Earnings Call Transcript - PEB 2026-10-30

Operator

The Pebble Brook Hotel Trust Third Quarter Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone requires operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Raymond Martz, Co-President and Chief Financial Officer. Thank you. You may begin.

Raymond Martz, CFO

Thank you, Donna, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter 2026 earnings call. Joining me today are John Bortz, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Tom Fisher, our Co-President and Chief Investment Officer. Before we begin, I'd like to remind everyone today that our remarks are as of October 30, 2026, and today's comments may include forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Please refer to our SDC filings for a detailed discussion of these risk factors, and visit our website for reconciliations of any non-GAAP financial measures mentioned today. Now, let's get into the quarter. We're pleased to report that for the third consecutive quarter, our results far exceeded the high end of our outlook across every major earnings and operating measure. Same property hotel EBITDA increased 15.1% to $115.2 million, $10.7 million above the high end. Adjusted EBITDA was $107.9 million, $11.4 million above the high end, and adjusted FFO per diluted share was $0.63, or $0.11 above the top end of our outlook. Beyond the headline beat, the strength was broad-based across the portfolio. ADR increases drove the bulk of our room revenue growth, and resorts generated strong out-of-room spending, and our hotel operating teams converted a substantial portion of those revenue gains into profit. Stained property rep art grew a robust 8.3%, driven by a strong 7% increase in ADR, and suddenly more than a 1% growth in occupied room nights. This is an important shift from earlier in the recovery, when filling rooms did most of We're achieving higher rates while still growing occupancy, and our business and leisure customers continue to spend while on property. Significantly higher transient revenue drove much of this quarter's improvement. Transient ADR increased 8.5%, producing a very strong 9.1% growth in transient room revenues. Corporate transient ADR increased 9.4%. Room nights also increased significantly in our higher-priced consortia channel, while certain discount channels declined. Overall, that means we had a stronger customer mix, not just higher prices in the same business. Group room nights also grew over 3%, while group ADR increased 1.2%. The monthly trend was encouraging as well. Same property Ruppar grew 10.1% in July and 5.3% in August, before rebounding to 9.4% in September. Importantly, the strength continued beyond the early summer events. Based on our estimates, one-time events accounted for only about 40 basis points of Q3 Ruppar growth. Now, let me break down the portfolio performance, starting with the resorts. Resort rep par increased 8.4%, while total rep par at our resorts grew 9.2%. Food and beverage revenue climbed 11.2%, reflecting very strong outlet, banquet, and catering demand. Eight of our 13 resorts generated hotel EBITDA growth of 20% or more, and our resort EBITDA margins expanded 250 basis points to 32.6%. Altogether, our resorts contributed $8.2 million of the $15.2 million increase in same property, hotel EBITDA. These results demonstrate the continuing payoff from our strategic redevelopment investments. Newport Harbor Island is a terrific example of this. Repar increased more than 14% in Q3, driven by an ADR increase of almost 20%. Total Repar grew even faster, and hotel EBITDA increased by more than $2 million, or 19%. We didn't transform Newport simply to sell more room nights. We set out to create a higher-quality resort that attracts guests willing to pay more and spend more throughout the resort. That strategy is working at Newport, and we're seeing similar success elsewhere in the portfolio. La Bears, Del Mar, Paradise Point Resort and Spa, and Estancia La Jolla also delivered significant improvements in profitability this quarter. Turning to our urban markets, Repar grew 8.3%, generating almost 7 million of incremental hotel EBITDA versus last year. The largest positive contributors came from San Francisco, Boston, and Los Angeles, together adding 8.5 million of hotel EBITDA compared with last year. Those gains were probably offset by weaker results in downtown San Diego, which I'll come back to shortly. San Francisco's strong recovery gained further momentum. Repar increased 14.5% in Q3, and Hotel EBITDA improved $3 million. At one hotel San Francisco alone, Repar rose 21%, adding more than $1 million of EBITDA. Based on our current full-year forecast, our San Francisco hotel EBITDA is on pace to grow a massive 65% in 2026, following a 59% increase last year. Even with that growth, year-end EBITDA will remain roughly $25 million below its pre-pandemic level, leaving substantial room for further recovery. Boston was another major contributor, adding $2.7 million of incremental hotel EBITDA, supported by 10.6% REPPAR growth. All five of our Boston hotels improved REPPAR despite a softer convention calendar. The Liberty, W. Boston, and Weston Copley each posted double-digit REPPAR gains, showing the strength with broad base. Los Angeles Repar increased 10.7%, and Hotel EBITDA climbed 2.8 million, or 60%. Our full-year forecast still leaves our LA Hotel EBITDA more than $23 million below its prior peak. But with a favorable lineup of major events in 2027 and 2028, we see a meaningful runway in LA for continued earnings