Earnings Labs

Ashford Hospitality Trust, Inc. (AHT)

Q2 2014 Earnings Call· Fri, Aug 8, 2014

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day and welcome to the Ashford Hospitality Trust and Ashford Hospitality Prime Second Quarter 2014 Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. At this time I would turn the conference to your host, Scott Eckstein. Please go ahead, sir.

Scott Eckstein

Management

Thank you, operator. Good day, everyone, and welcome to today’s conference call to review results for both Ashford Hospitality Trust and Ashford Hospitality Prime for the second quarter of 2014 and to update you on recent developments. On the call today will be Monty Bennett, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Douglas Kessler, President; Deric Eubanks, Chief Financial Officer and Jeremy Welter, Executive Vice President of Asset Management. The results as well as a notice of the accessibility of this conference call on a listen-only basis over the internet were distributed yesterday afternoon in press releases that have been covered by the financial media. At this time, let me remind you that certain statements and assumptions in this conference call contained are based upon forward-looking information and are being made pursuant to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements are subject to numerous assumptions, uncertainties and known or unknown risks which could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. These risk factors are more fully discussed in both company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements included in this conference call are only made as of the date of this call and the company is not obligated to publicly update or revise them. In addition, certain terms used in this call are non-GAAP financial measures, reconciliations of which are provided in the company’s earnings releases and accompanying tables or schedules which have been filed on Form 8-K with the SEC on August 7, 2014 and may also be accessed through both companies’ website at www.ahtreit.com and www.ahpreit.com. Each listener is encouraged to review those reconciliations provided in the earnings releases together with all other information provided in the releases. I will now turn the call over to Monty Bennett. Please go ahead, sir.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Thank you and good morning. During the second quarter, the performance of both Ashford Trust an Ashford Prime demonstrated our continuing ability to capitalize on the positive lodging industry fundamentals we are currently seeing. We continue to focus on finding innovative ways to create near term and long-term shareholder value for our two platforms. Our outlook for the hotel sector remains positive and we are confident these initiatives are adding value for our shareholders. As a team, we at Ashford have always employed a methodical, analytically driven approach when making day-to-day business decisions and more complex strategic transactions. This remains true in both of our platforms. Our process has stood the test of time as this management team has achieved a 230% total return to our shareholders since Ashford Trust's IPO in 2003 compared with the 147% return from our peers over the same time period. We have continued to outperform our peers in every yearly cumulative total shareholder return period since our IPO. While our Ashford Prime portfolio is still in the early stages of its development as an independent public company, we expect to continue to this record of success with that platform as well. An integral part of this methodology is our commitment to acting as shareholders in our companies. That is really not difficult for us because we are shareholders. Our insider ownership in Ashford Trust is 17% and following the spin-off and subsequent equity raise, our insider ownership is 13% in Ashford Prime. The next closest hotel REIT peer has 4% insider ownership. Over the years, collectively we have sold very little of our stock and have made material cash purchase of shares. In fact, back in March, I have bought $500,000 of Ashford Prime stock in the open market. The vast majority of our…

