Host Hotels & Resorts Q3 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Presentation

[Operator]

Good morning and welcome to the Host Hotels & Resorts Third Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Jaime Marcus, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations.

[Jaime N. Marcus, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Thank you and good morning, everyone. Before we begin, please note that many of the comments made today are considered to be forward-looking statements under federal securities law. As described in our filings with the SEC, these statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause future results to differ from those expressed and we are not obligated to publicly update or revise these forward-looking statements. In addition, on today's call, we will discuss certain non-GAAP financial information such as FFO, adjusted EBITDA RE and comparable hotel level results. You can find this information together with reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP information in yesterday's earnings press release, in our 8-K filed with the SEC and in the supplemental financial information on our website at hosthotels.com. With me on today's call are Jim Risoleo, President and Chief Executive Officer and Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.

With that, I would like to turn the call over to Jim.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Thank you, Jaime and thanks to everyone for joining us this morning. Before we turn to the quarter, I want to take a moment to acknowledge the devastating effects of Hurricanes Helene and Molly, which made landfall in late September and early October. We were deeply saddened to see the loss of life and damage the hurricanes brought. And while many of our hotels were impacted, we are very fortunate that the employees at our properties remain safe throughout the storms. In response to the urgent needs of those impacted, we partnered with the American Red Cross, World Central Kitchen, Team Rubicon, Community Foundation Tampa Bay and feeding Tampa Bay to deliver vital disaster relief support.

Due to evacuation mandates and the loss of commercial power from Hurricane Helene and Molly, four of our properties were temporarily closed, three of which reopened within 10 days. The most significant damage occurred at The Don CeSar, which remains closed to guests. We are still evaluating the remediation and disruption impacts of the storms and we currently expect a phased reopening of the Don CeSar beginning towards the end of the first quarter of 2025. Please note that the Don CeSar is still included in our comparable hotel results in the third quarter, but it has been removed from our comparable hotel set in our full-year guidance. It is worth noting that our resilience investments at the Ritz-Carlton, Naples paid-off during both hurricanes.

As a reminder, during the remediation following Hurricane Ian, we opportunistically enhanced the resiliency of the property by elevating critical equipment, improving dry flood proofing measures and accelerating future building envelope waterproofing replacements. As a result of these investments, we saw minimal water intrusion inside the resort despite a storm surge comparable to that of Hurricane Ian. And we reopened the resort seven days after commercial power was restored. Following the success of these enhanced resiliency measures, we will continue to prioritize these types of investments across our portfolio over the near-term.

For additional details on our resiliency investments, please see our 2024 Corporate Responsibility Report, which details our CR program and strategy, our ESG initiatives and our industry-leading accomplishments. It can be found on the Corporate Responsibility section of our website at hosthotels.com.

Turning to our results in the third quarter, we delivered adjusted EBITDAre of $324 million and adjusted FFO per share of $0.36. As a reminder, in the third quarter of last year, our adjusted EBITDAre benefited from $54 million of business interruption insurance proceeds, which led to a 10% decrease in our adjusted EBITDAre this quarter. Excluding the business interruption proceeds, our adjusted EBITDAre would have been up over 5% and adjusted FFO per share would have been up 9%.

We delivered a year-over-year comparable hotel total RevPAR improvement of 3.1%, underscoring the continued strength of out-of-room revenue, while comparable hotel RevPAR was up 80 basis points. As a reminder, the operational results discussed today refer to our comparable hotel portfolio for the third quarter, which excludes the Ritz-Carlton, Naples and Alila Ventana Big Sur. Our third quarter comparable hotel RevPAR came in slightly better than we expected despite weather impacts from the hurricanes in Florida during the last week of the quarter. While Maui is recovering, the year-over-year decline in RevPAR for Maui had an actual drag of 170 basis points in the third quarter. As we have discussed over the past few quarters, this understates the true impact of the wildfires as we would have expected Maui to contribute 20 basis-points to portfolio RevPAR growth in the third quarter, given the transformational renovation at Fairmont Kea Lani in 2023 and the expected lift for 2024.

As a result, the total estimated impact of the wildfires on third quarter RevPAR is approximately 190 basis points. Following the anniversary of the tragic wildfires, we supported our managers, local tourism authorities and government officials in promoting the return of visitors to Maui. Our three hotels launched the Ho'okipa marketing campaign. Ho'okipa means the spirit of hospitality in Hawaiian. The marketing efforts included social media and TV ads, digital displays, an email campaign and videos from each of our resorts that aired in Southern California during the month of September.

Additionally, the Governor of Hawaii, the Mayor of Maui and the head of the Hawaii Lodging and Tourism Association met with longtime supporters of Hawaii, the Los Angeles Rams and key travel partners across the Greater Los Angeles market to communicate the importance of tourism for Maui's economic recovery. The ramps have supported Hawaii over the years and part of the governor's trip was aimed at formalizing the relationship between the two going forward. Thus far, the sales and marketing efforts are paying-off. Thanksgiving infested revenue pace for our three Maui resort is up over 35% and over 65% respectively, compared to the same time last year. We are encouraged that Maui is beginning to show improvements on its road to recovery.

