Earnings Labs

Chatham Lodging Trust (CLDT)

Q4 2013 Earnings Call· Wed, Feb 19, 2014

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Chatham Lodging Trust Fourth Quarter Earnings Conference Call. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question and answer session. Instructions will be provided at that time. (Operator Instructions) I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being recorded today February 19, 2014. I will now turn the conference over to Mr. Chris Daly President, Daly Gray Inc. Please go ahead.

Chris Daly

Management

Thank you, Sara. Good morning everyone and welcome to the Chatham Lodging Trust fourth quarter and full year 2013 results conference call. Yesterday, after the close of the market, Chatham released results for the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2013, and I hope you’ve all had a chance to review the press release. If you did not receive a copy of the release or you would like a copy, please feel free to call my office at 703-435-6293 and we’ll be happy to email you a copy. Or you can also take a look at the release at Chatham’s website, www.chathamlodgingtrust.com. Today’s conference call is being transmitted live via telephone and by webcast over Chatham’s website and at streetevents.com. A recording of the call will be available by telephone until midnight on Wednesday, February 26, 2014 by dialing 1-800-406-7325 reference number 4646993. A replay of the conference call will be posted on Chatham’s website. As a reminder this conference call is the property of Chatham Lodging Trust, and any redistribution, retransmission or rebroadcast of this call in any form without the expressed written consent of Chatham is prohibited. Before we begin, management has asked me to remind you that in keeping with the SEC’s Safe Harbor guidelines, today’s conference call may contain certain forward-looking statements about Chatham Lodging Trust, including statements regarding future operating results and the timing and composition of revenues among others. Except for historical information, these forward-looking statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially, including the volatility of the national economy, economic conditions generally, and the hotel and real estate markets specifically, international and geo-political difficulties or health concerns, governmental actions, legislative and regulatory changes, availability of debt and equity capital, interest rates, competition, weather conditions or natural disasters, supply and demand for lodging facilities in our current and proposed market areas and the Company’s ability to manage integration and growth. Additional risks are discussed in the Company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. All information in this call is as of February 17, 2014 unless otherwise noted, and the Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to conform the statements to actual results or changes in the Company’s expectations. During this call, we may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures, such as EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA, which we believe to be common in the industry, and helpful indicators of our performance. In keeping with the SEC regulations we have provided and encourage you to refer to the reconciliations of these measures to GAAP results in our earnings release. Now to provide you with some insight into Chatham’s 2014 – excuse me – 2013 fourth quarter and full year results, allow me to introduce Jeff Fisher, Chairman, President and CEO; and Dennis Craven, Executive VP and Chief Financial Officer. Let me turn the session over to Jeff. Jeff?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Thanks, Chris good morning everybody. Dennis and I are happy to be here again to talk with you this morning about 2013 and also give you a little guidance on 2014. 2013 was another great year for Chatham. I think our momentum continued to build very strongly and as we look at the metrics that the company is reporting here for 2013 and in particular, I am very pleased at the acquisitions that we made in 2013. Clearly demonstrating our ability to selectively target certain hotels within certain very specific markets, our target markets with high barriers to entry and growing demand generators, sometime leisure, sometimes medical, all the time corporate, really, really shows. I think when you look at RevPAR results particularly RevPAR results and EBITDA growth for the hotels that we’ve acquired. So, we really believe again in 2014 I don’t see any reason why that momentum should not continue to build this year because fundamentally there is some difference in the supply demand equation. Of course, assuming the GDP growth, say it’s anywhere around where it was in 2013 and I know that we’ve got a pretty healthy pipeline of hotels and deals that we are working on. So from that perspective I think again great internal growth and some possibilities for some substantial external growth for the company as well. Speaking to great deals, we were able to make a couple in the fourth quarter as we expanded our portfolio in the off-market acquisition of two very high quality hotels comprising almost 400 rooms for approximately $112 million. The beautiful 231 room, Residence Inn in downtown Bellevue, Washington, a very strong and fast-growing market and a 160-room SpringHill Suites in the historic Savannah Georgia Downtown/Historic District. Both really exemplify again our focus in buying when possible…

Dennis Craven

Management

Thanks, Jeff. Good morning. For the fourth quarter, we reported we reported net loss of $0.1 million or $0.01 per diluted share compared to net loss of $2.4 million or $0.17 per diluted share in the 2012 fourth quarter. Acquisitions, reduced interest expense and margin growth contributed to the overall improvement year-over-year. Third quarter RevPAR is at 4.4% to $103 for the 25 hotels we own for the entire quarter, compared to our prior earnings target of plus 2% to 3%. The general outperformance was really across our entire portfolio that led to the beat on the RevPAR side and as Jeff alluded to the DC hotel was beginning to ramp a little bit more significantly as we move through the quarter. The RevPAR gain was attributable to about a 50-50 split in both occupancy and ADR gains with occupancy up 77% and ADR up to $139. The percentage point of RevPAR growth translates to approximately $0.2 million of revenues, so it’s a slightly significant beat on the RevPAR side, it doesn’t meaningfully impact FFO for the quarter. Super storm Sandy impacted our portfolio RevPAR growth by approximately 200 basis points in the quarter as our hotels, New Rochelle, New York, White Plains New York and most significantly Holtsville, New York on Long Island gained business in the fourth quarter. The Holtsville hotel alone, the impact from that hotel impacted RevPAR by about 150 basis points in the quarter. In the 2013 fourth quarter RevPAR for Holtsville Residence Inn was down about 12% all attributable to Sandy gains in the fourth quarter of 2012. Our hotels mostly extended stay and select service hotels run high occupancies due to the relocations, their markets that command high rates and occupancy. And the fact that basically the upscale standard stay segment, we believe…

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Anybody there, Sara? Chris, you there? Sara, are you there?