Deric Eubanks

Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Monty. For the second quarter of 2014, Ashford Trust reported AFFO per diluted share of $0.39 compared with $0.55 a year ago. It's important to note that the second quarter of 2013 included the operations of the Ashford Prime hotels. Ashford Prime reported AFFO per diluted share of $0.45 compared with $0.44 a year ago. For the second quarter, we reported adjusted EBITDA of $96.4 million for Ashford Trust and $25.9 million for Ashford Prime. This adjusted EBITDA result for Ashford Prime reflected a 35% increase over the prior year. At quarter's end, Ashford Trust had total assets of $3.6 billion including the Highland portfolio which is not consolidated. It has $1.8 billion of mortgage debt in continuing operations and $2.6 billion overall including Highland. The total combined debt for Ashford Trust currently has a blended average interest rate of 5.57% and is currently 54% fixed rate and 46% floating rate, all of which have interest rate caps in place. Including the market value of Ashford Trust's OP units of Ashford Prime and as pro rata share of the net working capital of the Highland portfolio, Ashford Trust ended the quarter with net working capital of $467 million. Ashford Prime at quarter’s end had total assets of $1.3 billion. It had $767 million of mortgage debt in continuing operations which had a blended average interest rate of 4.99% and is currently 55% fixed rate, and 45% floating rate, all of which have interest rate caps in place. At quarter’s end, the Ashford Trust portfolio consisted of 114 hotels, with 22,667 net rooms and the Ashford Prime portfolio consisted of ten hotels with 3,472 net rooms. Ashford Trust share count currently stands at 110.9 million fully diluted shares outstanding, which is comprised of 90.9 million common shares and 20 million OP units. While Ashford Prime share count currently stands at 34.5 million fully diluted shares outstanding which is comprised of 25.4 million common shares and 9.1 million OP units. I would also like to point out that Ashford Trust recorded a $10.8 million accrual for a litigation judgment in the second quarter. This judgment relates to tenant dispute from 2008 at one of its hotels where Ashford Trust believed the tenant had violated various lease provisions of the lease agreement and was therefore in default. The tenant counter-claimed and asserted multiple claims including that he had wrongfully evicted. The litigation proceeded to a jury trial in June of 2014 and the jury awarded the tenant total claims of $10.8 million. We strongly disagree with this verdict and are in the process of appealing it. In the results for the second quarter, we have adjusted for this accrual for purposes of calculating adjusted EBITDA and AFFO. I would now like to turn it over to Jeremy to discuss our asset management accomplishments for the quarter.

Jeremy Welter

Management

Thank you, Deric. RevPAR at the ten properties in the Ashford Prime portfolio increased 4.6% in the second quarter of 2014, as difficult market conditions in Washington DC, Chicago and Philadelphia weighed on our results. However, that 4.6% portfolio RevPAR growth translated into a significant increase in market share versus the same period last year which illustrate the high quality nature of the Ashford Prime portfolio. Half of the Ashford Prime properties experienced double-digit RevPAR growth in the quarter. Strength in the West Coast markets continued through the second quarter where Ashford Prime's four properties produced a combined RevPAR growth of 11.9%. I would also like to point out that we are pleased with the strong start to the third quarter with a year-over-year increase in RevPAR of 11.4% in July with the Ashford Prime portfolio. Among these properties is the Hilton La Jolla, which grew RevPAR by 17.5% in the quarter. This asset continues to excel since the completion of a stunning renovation of the property in the second quarter of 2013, yielding a significant return on our capital expenditure. San Francisco and Seattle continue to be strong markets for Ashford Prime, where our three properties produced a combined RevPAR growth of 10.4% for the quarter. Another source of growth this quarter came from the Renaissance, Tampa property, which increased RevPAR by 13.4% due to multiple citywide events. It has been five months since Ashford Prime closed on the Sofitel, Chicago acquisition in the heart of downtown Chicago. Our team has spent much time with the property, identifying opportunities to improve asset performance. Since the acquisition, we have already identified and implemented cost cuts that we believe will result in approximately $700,000 in annualized cost savings. While the Chicago market has had a difficult last couple of quarter, we…