Moving on to business mix. Group room night revenue was up 1% in the third quarter, driven by rate as group room nights were flat due to the recovery in relief rooms in Maui that were booked in the third quarter of 2023. Our property booked 212,000 group room nights in the year for the year, bringing our definite group room nights on the books for 2024 to 4.2 million rooms with total group revenue pace up approximately 5% compared to the same time last year. Business transient revenue grew 5% in the third quarter, as strong rate growth was driven by market and customer mix shifts.

Turning to leisure, the unfavorable international demand imbalance held steady in the third quarter. Transit room nights sold at our comparable resource were up 4% in the third quarter, driven by Maui. In addition, leisure rates remained resilient during the third quarter. Transient rates at our comparable resource were up approximately 50% compared to 2019, which is in line with recent quarters, continuing to underscore the financial health of the affluent consumer.

Out-of-room spending trends this quarter also continued to demonstrate the strength of group and affluent consumers. Comparable hotel total RevPAR grew over 3% in the third quarter, which represents the largest spread to RevPAR growth in six quarters. As a reminder, in 2023, nearly 40% of our total revenue came from food and beverage and other revenue and our 2024 guidance assumes a similar proportion. We continue to believe that total RevPAR represents a more holistic picture of our underlying business, as our portfolio continues to benefit from substantial out of room spend.

Turning to capital allocation, during the quarter, we repurchased 3.5 million shares of stock at an average price of $16.33 per share through our common share repurchase program, bringing our total repurchases for the quarter to $57 million. Since 2022, we have repurchased $315 million of stock at an average repurchase price of $16.27 per share and we have $685 million of remaining capacity under our share repurchase program. Looking back on our transaction activity this year, we acquired $1.5 billion of iconic interreplaceable real estate and a blended 13.6 times EBITDA multiple based on estimated 2024 results. Thus far, the I Hotel in Nashville and the Embassy Suites by Hilton Nashville Downtown, the one hotel Central Park and the Ritz-Carlton O'ahu, Turtle Bay are performing in line with our underwriting expectations. The brand and management transition at the Ritz-Carlton O'ahu, Turtle Bay is going well and we expect continued growth as awareness of the rebranded resort spreads.

Turning to portfolio reinvestment, our updated 2024 capital expenditure guidance range is $485 million to $580 million, which includes approximately $225 million to $255 million of investment for redevelopment, repositioning and ROI projects, $225 million to $275 million for renewal and replacement projects and $35 million to $50 million for property damage reconstruction. Included in the ROI project is the Hyatt Transformational Capital Program, which is on-track and slightly under budget so far. We received $2 million of operating guarantees in the third quarter to offset business disruptions related to the Hyatt Transformational Capital Program and we expect to receive an additional $3 million this year, bringing the total operating guarantees to $9 million in 2024.

In addition to the capital expenditure range, this year, we expect to spend $50 million to $60 million on the 40 unit residential condo development at our Four Seasons Resort Orlando at Walt Disney World Resort. The development is well underway and marketing efforts begin in July. We anticipate the formal sales launch to begin later this month with closings to begin in the fourth quarter of 2025. More broadly, we have completed 24 transformational renovations since 2018, which we believe provide meaningful tailwinds for our portfolio. Of the 15 hotels that have stabilized post-renovation operations to date, the average RevPAR index share gain is over 7 points, which is well in excess of our targeted gain of three to five points.

Wrapping up, we continue to believe that Host is well-positioned due to our investment-grade balance sheet, our geographically diverse -- diversified portfolio and our continued reinvestment in our assets. As we have shown, we are able to access many capital allocation levers to create shareholder value and we will remain opportunistic going forward.

With that, I will now turn the call over to Sourav to discuss additional, operational detail and our revised 2024 outlook.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Thank you, Jim and good morning, everyone. Building on Jim's comments, I will go into detail on our third quarter operations, updated 2024 guidance and our balance sheet. Starting with total revenue trends, total RevPAR growth continues to meaningfully outpace RevPAR growth as both group and transient guests maintain elevated levels of out of room spending. Comparable hotel food and beverage revenue grew 6% in the third quarter, driven by banquet and catering. In fact, banquet and catering revenue achieved the strongest third quarter in host history with contribution per group room night up 13% year-over-year.

Transient guests showed continued willingness to spend as well with SPA revenues up 5% and resort outlet revenue per occupied room up 3%. Overall transient room revenue was up slightly compared to the third quarter of 2023, driven by the recovery in Maui, as well as strong rate and occupancy growth in San Diego, New Orleans and Houston. From a leisure perspective, we are encouraged that Maui is beginning to show improvements. While RevPAR in Maui was down 19% in the third quarter, total RevPAR was down only 10% as out of room spending trends returned with the traditional group and leisure guests coming back to the island.