recovery. San Diego had two very different stories. Our four resorts were exceptional, with Repar increasing 14% and Hotel EBITDA growing $4.5 million. Downtown San Diego was a different story. Repar declined 4.5% and Hotel EBITDA fell $1.6 million. The soft convention calendar, especially in September, was the primary headwind for downtown, not a broader market concern. With a much stronger citywide calendar expected in 2027, we anticipated a significant rebound in downtown San Diego. To put that opportunity in perspective, on a comparable basis, our resorts generated $16.8 million more hotel EBITDA in this year's third quarter than in Q3 2019. Our urban hotels, meanwhile, were still $21.8 million below their 2019 third quarter level. That contrast captures our investment thesis rather well. We've created substantial resort value in large part through our redevelopment projects, and there remains meaningful earnings recovery potential across our very well-positioned urban portfolio. Across the portfolio, strong revenue growth translates into an even stronger profitability result. Our teams converted 58% of the $26 million increase in same property total revenues into $15.2 million of incremental hotel EBITDA. Total expenses increased just 4% compared with almost 7% revenue growth, and hotel EBITDA margins expanded 205 basis points to 28.8%. That reflects tremendous disciplined execution by our operating teams and asset managers. We also benefited from lower fixed costs, which are worth separating from day-to-day operating productivity. Property taxes declined by approximately $1 million, reflecting a property tax credit and lower property taxes in San Diego. Property insurance costs were $1.6 million lower, and the lower property insurance premium run rate should also benefit in 2027. We also have a large number of property tax appeals outstanding, which we expect will generate additional savings, although the timing and magnitude are difficult to predict. Those fixed cost savings help drive this quarter's 58% flow through, but we wouldn't expect that run rate every quarter. The more important point is that our underlying operating efficiencies are consistently improving results. And year-to-date, results have reinforced that point. Through September, same property revenues increased 7.1%, hotel EBITDA rose 14.7%, and margins expanded almost 190 basis points. We have increased margins each of the first three quarters. At the corporate level, adjusted EBITDA increased 8.7% in Q3, and adjusted FFO grew 18.9%. Adjusted FFO per diluted share increased 23.5%, benefiting from both stronger earnings and a reduced share count. Our free cash flow increased more than 24% to $55.6 million in Q3 and even more on a per share basis. Through September, free cash flow reached $143 million, 45% above last year, and that's after capital investments and common dividends. That growing cash generation gives us more flexibility to strengthen our balance sheet and allocate capital opportunistically. We invested $14.8 million in the quarter during Q3 and lowered our full-year capital investment outlook by $5 million to a range of $60 to $70 million. The reduction primarily reflects timing. And we also continued to refine the portfolio through selective property sales. Earlier this month, after quarter end, we completed the sale of the Hotel Zags in Portland for $10 million. The hotel generated $600,000 of negative EBITDA over the preceding 12 months, so the sale improves our ongoing earnings profile while also generating cash for reappointment. We also recorded $77.3 million of non-cash impairment charges related to the sale of hotel Zags and updated valuations for several other properties. These adjustments reflect our ongoing review of potential dispositions as we work to optimize the portfolio and create value for shareholders. Over the past year, we've sold nearly 170 million of hotels at an aggregate 17.4 times trailing EBITDA multiple and a 3.9% NOI cap rate. These transactions provide meaningful pre-market valuation benchmarks, and each hotel was sold within our NAV ranges at the time. We also increased our estimated NAV by $1 per share from last quarter to a range of $23.50 to $27.50 per share. The updated NAV reflects improved operating performance of our properties, the current transaction market, and the benefit of our common and preferred share of buybacks. Speaking of buybacks, during Q3, we repurchased approximately $1.2 million of common shares at an attractive price of $18.12 per share, and deployed $7.2 million to retire preferred shares at an average 23% discount for liquidation preference. Our goal is to grow value per share, not simply to buyback securities. And our balance sheet continues to strengthen. Net debt, the trail of 12-month corporate EBITDA fell to 5.1 times from 5.9 times at year-end. We finished September with $298 million of cash and restricted cash, $641 million of revolver availability, and another $90 million of undrawn term loan capacity. The remaining $350 million of convertible notes due in December are fully funded by existing resources and expected cash flow. After that, we have no other debt maturities into the 2028. But stepping back, Q3 demonstrated how our strategies reinforce and build on each other. Our previous major strategic redevelopment investments are helping to drive pricing increases and higher on-property spending. Our operating initiatives are converting more of that revenue into profit, while lower capital requirements are lifting free cash flow. And with the meaningful urban recovery still ahead, we see a compelling path to even stronger FFO and free cash flow growth. And with that, I'll turn it back over to John to discuss the industry backdrop, our updated outlook for 2026, and the opportunities ahead in 2027. John? Thanks, Ray.