Douglas Kessler

President

Thank you, Jeremy. Since the end of the first quarter, Ashford Trust has continued to strengthen its capital structure by capitalizing on attractive market conditions to strategically manage our debt maturities while generating excess proceeds to bolster our cash position and also raising equity for two acquisitions. During the quarter Ashford Trust completed a follow on public offering of 8,350,000 shares of common stock at a price of $10.70 per share and used the proceeds from the offering to acquire the Ashton Hotel and the Fremont Marriott Silicon Valley. As a reminder, during the downturn we purchased over $75 million shares of Ashford Trust common stock in the open market at an average price of around $3 per share. So reissuing those shares at a price of $10.70 resulted in significant value creation for Ashford Trust's shareholders. Turning to financing activity during the quarter. Ashford Trust refinanced the $5 million loan secured by the Courtyard Manchester with a new $6.9 million loan. The new loan has a tenure term with a fixed interest rate of 4.99% and 30-year amortization. Ashford Trust owns this hotel and a joint venture with Interstate Hotels and Resorts where Ashford Trust owns 85% and Interstate owns 15%. The excess proceeds after transaction costs were distributed to the partners on a pro rata basis. Additionally, Ashford Trust recently announced the successful refinancing of three mortgage loans with a combined outstanding balance of approximately $325 million. The three previous mortgage loans that were refinanced include the $135 million J.P. Morgan Floater Loan; the $101 million UBS 1 loan; and the $89 million Merrill Lynch 3 loan. The new loans total $469 million and include a $301 million loan with a two-year initial term and three one-year extension options that bears interest at a floating rate of LIBOR…

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) We will take our first question from Andrew Didora with Bank of America.

Andrew Didora - Bank of America

Analyst · Bank of America

Monty, maybe the first one, just wanted to touch upon the margins at Ashford Trust. Up just 56 basis points on a very RevPAR number. I was looking at the data that you guys disclosed in your press release. It looks like it was incentive fees and some new franchise fees eat into some of the upside. Just looking back at historical performance, it seemed like 1Q had some similar headwinds but drew margins over 125 basis points. I guess, back half of the year, do you think this variability will continue and then maybe can you give us a sense of what we should think of in terms of margin growth in sort of a mid-single digit RevPAR environment.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Sure. This margin growth is lower than what we have typically achieved. Those incentive management fees in trust were primarily paid to our Remington and that was because of some really strong management fees Remington are capped to the -- they are capped at 1% of gross revenues. And so there is certainly a limitation to how many of those fees are paid in our five properties based upon fitting in budget or not. As far as what the future holds, we don’t give guidance on that but we could off line work with you and help you calculate about how much management fees were paid so far and therefore you can know at least how much more on the maximum side could be paid as part of that incentive. Those franchise fees headwinds were a result of us converting some properties to franchises in approximately May of 2013, some Marriott managed. Now, overall the cost structure of those assets came down even with the franchise base. But franchise fees do show up as a variance and that will go away going forward because we have lacked that information.

Andrew Didora - Bank of America

Analyst · Bank of America

Got it. Okay. Makes sense. And then kind of a similar question at Prime. Sorry, you might have mentioned this briefly in your prepared remarks but just wanted to ask you about, San Francisco and Seattle both had RevPAR growth of over 12% yet negative margins. What was the driving force here and how long do you expect this kind of margin underperformance to continue?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Sure. The brand incentive fees hit us pretty good in the Prime portfolio. And while some of that is due -- a lot of that is due just to improving performance, a lot of it has to do with how we booked them last year. We weren't as aggressive in booking the incentive fees in the first and second quarter of last year and therefore being more aggressive booking them this year, really hit our margins. Starting in the third quarter and fourth quarter, the booking methodology will be same. And so we don’t anticipate the incentive fee impact to margins to be nearly as significant going forward.

Andrew Didora - Bank of America

Analyst · Bank of America

Got it. That’s helpful. And then finally, this is for Doug. Obviously competition for high quality hotels in top markets continues to be high. A lot of your peers this earnings season have mentioned on their calls that they are losing add-on deals and these are peers with probably, presumably a little bit of a lower cost of capital than you guys. At what point in the cycle, do you kind of make the decision that you may look to sell part of the Prime portfolio or the entire portfolio if you decide that you really can't grow accretively?