Looking at holiday progression, Maui is expected to shift from lagging to leading our portfolio. In the third quarter, Maui represented a drag to portfolio results for both the July 4th and Labor Day weekends. Looking-forward and as Jim alluded to earlier, Maui is driving holiday performance in the fourth quarter. Transient revenue pace for the total portfolio is up 2% for Thanksgiving week compared to the same time last year and festive period is up 20%. Business transient revenue was 5% above the third quarter of 2023, driven by rate strength. Overall, business transient demand was down 2%, driven by fewer government room nights. Encouragingly, demand from consulting firms increased this quarter, narrowing its gap to pre-pandemic levels.

Turning to group, revenue grew 1% in the third quarter, driven by rate growth and strong pickup in New Orleans, New York and Boston. As a reminder, group business faced tough comparisons this quarter due to the recovery in relief rooms booked in Maui last year. We estimate that Maui negatively impacted third quarter group revenue growth by 570 basis points. For full-year 2024, we have approximately 4.2 million definite group room nights on the books, keeping us ahead of same time last year. Group rate on the books is up 3% and total group revenue pace is up 5% over the same time last year, bolstered by banquet and catering spend.

Looking ahead, our 2025 total group revenue pace is nearly 5% ahead of the same time last year, driven by both rate and room nights. We continue to be encouraged by the citywide booking pace in San Francisco, San Antonio, Seattle, Nashville and New Orleans, all of which have citywide group room night pace up meaningfully compared to the same time last year. It is also worth noting that San Francisco citywide room nights are pacing up 40%.

Shifting gears to margins. Third quarter comparable hotel EBITDA margin of 25.3% was 130 basis points below last year. The decline was driven by increases in wages and benefits. Additionally, we estimate a 110 basis-point impact from Maui and the Hurricane Ian business interruption proceeds we received from four comparable hotels last year. Turning to our revised outlook for 2024, despite the impact of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, we maintained our previous full-year comparable hotel guidance growth midpoints. As a result, we anticipate comparable hotel total RevPAR growth of approximately 1% and comparable hotel RevPAR to be approximately flat compared to 2023. Our guidance assumes a continued recovery in Maui and steady demand trends in the fourth quarter.

We estimate the Maui wildfires will impact full-year comparable hotel total RevPAR by 180 basis points and RevPAR by 220 basis points. Excluding business interruption proceeds received earlier this year, we expect full-year adjusted EBITDAre to be impacted by approximately $75 million relative to our prefire estimate. We expect a comparable hotel EBITDA margin of approximately 29%, which is 90 basis points below 2023. We estimate a 30 basis point impact to full-year comparable hotel EBITDA margin from Maui relative to our prefire estimate, a 40 basis point impact from insurance and property taxes and a 110 basis-point impact from wages and benefit rate increases, which is partially offset by a 90 basis point benefit from operational improvements.

Our revised 2024 full-year adjusted EBITDAre guidance is expected to be $1,630 million, a $15 million or approximately 1% decrease over the prior midpoint as a result of the hurricanes in Florida. Of the $15 million, we estimate that $2 million occurred in the third quarter and $13 million will occur in the fourth quarter. Our adjusted EBITDAre estimate includes approximately $57 million from operations at The Ritz-Carlton, Naples, a decline of $5 million compared to our prior guidance and $24 million from operations at The Don CeSar, a decline of $9 million compared to our prior guidance. In addition, it includes $11 million from operations at Alila Ventana Big Sur. As a reminder, The Ritz-Carlton, Naples, Alila Ventana Big Sur and the Don CeSar are excluded from our comparable hotel guidance for full-year 2024.

Turning to our balance sheet and liquidity position in the third quarter, we completed the issuance of $700 million of Series L senior notes at 5.5%. The proceeds were used in part to repay the outstanding revolver portion of our credit facility. Our weighted average maturity was 5.5 years at a weighted average interest rate of 4.8%. Our quarter end leverage ratio was 2.7 times and we currently have $2.3 billion in total available liquidity, which includes $240 million of FF&E reserves and $1.5 billion of availability on our credit facility. In October, we paid a quarterly cash dividend of $0.20 per share, demonstrating our commitment to returning capital to stockholders. As always, future dividends are subject to approval by the company's Board of Directors.

To conclude, we are pleased with the performance of our portfolio and we are encouraged by steady business mix trends heading into 2025. We will continue to opportunistically allocate capital as we seek to elevate the EBITDA growth profile of our portfolio and increase shareholder value. With that, we will be happy to take your questions. To ensure we have time to address as many questions as possible, please limit yourselves to one question.