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Since Ray covered our third quarter performance in detail, I want to step back and talk about what we're seeing across the industry. Why the strength is building and what that could mean for Pebble Brook in 2027 and beyond. As a reminder, the industry setup was very favorable for Q3. A better holiday calendar, an active major events calendar, and the ongoing reconnection between GDP growth and industry demand growth, they all delivered again in the third quarter, just as they did in the second. Going into the third quarter, our concerns continue to revolve around the potential for geopolitical or policy events that could negatively impact the economy and travel. Fortunately, the conflict in the Middle East and constantly changing trade policies don't seem to have negatively impacted the economy or U.S. travel so far this year. As a result, industry demand growth improved sequentially in the quarter as the economy accelerated, seemingly unaffected by global and geopolitical uncertainty. With little new supply being added, occupancies also rose sequentially. We experienced more compression days. There was less price sensitivity by higher-end customers in particular. Pricing confidence improved and led to better segmentation, less discounting, and fewer promotions. As a result, ADR growth accelerated in the summer, with the industry averaging 4.3%, while we achieved 7% from July through September. We were pleasantly surprised and encouraged by this recent acceleration in demand and pricing. All of the major hotel demand segments were humming throughout the quarter, urban transit and weekdays and weekends alike. Only international inbound failed to improve. From Pebblebrock, we saw the same benefits as the industry did in Q3 and more, despite Light, softer, convention calendars in several of our major markets. During the third quarter, in the quarter, for the quarter, pickup was exceeding last year by $10.5 million. This is an acceleration, and in the year for the year, pickup in Q3, increased by $15.3 million, leading to the large inclusive side. We haven't seen any increase in group cancellations or attrition, and attendance levels for group meetings have Have been more predictable than last year. We continue to watch for signs of weakening, but pickup remains favorable across the month, quarter, full year, and into 2020. Business investment and consumer, and continues to be employed, is in very good financial condition, is benefiting from substantial increases in wealth, and continues to prioritize experiences, including travel. Hebelbrook's concentration in upper upscale and luxury hotels continues to spread. Very positive and visible factors driving demand growth, and with little new supply throughout the year, continuing through the rest of this year and next year. Potential negative impacts from the protracted and widening policy changes and geopolitical instability, the potential The potential impact of rising interest rates and the possibility of another government shutdown following the elections. Given the strong operating performance, and with October continuing that trend, we've increased our U.S. industry repart growth outlook by 175 basis points at the midpoint to a range of 5.5 to 6. As we look beyond this year, we continue to believe we're at the beginning of a very strong multi-year upcycle for the hotel industry. I think we can now confidently forecast that the new supply pipeline is significantly constrained and should remain so through the rest of this decade. Demand growth is supported by the major multi-year capital related to both AI and reshoring of manufacturing that has just begun, and we expect the creation and build-out of the robotics industry will We will provide an increasingly significant lift to business investment over the next decade, which supports demand growth even further into the future. We also expect large and growing benefits from the massive wealth that has been created over the last 15 years for both investors and employees, and from the largest transfer of wealth in global history as the baby boomers begin to pass on the wealth they've amassed. We believe the prospects for healthy multi-year demand growth have never been stronger or have supply growth been so limited at the same time. The median turn setup is very good, just like this year's setup was a lot of things as they did last year. Before turning to Q4, let me explain why we're increasingly constructive about 2027, even with this year's strong results. While some industry rep are concerned about difficult comparisons, our constructive view rests on powerful fundamentals and cyclical trends and their benefits, including demand growth continuing to outpace very little new supply, which creates an improving overall pricing. As I just mentioned, we expect the economy to remain strong and potentially accelerate as business capital investments ramp further next year, and corporate profit growth remains above historical levels. We believe the wealth effect will increasingly boost spending and travel, particularly for the affluent customer who continues to favor experiences. And our portfolio is built, and while we have a strong, it's pretty much just as big, and even though the industry benefited