Douglas Kessler

President

We have been selling assets. We have got two assets for sale right now in the Trust portfolio, or maybe three assets for sale in the Trust portfolio. So we are constantly renewing on our portfolio. So we look at that all the time. You know as far as looking at it in a more larger forms, I would rephrase the question and that I will rephrase your answer in that. We are committed to strong returns in both of these platforms and we will pursue whatever strategies it takes in order to get those strong returns. Now if that involves selling a good number of assets, then that’s what we are going to do. And we are going to be looking at that continuously. So I don’t if we will just reach a point on it. We do think that we have got a good bit of running room left in this cycle. And so there is no reason to do anything to dramatic right now. But we want these platforms to perform well and we are committed to making sure that happens one way or the other. Whether it's selling assets or any other moves we might consider. Trust has been, I believe, the number one performer of all of our REIT peer so far this year. But Prime has not done as well. But we really look at Prime's growth starting from when we raised the capital in Prime which is at $16.50. Looking at its starting price of -- when it was spun out at (indiscernible), so few shares were traded. But we raised significant capital at $16.50. We had a good run up these past couple of months but have pulled back here a little bit. But we are very excited about the platform and think that it's going to do very well.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

And if I could just add a couple of points. Obviously, some groups are selling assets because it's a strategic shift. What we have clearly with the benefit of our multiple platforms is that we have created those shifts already. And the cost of capital with respect to the opportunities are better aligned. Also, we are sitting on a fair amount of capital within both platforms, so the idea of selling assets just to raise capital, to redeploy at a time that it's fairly competitive doesn’t sit strategically well with our seating. We don’t think that’s in the best interest of the shareholders. I think some industry experts are forecasting that the peak transaction period won't even be until sometime in 2018. So our view is that there is plenty of run, room to run in the cycle and that we in many cases would be leaving cash on the table of selling into what we view to still be an industry wide strong RevPAR performance and increased liquidity for hotel transactions. So from that standpoint we view that our current strategy certainly makes sense.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. We will move on to our next question from Ryan Meliker with MLV & Company. Ryan Meliker - MLV & Company: I guess one quick follow up to what Andrew just asked with regard to incentive management fees at AHT. Obviously, you know it had an impact on margins this quarter. Can you tell us how close you guys are to bumping up against that 1% max, Remington. Should we expect incentive fees to be elevated and have this type of impact over the next few quarters, if RevPAR continues to hold up at the current pace?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

We will have to work on that calculation offline. We don’t have it right here with us, Ryan, about how much of that potential has been booked already as far as the Remington incentive fees. Ryan Meliker - MLV & Company: Okay. Well, can you tell us whether we should expect if RevPAR continues at the current pace across Trust's portfolio, whether we should see similar 50 basis point impact to property margins going forward.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

That depends on the that calculation that I just referenced to. So we will have to sit down. But, overall, all the -- I don’t know -- other areas and all areas of Trust are fine and in good shape. So it's just that incentive fee that we will have to take a closer look at to see how much it might impact over the next few quarters. But again, since we don’t give guidance, we will tell you how much has been booked so far, what the potential is and then you can make your estimates about how you think that looked at margins going forward. Ryan Meliker - MLV & Company: Okay. That’s makes sense. And obviously when incentive fees are being booked it's because the properties are doing better than expected. So that’s usually a positive. Second question I have, I was wondering if you could give me a little color on the Chicago Sofitel Water Tower. When you guys announced the deal back in February, you indicated that it was a trailing 6% cap rate and a forward 6.8% cap rate implying that cash flows are actually growing over on an NTM basis. But as we look at year-to-date property EBIT is down 17%, down 10% in the second quarter. You know is this -- it doesn’t sound like this is what you are underwriting initially given you are expecting cash flows to be, or NOI to be growing. What's missing or is this what you were expecting and now are you going to see a pretty sharp uptick over the next couple of quarters?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

We do expect the back half of the year to be stronger then the first half of the year. Both just in general and because of the convention calendar. So that’s happening. When we underwrote this property, we knew that the convention calendar was going to be weak in the first part of the year and this properties own bookings. And so that’s not new. What was new was that winter that just absolutely tore us up there, but that’s in the market. And I think we even lost some share at that property during that period of time. But that was a difference, was that winter. And I would have to sit down and really look at the numbers and maybe the convention calendar was a little weaker than we expected. I am not sure here off hand but it was primarily due to that brutal winter and the fact that we expected the games to be more back-loaded than frontloaded.