Questions and Answers

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from the line of Stephen Grambling with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

[Stephen Grambling, Analyst at Morgan Stanley]

Hey, thanks for taking the question. I guess I'd like to touch base on the transaction market. You obviously were active this year with acquisitions. I'm curious how you're thinking about how the market might be evolving now and whether you'd be more likely to be a buyer or seller, you know at this point, if you're seeing any change in terms of who's actually an active participant, either from people putting up assets for sale or people coming to you looking for assets for sale. Thanks.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure, Stephen. I would say that until the last 90 days or so, really both buyers and sellers have been on the sidelines. The bid-ask spread has just been too great and everyone was in a wait-and-see mode. Wait-and-see mode for a couple of different reasons. I think the fact that we're past the election now will clear one hurdle for a lot of people. They'll be able to wrap their arms around what the economic policies of the new administration are likely to look like over the near-term and the debt capital markets have become much more conducive to transacting. Rates have come down, spreads have come in, you know, SASB financing is available and I think that as we get into next year, you're likely to see private equity get back into the game and come off the bench. There have been some additional transactions out there that we have evaluated. Nothing has risen -- has beat the bar for us and we're absolutely delighted that we were able to complete the three deals, four hotels and three transactions that we did.

Earlier this year, our balance sheet is a differentiator and it will continue to be a differentiator for us. I think that we would have more competition today if those assets were brought to the market. Clearly, there would be because they're all attractive properties. They're all unique and they're all in great locations and one of a kind assets. So that said, relationships and reputation matter and we'll always, I think, continue to differentiate host as we go forward. So our ability to move quickly with no need for financing is always a differentiator for us. I expect that over the course of the -- not the balance of this year so much, but next year, probably you know, I know you hold me to this if it doesn't come true, but I'm willing to go out on a limb and say that at Alice [Phonetic], we're likely to hear about additional transactions coming to market because I do think that people have waited a long-time.

And the good news is that the pressure to sell wasn't there and that's because fundamentally, the business is very sound and resilient. Yes, we have our little bumps on the road along the way, but it's not like folks are rushing to exit at any -- at any price. So I think we'll see an active transaction market next year. And from host perspective, we're likely to test the market our self with some of our non-core assets to really understand pricing of assets that likely will need heavy capex investments that we just don't see good hotels, but not a long-term fit for the portfolio given the direction that we have moved in over the last seven or eight years in terms of the types of assets we own and really with our focus being on free-cash flow generation as a differentiator going forward.

So we're likely to test the market. We'll see what pricing comes back at. If pricing is attractive, we'll sell. If it's not, we'll pull back and invest in the assets ourselves. We'll be hopeful to be able to be a continued net acquirer going-forward. I mean, mean we sit here at 2.7 times leverage today. We have a lot of dry powder and it will either be -- well, it will always be continuing to invest in our portfolio. Sourav I think mentioned in his comments that we've seen a 7 point yield index gain on average from the investments we've made. We bought back $57 million of stock last quarter and we bought $1.5 billion of assets this year. So we'll look-forward to continuing to grow the portfolio and we prefer to do it on a one-off basis and not be in a competitive situation, but if we have to be in a competitive situation, we will and we'll just see what happens.

[Stephen Grambling, Analyst at Morgan Stanley]

Great. Maybe one unrelated follow-up for Sourav. I know we've talked about this on prior calls and maybe I missed this in your remarks, but I guess, are we still thinking about the underlying EBITDA? There's a lot of moving parts with the different acquisitions, there's the Don CeSar issues and insurance and proceeds. Is the underlying EBITDA build-off of still kind of that $1.75 billion? And I guess within that, does that have to include what level of recovery in Maui? And how would you generally think about Maui kind of building back? Thanks.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure. Yeah, Stephen, it's still the $1.750 million and I'll build it from the $1.630 million to have all the different moving pieces. So starting off with the midpoint of our current guidance of $1.630 million, you would take out $40 million of DI for this year. So $19 million of it Ian, that was $10 million in Q1, $9 million in Q2 and then $21 million DI that we received for the Maui wildfire. So that's the $40 million that you would deduct. Then you would add about $49 million or so for Turtle Bay and 1 Hotel Central Park, add another $13 million for Nashville. And then the $75 million to $80 million Maui, which I'll get into a little bit more in terms of how we are thinking about recovery. Then you would add $5 million for Alila Ventana and then the $15 million we talked about in terms of hurricane impact, you would add to that to get to a grand total of $1.750 million. That's what we really consider to be the true run-rate when you think about adjusted EBITDAre.

As it relates to Maui, as Jim and I sort of got into in our prepared remarks, we're certainly encouraged by the transient trends and the pickup we are seeing specifically for Thanksgiving, as well as for effective -- effectively around the week of Christmas and New Year's. The piece that is going to be a little bit challenging and will take a little bit longer to recover is going to be the group piece because if you recall, beginning of this year, there certainly wasn't a clear message on Maui in terms of being open for business. Once we lapped over the one-year anniversary of the fire, there's certainly much more clear direction in terms of the island being open for tourism and welcoming guests back.