meaningfully in June and early July from World Cup, and to a lesser extent, American 250, we expect overall demand to materially outpace supply next year, creating more compression, more than offset the loss of this year's, because I don't think investors and prognosticators, and they certainly haven't been very good at forecasting it. Behavior with growing demand and limited new supply demonstrate how pricing can accelerate through the favorable part of the industry cycle. We started to see it in Q2, and it has continued in Q3 demand growth. ADR increased by a compounded annual growth rate of four DPI's compounded growth rate of just one point. When occupancies rise, you get more sold out or high occupancy nights, which which leads to higher average price gives operators and revenue managers the confidence to raise posted rates, shift business away from lower price channels, reduce discounting, and run fewer less aggressive promoted annual growth rate in prices higher than inflation. High inflation during the pandemic, and we believe the next few years offer the industry an opportunity to catch up through more rapid and significant price growth. We've started to see this price growth accelerate as this year has progressed, and we expect it to continue next year and over the next few years, barring a negative event that substantially impacts the economy and travel. For Pebble Brook in 2027, there's more drivers of upside. We expect our urban market recovery, led by San Francisco and Los Angeles, to keep rolling, with more favorable convention calendars in San Diego, Boston, and Washington, D.C., which are expected to significantly improve the performance of those markets next year. And importantly, the World Cup only provided a modest benefit to our revenue and EBITDA growth, so we won't face the same event-related headwinds as the industry. Significant events next year, including the Super Bowl moving from San Francisco to Los Angeles, NCAA men's basketball regional finals in L.A., the NFL draft in Washington, D.C., 50th anniversary celebration in L.A., the Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Chicago, the WNBA All-Star Game in San Francisco, and a significant amount of pre-Olympic travel into L.A. We should also see further upside from our redeveloped properties, including La Playa and Naples, as they ramp further and gain additional share. And finally, our resorts should continue to benefit from the strong economy and growing wealth of the higher-end consumer. In San Francisco next year, we still expect strong REVPAR growth in the city as conventions continue to return and corporate transient travel continues to increase significantly and does so at higher rates as corporate growth in San Francisco continues to boom. We also expect leisure travel to see further increases as the general impression has turned positive over the last year. Our broader industry is currently ahead by almost 5%. Q1 will be our most challenging with soft convention calendars in San Diego and Washington, D.C., the Super Bowl in L.A. versus San Francisco, and a big citywide in San Francisco shifting back from Q1 into Q2 next year. Our Q1 revenue pace is currently negative, but it's up 8% or more in each of quarters 2, 3, and 4. But turning back to 2026, Q4 is off to a great pace. We're proving to be stronger than we expected and healthy ADR improvements. As to the upside, as it did in Q3, and we think this indicates that businesses remain confident in their near-term prospects, is also favorable and is ahead of last year by $7.3 million or 6%. Year-over-year revenue growth continues to be led by Transient, represents more than half of our Q4, our hotel EBITDA of $73 to $77 million, adjusted EBITDA of $66 to $70 million, and adjusted FFO per share of 20, raising our full-year outlook by more than the amount of our Q3 At the midpoint, adjusted EBITDA is moving up $16.3 million. $13.4 million of that increase reflects Q3's outperformance versus our prior midpoint, while the remaining $2.9 million comes from our higher expectations for clearly signaling that the positive trends and they've continued beyond September. Same property revenue of $7.6 million. Who would have thunk it? With the midpoint increasing a strong 280 basis points from our last out. The hotel EBITDA growth for the year of 12.9% to 14.1%, with the midpoint at 30. That's up 420. These increases translate into an adjusted FFO at the midpoint. And this year's $1.90 midpoint represents more than a 20% over last year's $1.58. These numbers clearly demonstrate the positive benefits of the operating and financial leverage in our business today. That per share growth is particularly meaningful considering we owned more properties last year and also received $12.7 million of business interruption insurance proceeds that are not recurring. As I indicated earlier, but worth repeating since it's been a long time since we could say this, Current trends remain very favorable, which gives us increased confidence heading into Q4. As we stated last quarter and at the beginning of this year, if geopolitical events, macroeconomic risks, and policy don't get in the way, the very positive fundamental setup for our industry and business should generate attractive results. And that's exactly what's happened so far this year. Our entire team at Pebblebrook is proud of our performance so far this year, and we remain intensely focused on delivering strong results in Q4, 2027, and the years ahead. With that, we now be happy to take your questions. So Donna, please proceed.

