foundational for the development of future 5G network.
With our high quality towers concentrated in the top markets, we are clearly benefiting from this focus with an expected 6% organic growth for our Tower segment in 2021 and an expected 20% increase in tower core leasing activity next year when compared to these 2021 levels.
With history as a guide, we believe the deployment of additional spectrum on existing cell sites will not be enough to keep pace with the persistent 30% plus annual growth in mobile data traffic.
With more than 80,000 small cells on air or committed in our backlog, high capacity fiber assets and the vast majority of the top 30 markets in the U.S. and industry-leading capabilities, we believe we are well positioned to deliver value to our customers as their priorities evolve, driving meaningful growth in our small cell business.
In the near term, as I mentioned before, we expect to deliver outsized AFFO per share growth of 12% in 2021.
We expect to generate 8% growth in AFFO per share in 2022 at the high end of our long-term growth target and supported by an expected 20% increase in tower core leasing activity and we increased our common stock dividend by 11% for the second consecutive year.
Importantly, we provide access to such attractive industry dynamics, while providing a compelling total return opportunity, comprised of a high-quality dividend that currently yields 3.5% with expected growth in that dividend of 7% to 8% annually.
We remained on track to grow AFFO per share by an anticipated 12% this year.
We expect to be at the high end of our growth target in 2022 with 8% AFFO per share growth and we increased our quarterly common stock dividend by 11% for the second consecutive year, meaningfully above our long-term target growth rate while maintaining a consistent payout ratio.
Our third quarter results were highlighted by 8% growth in site rental revenues, 11% growth in adjusted EBITDA and 13% growth in AFFO per share when compared to the same period last year.
Record tower activity level supported this strong growth, generating organic tower growth of 6.3% and higher services contribution when compared to the same period in 2020.
We are maintaining our 2021 outlook with site rental revenues, adjusted EBITDA and AFFO growing 7%, 11% and 14% respectively.
For full year 2022, we expect continuing investments in 5G to drive another very good year for us, with 5% site rental revenue growth, 6% growth in adjusted EBITDA and 8% AFFO growth.
The full year 2022 outlook includes an expected organic contribution to Site Rental revenues of $245 million to $285 million or 5%, consisting of approximately 5.5% growth from towers, 5% growth from small cells and 3% growth from fiber solutions.
With that definition in mind, we expect 2022 core leasing activity of $340 million at the midpoint or $350 million inclusive of the year-over-year change in prepaid rent amortization.
The 2022 expected core leasing activity includes a $160 million in towers, representing a 20% increase when compared to our 2021 outlook and an approximately 50% increase when compared to our 5-year trailing average.
$30 million in small cells compared to $45 million in $2021 and a $150 million in fiber solutions compared to a $165 million expected this year.
You can see, we expect approximately 90% of the Organic Site Rental Revenue growth to flow through the AFFO growth, highlighting the strong operating leverage in our business.
As we discussed in July, we expect to deploy an additional 5,000 small cells in 2022, which is the same number we expect to build in 2021.
We expect a discretionary capex to be approximately $1.1 billion to $1.2 billion in 2022, including approximately $300 million for towers and $800 million to $900 million for fiber, similar to what we expect in 2021.
This translates to $700 million to $800 million of net capex when factoring in $400 million of prepaid rent contribution we expect to receive in 2022.
The full year 2022 outlook for capex represents an expected 30% reduction in discretionary capex for our fiber segment relative to full year 2022 when we deployed approximately 10,000 small cells.
Our cost structure is largely fixed in nature as you can see, with nearly 90% of the full year 2022 expected Organic Site Rental Revenue growth to flow through to AFFO growth as I referenced earlier.
And we have taken steps to further strengthen our investment grade balance sheet, that now has more than 90% fixed rate debt, a weighted average maturity of more than 9 years and a weighted average interest rate of 3.1%.
In conclusion, we are excited about the outsized growth we are generating as a result of the initial 5G build out by our customers, which is translating into back-to-back years of 11% growth in our quarterly common stock dividend.
This dividend currently equates to an approximate 3.5% yield, which we believe is a compelling valuation given our expectation of growing the dividend 7% to 8% per year, combined with our high quality, predictable and stable cash flows.

Summary:
And we increased our annualized common stock dividend by approximately 11% to $5.88 per share, marking the second consecutive year of dividend growth that meaningfully exceeds our long-term target.
Our significant out-performance in 2021 combined with our forecast for 2022 enabled us to raise our dividend 11%, well above our stated goal for the second year in a row.
Since we established our common stock dividend in 2014, we have grown dividends per share at a compounded annual growth rate of 9% with growth ranging from 7% to 11% in each year.
We expect to generate 8% growth in AFFO per share in 2022 at the high end of our long-term growth target and supported by an expected 20% increase in tower core leasing activity and we increased our common stock dividend by 11% for the second consecutive year.
We expect to be at the high end of our growth target in 2022 with 8% AFFO per share growth and we increased our quarterly common stock dividend by 11% for the second consecutive year, meaningfully above our long-term target growth rate while maintaining a consistent payout ratio.
Our third quarter results were highlighted by 8% growth in site rental revenues, 11% growth in adjusted EBITDA and 13% growth in AFFO per share when compared to the same period last year.
We are maintaining our 2021 outlook with site rental revenues, adjusted EBITDA and AFFO growing 7%, 11% and 14% respectively.
In conclusion, we are excited about the outsized growth we are generating as a result of the initial 5G build out by our customers, which is translating into back-to-back years of 11% growth in our quarterly common stock dividend.