The meeting planners didn't really have much of a chance in the beginning of the year to really book forward. So we didn't see much group booking activity into 2025 and into the future, we expect to see that really pick-up beginning next year. So the group piece of the business and group for Maui across our hotels on a room night basis works out to be about 30% or so and from a revenue perspective, it's around 20% of revenues at group, but it does build a meaningful base for the hotels, particularly with the Hyatt. That's going to take a little bit while to come back. So that $75 million to $80 million, I mean, we don't have any budgets yet, so can't really give you a number. But what I would say is, the trends are encouraging from a transient pickup perspective and group is going to come back certainly, it will just take a little more time probably towards the end of next year into 2026.

[Stephen Grambling, Analyst at Morgan Stanley]

That's helpful. Thanks so much.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure.

[Operator]

Next question is from Michael Bellisario with Baird. Your line is open.

[Michael Bellisario, Analyst at Robert W. Baird]

Thanks. Good morning. Just sort of along the same lines like on the moving pieces and all your numbers in the models. Can you maybe just take a step-back, what's the clean run-rate for the portfolio, both top and bottom-line that you think everything is performing at today ex all the one-timers? And then how might that be different or the same as you start thinking about looking out to 2025? Thanks.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Just so I'm sure I understand the question, the clean run-rate once you do all the puts and takes, including the acquisitions, taking out the BI is the $1.750 billion I just walked through. A big component of that $1.750 billion is obviously the $75 million to $80 million of Maui EBITDA that we are missing. The question really is for 2025, how much of that EBITDA comes back. For 2025, without getting into too much details because we don't obviously don't have budgets right now, I don't really have a good sense in terms of where top line and expenses will come in. But what we do know is group booking pace is looking strong for 2025. We already have 2.8 million group room nights on the books. We picked-up about 400,000. Total group revenue is up objectively 5% and rate -- group rate is up about 3.5%, but we are feeling pretty good about 2025 from group perspective in terms of what visibility we have.

Specific to Maui, like I said, I think group is going to take a little bit of time to get back and unclear at this point in time, how much of that $75 million to $80 million will really be able to see in Maui.

[Michael Bellisario, Analyst at Robert W. Baird]

Got it. Sorry, I should have been clear. I was sort of referring to the current top line and bottom line growth rates, right? Like are you seeing -- do you think the underlying performance of the portfolio is 3% on the top line, 4% expenses, all the -- ex all the one-time items, not really thinking about the absolute numbers, more about the growth rates ex all the one-time items.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

For -- you're saying for 2024 or into 2025?

[Michael Bellisario, Analyst at Robert W. Baird]

Just today, just I think as everyone thinks about, is this a 2% RevPAR growth environment? Is it 3%, 4% expenses? What's kind of your view on where the portfolio is performing today and looking out into 2025 ex all these one-time items? Just thinking about in terms of growth rates?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yeah. If you think in terms of growth rates, I mean this year would have just on a RevPAR perspective, given how much drag we're seeing from Maui would have been closer to a 3% RevPAR growth rate. And in that case, we would have actually seen margin expansion because our total expenses was up 2.8%. So net-net for this year, we would have meaningfully outperformed relative to the industry just given the benefit we saw from all the capital investments we put into our -- into our hotels on the Marriott and Hyatt Transformational Capital program. And as Jim spoke to, the index share gains that we saw. So it's sort of unfortunate that we've had a drag in terms of the Maui wildfire, otherwise certainly a 3% growth rate in RevPAR just for this year and we would have actually seen about a 10, 15 basis-points margin expansion.

[Michael Bellisario, Analyst at Robert W. Baird]

Helpful. Thank you.

[Operator]

Your next question comes from Smedes Rose with Citi. Your line is open.

[Smedes Rose, Analyst at Smith Barney Citigroup]

Hi, thank you. I just -- sorry, I wanted to just clarify something on Maui. Could you just talk about what you're expecting there this year in terms of EBITDA, I guess, excluding the business interruption proceeds, so I just get a sense of like what the -- the gap is to $75 million to $80 million you're talking about potentially for next year?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

For sure. It's $97 million excluding $97 million excluding the BI proceeds.

[Smedes Rose, Analyst at Smith Barney Citigroup]

Okay, thanks. And then I guess one thing you mentioned next year for the group outlook, the group calendars look good, convention calendars look good. Any thoughts around sort of grouping up, I guess, into 2025 to help sort of lock-in demand now and revenues or would you expect to keep more in-line with where you've been historically in terms of the percent of overall group segmentation?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yeah. I mean, honestly, it is really an asset-by-asset exercise that we go through and we know for which years what the optimal group room night is and so that we can maximize yielding of the transient rate. So it really depends. But overall, I would say the mix is not going to shift meaningfully up for the portfolio. We certainly focused on grouping up on across-the-board wherever it does make sense and wherever we do have holes, we also like fill in with contract business. So you'll see shift in contract business over the years. So the yield management is really asset-by-asset. The encouraging thing is there's a few citywide that are certainly pacing very well for next year. And specifically for the host markets, I would say you know, San Francisco being up 40% from his standpoint, New York, San Antonio, Orlando, DC, it really makes up more than 40% right now of the group room night that we already have on the books for 2025. So overall, feel really good. And as we see the needs for each of these assets and where the holes are, we are going to fill accordingly. I certainly hope that the strength in Corporate Group continues and the banquet and catering contribution that comes along with it to really drive total EBITDA.