Operator

Thank you. The floor is now open for questions. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad at this time. A confirmation tone will indicate that your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up the handset before pressing the star keys. We do ask that you please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. Again, that is star 1 if you would like to register a question at this time. Our first question today is coming from Dwayne Fenningworth of Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

Dwayne Fenningworth, Analyst — Evercore ISI

Hey, thanks, and good morning. Just one for me, I wanted to ask you about investment pacing. Given the higher performance level of your portfolio and the increased comfort you obviously have that close-end demand is going to continue to show up, does it start to influence your thinking about the pacing of reinvestment back into the portfolio? Maybe projects that did not clear your high hurdle rates over the last two years that now look more feasible. Maybe you can just kind of sketch out what the next few years look like. Thank you.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Sure. Thank you, Dwayne. And so, yes, there is some impact on, I would say, small to medium-sized projects within the portfolio that we've deferred because investing capital into our shares was a more attractive way to create value and increase cash flow per share for the shareholders. And I think we'll increasingly look at those types of projects. They're not major projects in terms of redeveloping any of our assets because we've been through that through the portfolio over the last five years, six years in total. But there are projects and potential upside for things like additional alternative accommodation types at Skamania, where, you know, we have nine tree houses and five glamping units and some cabins and villas, but we may accelerate the expansion of the program there. We could build another 150 to 175 units there, and that's not to say that we would do that all at once, but in the past, we've been doing about three or four a year. We may increase that pace, as an example. There's some other projects through the portfolio that we'll be evaluating for next year, and those may provide high enough returns. We're certainly looking at a number of solar projects through the portfolio, particularly as electricity prices and peak electricity prices in particular continue to climb, and as, frankly, climate change has As has been increasing average prices around the United States and the globe, that's resulting in more periods of peak electricity, so-and peak pricing. So those types of projects are certainly-will certainly be moved up on-on our consideration calendar. Thank you, John.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Jamie Feldman of Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

Connor, Analyst — Wells Fargo

Hi, thank you. This is Connor on with Jamie. I appreciate you taking my question. So it looks like the band reaccelerated in September, and October REVPAR, I believe you said, is at least 6% so far. Given this current pace, can you help me understand the 4Q deceleration within Guide and what you're watching for to get to the upper end or the lower end of your REVPAR range?

Jon Bortz, CEO

Sure. So when you think about October, first of all, the one big negative impact For our portfolio compared to the overall industry is that DreamWorks moved from October last year to September this year. So in San Francisco, that brings down our average compared to the industry. And then as we look at November and December, I think our hope we're being conservative. We'll see how it plays out. But compression dates, he's ramped down. I mean, our occupancy, you know, 10 to 12 points from October. October to November as an example, and then another 8 to 10 points into December. And so that just generates, I think, fewer opportunities for pricing increases in the portfolio. And that may turn out to be conservative, but certainly that's the way the compression days change. It's just a smaller percentage overall of compression days in the months of November and December.

Raymond Martz, CFO

And, Jamie, it's all to remember, too, it's seasonality as well. You have less business. You have more business travel in October. That's about half the strength of the entire quarter. When you start getting into the November, mid-November, Thanksgiving, Christmas time, there tends to be, in general, less business travel relative to other quarters and more leisure travel.

Connor, Analyst — Wells Fargo

Thank you. Really appreciate the insight.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Rich Hightower of Barclays. Please go ahead.