Operator

Operator

My apologies. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now conduct the question and answer session. (Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of Patrick Scholes of SunTrust. Please go ahead. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Hi, good morning gentlemen.

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Hey, Pat. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: A couple questions here for you. You noted your target leverage ratio was at the yearend 36%. I am sorry, not target, your actually leverage ratio was 36%. Where do you see your – that your target at for that leverage ratio?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I’ll let Dennis to take wag on that.

Dennis Craven

Management

That was impacted, I think, for the time being, given where we believe we can buy assets and where we can finance some. I think we can certainly see ourselves moving that from 36% to where we were before when we get the Innkeepers deals which was kind of in the low 50% range, we were very comfortable at that level. And if you look at where we would be on kind of a pro forma basis, it does touch the levels and we still provide very sufficient coverages in overall value – loan-to-value ratios at that type of level. So, it allows us to – and we believe do some more acquisitions. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, makes sense. And then a couple questions on the joint venture that is for sale. First, you are the minority partner; let’s say an attractive offer came in to the majority partner, what legal rights do you have there? Or would you be allowed to refuse it or what sort of say do you have in that?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I think we ought to get, on a call or anytime too far into the legal document or whatever, other than to say that, that we are far here in the deal and that deal is considered together as the overall decision-making process goes, offer, sales, refinance, any of these kind of decisions that we’ve made in the past. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, just as I asked because I actually tried to research those documents, I couldn’t find anything. I don’t know if you can point me to what date that would have come out as an SEC release?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Well, the JV agreement itself was filed with the 10-K 20/11 10-K. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, okay, I can go from there. Then, hypothetically, what would the ballpark proceeds be for – be to you if Innkeepers was monetized and what hypothetically would you do with the proceeds?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

You got to pick a price. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Right, okay let’s say $1.3 billion.

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Well, I think, which – I’ll turn it to Dennis take that all together it is around $80 million or $85 million. Is that right, Dennis?

Dennis Craven

Management

Yes, yes, that correct. It’s around, $80 million, if $1.3 billion, includes both our promo and our capital. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, and then lastly, is it fair to think that you are active – or you would be potentially an interested buyer in this in purchasing the JV, either going back into it as a JV partner or possibilities for ownership?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Well, you could – yes, you could do that two different ways. You could roll your promote, you could substantially obviously pick up your ownership interest in the staying with the JV partner, you could try to do it in other ways. We think that, there is still legs left in the cycle and we still think that these assets exemplify in almost all respects other than perhaps age, exactly what we’ve been buying in Chatham. So, yes, I mean, we certainly are going to look at it and see how we can maximize for our shareholders. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, so, all options and possibilities are on the table in that regard it sounds like?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I think we need to. Patrick Scholes – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, fair enough. I appreciate the color. Thanks.

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Gaurav Mehta of Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead. Gaurav Mehta – Cantor Fitzgerald: Thank you. Good morning. Couple of questions on your acquisition pipeline. So, as you look into 2014 and compare back to 2013, can you comment on the volume that you have seen in the market and also on the pricing levels that you have seen?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I think the pricing levels really have not changed from 2013, probably at the outset of the year, there was a little bit less on the one-off basis, which is really what we have been specializing in cherry picking assets, talking to individual owners, but I would expect that will pick up a little bit as the year progresses. Of course, there is a lot large portfolios, select service portfolios on the market, starting the year which should not in this in 2013. Gaurav Mehta – Cantor Fitzgerald: Thank you and one question on your 2014 guidance. I'm sorry – I missed this, if I missed this, but did you talk about how much of RevPAR growth will be excluding the hotels in the renovations?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I think that’s put in a bracket, right Dennis?

Dennis Craven

Management

Yes, on a full year basis, the RevPAR excluding is going to up about a 100 basis points for the first quarter alone, that was a few 100 basis points for the White Plains Hotel and for Holtsville. If you are talking purely just renovations for the White Plains Hotel and the Hilton Garden Hotel, it’s about a 100 basis points for the full year. Gaurav Mehta – Cantor Fitzgerald: Okay, great. That's all I had.

Dennis Craven

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) Your next question comes from the line of Nikhil of FBR. Please go ahead. Nikhil Bhalla – FBR Capital Markets: Yes, hi, good morning guys. Good morning. Just a question on the timeline for the asset sales, any color you can provide us Jeff, in terms of how long the process might take, will it extend to the end of the year? Do you think it could be a little bit sooner?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

I don’t think it will be end of the year, I think everybody would be burnt out by that. I would think that there is some typical normal call for offers in 30, 45 days later another call for offers final, but all really had to start as I mentioned, but, I would say some time around mid-way through the year, somewhere it’s going to know who is going to own this or not. Nikhil Bhalla – FBR Capital Markets: Got it and typically the due diligence period after a contract signed is how long? Is it two to three months?

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

It varies, it could be anywhere from 30, 60 or 90 days in a portfolio of this size. Nikhil Bhalla – FBR Capital Markets: Got it. That's all for me. Thank you.

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Thanks, Nikhil.

Operator

Operator

There are no further questions at this time.

Jeffrey Fisher

Management

Well, thank you all for listening. We appreciate the continued support and interest. We look forward as I mentioned to another strong year and hopefully some further strong appreciation in our share price. We still think we are undervalued. We think the monetization of this promote interest should it occur, it will be a strong, strong gainer for us together with the internal growth in our assets and possible other external growth primarily funded by debt. We think that, what we are hearing and seeing are still very, very low interest rates as compared to on a historic basis as Dennis mentioned. So, again, we look forward to talking to everybody after this first quarter. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes the conference call for today. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.