Jeremy Welter

Management

Yes, Ryan, this is Jerry. I will just add a little bit. In the second half of the year, there is two more citywides in Chicago. So the group outlook definitely is more favorable for the city. And one of the things that I mentioned in the call, is we have cut a decent amount of cost at the hotel already that will help offset some of the revenue drops. Ryan Meliker - MLV & Company: Were those cost cuts implemented after the end of the second quarter?

Jeremy Welter

Management

They were towards the latter part of the second quarter. It's a process of working with the brand and the management team onsite.

Operator

Operator

Next question will come from Robin Farley with UBS.

Robin Farley - UBS

Analyst · UBS

Just circling back to the incentive fee question, again. I wonder if you could quantify for us, what percent of your properties are incentive fee payers -- were incentive fee payers in Q2 versus the prior year. Just to get a sense of the number of properties that are reaching that threshold.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

That’s hard to give you here right off the top here. So let us give you that offline. All of the Remington properties are subject to incentive fees but they are capped at 1% of gross revenues based upon exceeding budgeted levels, budget GOP levels. The non-Remington managed, the property managed, the brand managed properties, most of them have incentive fees as part of the management contracts, not all of them. And those are based upon a certain owner priority levels that we will just have to spend a little time with you all offline in order to help you with that.

Robin Farley - UBS

Analyst · UBS

Actually I am trying to get a sense, I guess, of whether even if the Remington properties are capped, do the non-Remington properties start to kick in here with RevPAR growing, even though the Remington properties may be capped that you have similar issues at your other owned properties?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Yes. A lot of the ones that have the bigger shares of splits so to speak, above owner's priority, have already kicked in. And specifically for the prime portfolio, five of the -- approximately half of the assets are currently paying incentive fees. They just happened to be a little bit higher incentive than some of the non-Remington hotels we have in the Trust portfolio.

Operator

Operator

Jordan Sadler with KeyBanc Capital Markets has our next question.

Austin Wurschmidt - KeyBanc Capital Markets

Analyst

It's Austin Wurschmidt with Jordan. Doug, I just had one question related to your comment on the Trust portfolio about having to remain very strategic on the acquisition side. I was just curious if you could provide a little color as to what you were referring to?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

I think we were just strategic with respect to both platforms. Nothing specific in that comment. I think the opportunities in the market today are broad based, single assets portfolio opportunities as well. And I think we are just being strategic at both platforms looking at minding the market for situations that fit either platform.

Deric Eubanks

Chief Financial Officer

To add to that a little bit. When we look at opportunities, we share the -- the way we measure accretion is a five-year total shareholder return based upon raising capital and deploying it in that asset we are looking at on a leverage-neutral basis versus not doing anything. And all the total shareholder return is based upon stock price and dividends, higher or lower, to our shareholders. And that is a very strict discipline that we stick to and that’s why our returns are so much higher than our peers. And so we get some questions about, are we going to sell some of the -- [write first] (ph) off our properties from Trust to Prime or would we do this or that. And the answer is, not to be (indiscernible) about it, but the answer truly is, we will conduct some of those transactions when it's accretive to both platforms. And at that time we will bring it to both the Trust forward's and the Prime board that it's in their best interest to do so, as it would be if it's accretive to both platform. So when we are strategic in our pursuits, everything has to pass through that filter. And that’s a discipline we will continue to keep.