[Smedes Rose, Analyst at Smith Barney Citigroup]

Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it.

[Operator]

The next question is from David Katz with Jefferies. Your line is open.

[David Katz, Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

Hi, thanks for taking my question. I'd love some initial commentary around you know, the labor market. I think there's a lot of potential puts and takes and opportunities that may or may not occur given the election outcomes. I know it's early and you've gone out of the limb elsewhere, so I'm not asking that. But any perspectives or thoughts you can share with respect to that and whether it's plus would be great.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure, David. Generally speaking, we are very pleased, pleased with the labor picture at our assets. We're not the -- we're not the manager, we're not the employer, but we have two of the very best in the business in Marriott and Hyatt, in particular that manage the bulk of our portfolio and they're an employer of choice. You know, they are the opportunity that people search out if they want to make hospitality a career. So we are very encouraged going-forward. We -- coming out of the pandemic, we got back to optimal staffing levels fairly quickly after we redefined and reinvented the operating model. So going -- looking-forward, I -- we're nothing but optimistic on the labor front. I don't see any issues that are going to present a problem for us as we get into 2025 and beyond.

[David Katz, Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

And then -- thank you. And if I may, I just wanted to follow-up on kind of leisure transient and maybe get one layer farther down. Are -- is some of the softness that we're discussing more a decision to go or no go or would you classify it more as a pushback on, you know on the level of rates and rate growth that were out there? How would we unpack that?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Well, I think there are a couple of different components to the leisure picture. You know, no go, I'm not sure that is a -- that's really the bottom line, David and I say that because if you look at international outbound air capacity versus inbound, we have seen that 120% number has held steady now for the last several quarters. So people are still traveling, they're spending money. They're just not spending it at our properties, generally speaking. We're not seeing any pushback on ADR in our -- leisure transient ADR in our portfolio. We finished the third quarter with leisure transient ADRs up 50% over the third quarter of 2019. And that is held for 10 quarters in a row now.

So people are still spending money when they get to our properties, they're spending money out of the room as well. We continue to see records on a quarterly basis in terms of per occupied room spend at our outlets. We've seen spa revenues continue to increase, golf revenues continue to increase. So clearly, the affluent consumer is still spending money. We believe that over time that the pendulum will swing back and we'll see a more normalized balance of international inbound versus international outbound. I think international inbound has held somewhere around 90% of 2019 levels, maybe even little less than that. A lot of that could have to do with the strong dollar. So we keep our eye on a lot of different things as we're assessing the health of the leisure consumer.

[David Katz, Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

Thank you very much.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Chris Darling of Green Street. Your line is open.

[Chris Darling, Analyst at Green Street Advisors]

Thanks, good morning. Going back to the Orlando Condo development, can you walk through underwritten sales proceeds relative to your development budget there? And then are there any similar densification opportunities that you might pursue in the near-term in other places within the portfolio?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure. You're talking about in terms of what assumptions we made with respect to top line sales?

[Chris Darling, Analyst at Green Street Advisors]

Yeah, that would be helpful all relative to your overall kind of construction budget there.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yeah. So I think the construction budget was $150 million to $170 million and that really hasn't changed. You know, we -- we started in mid-July the construction of the project. And we anticipate starting sales in later in the this quarter, mid-November, mid to the end of November. We're targeting completion of the mid-rise that's 31 of the 40 condos. I think in the fourth quarter 2025 and then there are nine billers that will be completed in the first half of 2026. So it's 40 units in total. And our anticipated returns are going to be in the mid to high-teens cash-on-cash. So we will not provide our assumptions with respect to sales per square-foot, but we underwrote it to a mid to high teens cash-on-cash return. And the construction budget is proceeding on-time and within budget. So we're fairly confident that we're going to hit those numbers.

[Chris Darling, Analyst at Green Street Advisors]

Okay, that's fair enough. And I guess to the second half of my question, any similar opportunities that you might pursue in the near-term elsewhere in the portfolio?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Well, you know, one of the really attractive attributes of The Ritz-Carlton O'ahu, Turtle Bay was a 49 acre parcel of entitled land for residential development, that's immediately adjacent to the resort, a significant portion of which is ocean front property. And you just don't find that type of opportunity in Hawaii and it's one of the things that really drove us to complete the acquisition of Turtle Bay. We are still in the planning stages and we have not taken into consideration any EBITDA upside for the resort, but we believe there is going to be over-time meaningful EBITDA upside at the risk itself, as well as a development profit. And that is whether or not we sell the land or we joint venture the development of those 49 units -- of those 49 acres, which probably going to be somewhere plus or minus 250 units and it's likely going to be Ritz residential units at least 50% of which will participate in the rental pool because that's just how things.