Austin Wurschmidt - KeyBanc Capital Markets

Analyst

So then just looking at the opportunities, both on a one-off versus portfolio basis. I mean are you seeing more accretive opportunities, I guess on the larger portfolios or moreover you can go in and mind some of the one offs.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

We have obviously done a couple one-offs. So here in 2014 that’s been on the smaller individual assets. But I don’t know if that’s necessarily a rule. I think that’s just how we happen to go out there and grab a few assets. Answered in another way, is that I think in the future there very well maybe individual asset transactions and our portfolio transactions. So I don’t think that you should assume that it should be one of the other.

Austin Wurschmidt - KeyBanc Capital Markets

Analyst

Thanks for the detail there. And then, Jeremy, you mentioned some renovation disruption in the second quarter, I am just curious, what the expectation is going forward and do you expect that to provide a little bit of a tailwind in the second half of the year. And the similarly, can you provide an update on where you guys are in the process of implementing the revenue management initiatives?

Jeremy Welter

Management

Okay. I am going to take the first part on the renovation. So if you look at the Trust disclosure that we have put out in terms of upcoming renovation schedule. We have about 7 hotels, I think or so in the third quarter, or less renovations and about 5 in the fourth quarter. So on a year-over-year basis the second half has significantly less renovation activity than what we had in 2013. As for Prime, there is really not a lot of renovation going on in that portfolio. So that looks pretty good, especially in the fourth quarter. And then -- what was the second question, I am sorry?

Austin Wurschmidt - KeyBanc Capital Markets

Analyst

Just where you guys are in the process of implementing the revenue management initiatives? I mean are there still initiatives under way? Do you anticipate some additional tailwinds? We have seen now RevPAR sort of accelerate into the first half from the back half of last year and just curious if we should expect that to continue as additional initiatives are put in place.

Jeremy Welter

Management

We think, we know that there is, for the initiatives that, some that have just been put in place and some that have not even been put in place yet. And those initiatives will continue to be put in place through the end of the year and even the first part of next year and then we should be getting some of the benefits from those. So we are optimistic about our revenue performance.

Operator

Operator

Our next question will come from Chris Woronka with Deutsche Bank.

Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

I realize you don’t give guidance but wanted to ask you about the SG&A, more so on the Trust side. And I see we added, I think $1.2 million of spin-off costs back. But is there anything else that is unusual that was kind of running through SG&A or what kind of impact -- what are some of the things that impacted timing on that if you can?

Deric Eubanks

Chief Financial Officer

Sure, Chris. It's Deric. The other thing that I would point out that was in the Trust G&A was the compensation adjustment related to the modified employment terms. There was nothing else that was in there that we adjusted for. But other than that, there is nothing really -- and the transaction cost like you mentioned, there is nothing else that I would point out as different than what we typically have.

Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Okay. On the stock-based comp, is there typically a lot of fluctuation, kind of quarter-to-quarter?

Deric Eubanks

Chief Financial Officer

No, not necessarily. The adjustment that I have mentioned, the compensation adjustment, part of that was in stock comp and then part of that was in the G&A. So the movement in the stock comp amount was partly related to that adjustment.

Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Okay. Got you. And then on the Ashton acquisition, I am guessing it maybe a little bit too small for that too end up in Prime. But is Fremont something that could potentially end up there, either of those?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

This is Monty. No, the Fort Worth asset is not only small but it's in Forth Worth and that’s not in keeping with our Prime strategy. And as far as the Fremont asset, it's not in a gateway market and it's also has a RevPAR that’s too low. So, no, you shouldn’t expect those two to ever go to Prime.

Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Okay. Got you. And then, you mentioned two limited service hotels that were unencumbered with the latest refinancing. Could we read into that those are sales candidates? Is there kind of a direct correlation that we see there?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Yes. Yes. We are marketing those for sale as the Homewood Suites in Mobile and it’s the Hampton Inn in Terre Haute. Those are two assets that are being marketed for sale.

Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Okay. Great. Just one more from me. Just as you think about, we see the two platforms and is there a way, I guess to kind of creatively, could you buy -- could you use more leverage on the Trust side to kind of compete with some of the buyers for these assets and then flip them over to Prime. Is there avenue to do that?

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Yes, there is an avenue to do that. And that’s one of the creative approaches that we are looking at, that Doug's looking at in very detail, let's say. We want to take advantage of these platforms to help them sell and help the sister platforms as long as its neutral or helpful to the first platform. We are never going to do something for the benefit of one if it's at the expense of the other. But if there is an opportunity to help each other, then that's what's going to happen. So considering what's going on in the marketplace where higher leveraged transactions are taking place and in order to be price competitive you have to have a little higher leverage, it may make sense to, in some form or fashion, warehouse them in the Trust. To perch them in Trust, warehouse them. And then at the appropriate time have them move over to Prime. But we would have to spend some time on that because we want to make sure that the Trust's shareholders, if did that, get a fair shake and get compensated for playing that role. And so as we are evaluating platforms, we are looking at any and all different kinds of ways in order to create value. We are also more open than before over on the Trust side to get into some joint ventures and do a little more creative type things, now that we have spun the Prime platform. So hopefully, we can apply our creativity to this market that we believe both in values and RevPARs is going to continue to improve in the foreseeable future in order to take advantage of those facts to the benefit of our shareholders.

Operator

Operator

Nikhil Bhalla with FBR Capital Markets has our next question.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi. This is [Westin Blomer] asking behalf of Nikhil. Most of my questions have already been answered but I was wondering if you guys could give an update on your stance on the share buybacks. Especially, given AHP's share discount to NAV at this point. Is that something you guys are considering or is it too early in the portfolios lifecycle. Any update on that would be great. Thank you.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Sure. That’s not something we are considering now for Prime. It is early in the lifecycle of Prime. It is trading, we believe, at a material discount net asset value to private market value. But we also have a desire to growth the platform and you don’t grow it by buying back shares. So we (indiscernible) with that for now and have no intention on buying back stock. And I think that generally what you are going to see from us is not buying back stock, hardly at all during, in either platform, during these more robust times in the industry. It's just a better use of capital to go out and buy assets. Where you will see us buying back shares, if we do it, will be during a downturn. Almost exclusively albeit never say never, but that’s generally what you are going to see. So I would be hard pressed to say that you will see us buying back shares in Prime or Trust. As a confidence boost to the marketplace, I went out there personally and bought some shares in Prime and although it's not material in the size of Prime, it's not an immaterial number at all to me personally. So we are going to keep getting on the road with potential investors for Prime and keep selling the story. And we have been getting some great feedback from investors and we are going to keep up those efforts to educate the market on Prime. Something that I think is very important is not only is that Prime structure more highly aligned with management than all the internally managed assets. But in a way it's one of the most purest ways that once can invest in a real estate platform, in that you are investing straight in the assets and they don’t have a management team that maybe embarking on other initiatives. So we think it's a great structure and a great platform and we think over time the returns will prove that out.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) We will move on to Patrick Scholes with Suntrust Research.

Patrick Scholes - Suntrust Robinson Humphrey

Analyst

Just a quick question here for you. Curious as to your appetite for taking [lengthy] (ph) turnaround projects given where you think we are at this juncture of this cycle. Thanks.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Sure. We will take on some turnaround projects. We think that we have got multiple years left in this cycle. So unless it's a new development which we typically don’t like to get involved in, a turnaround where you spend a year, a year and a half, in getting repositioning and then getting the benefit of the run up, we still think we have plenty of time for that. So we are definitely not counting those out at all in these platforms.

Operator

Operator

And those are all the questions we have at this time. I will turn the conference back over to management for any additional or closing remarks.

Monty Bennett

Chairman

Thank you all for your participation today and we look forward to speaking with you again on our next call.