As a matter of law, that's how things happen in Hawaii. So it's an exciting -- exciting project. It's a -- it's a fairly large project, that's why we're considering joint-venturing it or selling the property outright. But suffice it to say that we would expect to make a profit on the sale or development of the land and see meaningful upside to the resort, both from units being in the rental pool and a share of revenues with the owner, as well as ancillary spend at the restaurants, golf and spa, that's the most exciting project we have. We are looking at potential development, which I can't get into any details of at this point in time with you, potential residential development at another one of our resort properties, but that's in the very early stages. And is it -- as it manifest itself, we'll certainly share more details with you down the road.

[Chris Darling, Analyst at Green Street Advisors]

Okay. Appreciate the time. Thank you.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Aryeh Klein with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open.

[Aryeh Klein, Analyst at BMO Capital Markets]

Thanks, and good morning. Maybe just going back to Maui, it looks like you slightly narrowed the expected RevPAR headwind for the year in that market. I'm just curious if that -- if that was based on what you're seeing in Q4? And then Sourav, you mentioned group taking longer to recover in Maui, can you just provide us where group and Transient currently stands from a delta perspective relative to pre-wildfires?

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yeah, sure. So yes, if you recall, last quarter, we had said that the total Maui impact was about 250 basis points drag to the overall RevPAR. We have revised that to 220 basis points. In other words, it's actually improved by 30 bps. And yes, you're correct, it really is based on what we are seeing in terms of transient pace for Thanksgiving and for the defensive period. So if you feel encouraged in terms of where things are heading from a transient perspective, I will say like where we are off if overall is about, call it, 20% or so in terms of sort of room nights. The piece that is going to take longer to come back is, like I mentioned earlier is going to be more the group side versus the transient. And for Maui, if I remember correctly, for our three hotels, you know, pre-fire, we did about 100,000 group room nights. And while we are pacing okay for 2025, we are still a pretty behind double-digits in terms of group pace. And that's the piece which you are keeping a close eye on and hopefully at the beginning of next year, we will start seeing group activity pick-up.

The transient pace is actually pretty similar to where we were pre-fire, you know, at least for the fourth quarter, which is very encouraging relative to sort of where we were back in -- before the fires occurred. So group is a piece we're keeping an eye on and hopefully, we see the group activity pick-up as we get into next year.

[Aryeh Klein, Analyst at BMO Capital Markets]

Got it. Thanks for that color. And then, Jim, I'm wondering if maybe you can provide us with a little bit more color on the risk calls in O'ahu outperformance and how that's trended post-conversion?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

It's trending in-line with our pro-forma expectations, Ary. The transition is -- is going well. At the present time, it's the -- it's at the top of the list when anyone is searching for Ritz-Carlton. It's a very important asset to the Ritz-Carlton brand. It's getting all the attention that is certainly warranted going-forward. So we're excited about it. I mean we're working with Arte developers who bought an adjacent parcel from Blackstone on a realignment of the golf courses. There are two golf courses there. They're going to lease one and manage the other one on our behalf. So everything is going according to plan. The asset was in terrific shape when we bought it, so no near term capex needs and we're seeing good pace over festive season and beyond into next year.

[Aryeh Klein, Analyst at BMO Capital Markets]

Thanks for the color.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Chris Woronka with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.

[Chris Woronka, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the question. Jim, I wanted to kind of ask, year-to-date, I think you're running about 72% comparable occupancy and if I look back to 2019, I think it was over 79%. And I'm curious and I know there's nuances in the portfolio is a little different, but do you guys see any impact from whether you want to call it shadow supply Airbnb or conversely maybe some of these soft brands or even kind of these new affiliation brands that technically aren't part of your major brands. Just any thought as to whether -- because it seems like group and corporate occupancy is and certainly leisure is pretty much as far back as it's going to get. So is there any thought on kind of where those lost occupancy points are coming from?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yeah, Chris, I -- the short answer is, it's not as a result of shadow supply and it's not as a result of new supply because the new supply picture has never looked better relative -- relative to what's being developed today as to other times in the cycle. I think what has happened and we have about -- I think we think it's eight to nine points of occupancy that we can still pick-up. And we actually view that as a tailwind to the portfolio, not as a negative bias. You know, return to office is still slow to evolve in several markets, but it's coming back. And I think that is probably one of the biggest dynamic things that changed coming out of the pandemic. The good news is that Salesforce in San Francisco, they're going back to work. Amazon is going back to work. So a number of other big corporates are putting or mandating that their employees get back to the office. And I -- we believe that over-time, as the business transient travel continues to evolve and it has been evolving on a quarter-over-quarter basis that we should pick-up some of that occupancy gap relative to where we were in 2019.

[Chris Woronka, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

Okay. Appreciate the thoughts. Thanks, Jim.

[Operator]

The next question comes from the line of Robin Farley with UBS. Your line is open.

[Robin Farley, Analyst at UBS Group]

Great. Thank you. Can you give a little more clarity around leisure rates in the quarter on a year-over-year basis? And then kind of your expectation for 2025 in terms of what the leisure traveler kind of outside of Maui, but just sort of broadly, what leisure rate may look like next year and also what it was in Q3 year-over-year? Thanks.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

On a year-over-year basis, Robin, it's relatively flat in a lot of the market to slightly down because you may recall that there were certain quarters last year it was meaningfully above the 50% to 2019. It seems to have pretty much normalized around the approximate 50% over 2019, so for the most part, pretty flat. From a demand perspective, that's been the case as well. Again, pretty much flat throughout the year every single quarter that we look at. Actually, I believe it was down 3% year-over-year from a demand perspective in Q1, but then actually that demand improved as we went through. So again, close to flat, but not very far from flat and boards perspective year-over-year standpoint.

Going into 2025, just given the consumer strength we have seen and given that there is, you know, hopefully more clarity around sort of macro -- the overall macroeconomic outlook, we believe that there is -- that the leisure just has formed a new baseline. So effectively, that's where we have settled down. And given the growth expectations for next year from a GDP standpoint, from business investment standpoint and just overall macro outlook. And as Jim mentioned earlier, we expect that imbalance that currently does exist with international inbound, outbound choose at some point sort of revert to mean. And that should definitely help leisure overall stabilize and we don't expect any degradation in terms of rate or demand.

[Robin Farley, Analyst at UBS Group]

Okay, great. Thank you. And then just a quick clarification. When you were talking about the $1.75 billion run-rate, were you including and I know that was like excluding business interruption from Maui, were you including this theoretical like if you recovered $75 million to $80 million in Maui in that $1.75 million -- I'm sorry, I just didn't catch you were sort of giving a lot of puts and takes and what -- in that $1.75 billion, that includes what kind of recovery in that way? Thanks.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Yes. That did assume the $75 million to $80 million. That was effectively the long-term run-rate. So it wasn't necessarily for 2025.

[Robin Farley, Analyst at UBS Group]

Okay, great. That's why I wanted to clarify. In other words, based on your other comments, it would seem like you're saying that's not where you'd be in 2025. So just -- that's why I wanted to clarify. Thank you. Thanks.

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

That's correct, yep.

[Operator]

Thanks. The next question -- sorry, the next question comes from Duane Pfennigwerth with Evercore ISI. Your line is open.

[Duane Pfennigwerth, Analyst at Evercore ISI]

Hey, good morning. Just on San Francisco, if I heard you correctly, any times of year or specific citywide events that stick out. I think you said room night pacing is up 40% and I wonder if there's any more underlying detail you have on that?

[Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Sure. That's effectively for overall citywide pacing over here, specifically in terms of group room nights for us. We already for San Francisco have approximately 220,000 group room nights on the books, which is about close to 30% up year-over-year from a pace perspective, but it's still obviously far from where we were back in 2019, but nonetheless, good progress and we're really encouraged by the way it's pacing the 2025. And you recall, 2026 is World Cup and Super Bowl in San Francisco. So again, good things to come for San Fran.

[Duane Pfennigwerth, Analyst at Evercore ISI]

Okay, great. And then just to -- you touched on this in prior questions, but on capital allocation, if we think about ROI projects, additional acquisitions or buyback, I guess given your experience this year, are you leaning in any more of a direction in any of those three buckets going forward, just given your experience this year?

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Well, Duane, I think that you know, it goes without saying that the easiest opportunities to underwrite with the greatest degree of certainty are those that are in our existing portfolio. So we are well into the Hyatt Transformational Capital Program and we look forward to continuing to invest in those assets and complete that program in the near-term next year. ROI projects, we're always looking for places to continue to put money in our existing portfolio as well. Stock buybacks, 3.5 million shares, $57 million this last quarter. We will continue to be optimistic -- opportunistic on buying back stock. And you know, acquisitions, of course, if they make sense for us. We're sitting here at 2.7 times leverage today, we can take our leverage up to somewhere to 3, 3.25 times comfortably. So we have a lot -- significant amount of dry powder to allocate capital across all those various opportunities.

[Duane Pfennigwerth, Analyst at Evercore ISI]

Thanks, Jim.

[Operator]

This concludes the question-and-answer session. I will turn the call to Jim for closing remarks.

[James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer at Host Hotels & Resorts]

Well, thank you again for joining us today. We always appreciate the opportunity to discuss our quarterly results with you and we look-forward to seeing many of you in Las Vegas in the coming weeks and at other conferences over the course of the year. Have a great day.

[Operator]

[Operator Closing Remarks]

Participants

Corporate Executives

• Jaime N. Marcus, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations
• James F. Risoleo, President, Chief Executive Officer
• Sourav Ghosh, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer

Analysts

• Stephen Grambling, Morgan Stanley
• Michael Bellisario, Robert W. Baird
• Smedes Rose, Smith Barney Citigroup
• David Katz, Jefferies Financial Group Inc.
• Chris Darling, Green Street Advisors
• Aryeh Klein, BMO Capital Markets
• Chris Woronka, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft
• Robin Farley, UBS Group AG
• Duane Pfennigwerth, Evercore ISI