Rick Hightower, Analyst — Barclays

Hey, good morning, guys. John, I just want to remark, I don't know that I've heard you sound this positive on a call in a long time of us doing these calls, so just to point that out, but let me ask you this, you know, given your kind of renewed forward view as you made some comments on 27 and even beyond, and I still appreciate the fact that, you know, Pebblebrook is trading below its stated NAV, but at what point do you think it's time to To start growing the portfolio again with acquisitions, you know, kind of given, you know, your kind of capital availability in whatever source and at different costs. How do you think about that at this point?

Jon Bortz, CEO

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, we've, by the way, thanks for the positive comment about my positivity. It has been a long time. I mean, we haven't really had a good growth year in the industry since 2016, and so, you know, 17 through 19 were the back half of last cycle, and fairly typical. Then we hit the pandemic and all the noise that surrounded that and the recovery. So we are enjoying our first good year in 10, which we hope we get back to a more normal cycle here. And certainly we think the up part of that cycle has an opportunity to be normal or, frankly, better than normal in terms of an up cycle. I think in terms of how we allocate capital, you know, we've always been opportunistic about the way we allocate it. It's not about growing the company. It's about increasing value for the shareholder, increasing cash flow per share. That's always been the focus. So if the opportunity, the best opportunity is to buy assets in terms of use of our capital, whether it be assets that we, you know, presumably we can add value to or in markets where we think the risk return is more attractive, I mean, we will pivot to do that, and we've done that in the past, obviously. So it doesn't mean we might not continue to prune the portfolio and move out of markets where we think the risk returns aren't attractive enough, but in terms of where we invest the capital, you know, that we're certainly going to be flexible in terms of where are the best opportunities.

Rick Hightower, Analyst — Barclays

Okay, that's great. I guess just to follow up on the capital side, maybe from a modeling perspective, as I think about free cash flow and the dividend, you know, is there anything that's going to change with dividend policy, anything on sort of the burn off of previous NOLs that would sort of change the way you guys, you know, the magnitude and the cadence of the dividend going forward?

Raymond Martz, CFO

No question. Currently, right now, we have flexibility because of the net operating losses that we've built up a lot, as you know, through the pandemic and some through some sales we've had. But right now, there's no immediate need in 2027 to have to increase the dividend for tax purposes. Now, that's also a caveat that was it depends what assets we sell. We do have a number of assets in our portfolio that would generate significant taxable gains, which could use it up. But right now, in terms of the flexibility of free cash flow, I would not necessarily expect, again, it's a board decision, but that we would need to reinstitute a dividend in 2027, and that allows us to retain more free cash flow for either buybacks or acquisitions or other sources, depending on what the opportunistic use of capital is best at the time.

Jon Bortz, CEO

And, Rich, the one thing I'd add is I think that, you know, our view, and it's consistent with the feedback we've gotten from our shareholders, is having the flexibility to use that capital the best way we can to create value and improve cash flow per share is preferred on the part of our shareholders. And we think it's the right approach, obviously. Now, that could change. Our view could change. Their view could change. But that's where we see it right now.

Rick Hightower, Analyst — Barclays

Okay. It makes sense. Thanks.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Smeeds Rose of Citi. Please go ahead.

Smeeds Rose, Analyst — Citi

Hi. Thanks. Appreciate all your opening remarks, John. And I wanted to ask maybe on the cost environment, kind of how you're thinking about the pacing of wages and benefits at the property level, And just kind of, in general, the availability of labor across the portfolio.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Sure. So I think from a cost perspective, we feel like it's, in general, pretty well controlled. The labor side, we're not having particular difficulty finding labor, turnovers down through the portfolio. Wages, as they did pre-pandemic throughout my whole career, they do continue to pace above inflation. They're running about 4%, yet we've managed to continue to improve productivity in the portfolio, and we have a lot of initiatives with intense focus on how do we do things more efficiently, How do we use new technologies? How do we both lower costs at the same time that we improve service? And we're finding a lot of technologies that allow us to do that. The other thing I would say is I think what's fascinating about AI is, you know, we spent the last few years getting our data through our portfolio in a form that could be easily mined and utilized. And what we're finding is the ability to go through that data in detail and compare property to property, market to market, operator to operator, brand to brand, get into a level of detail of each line item of operating cost is something we were never really able to And what that mining of data has done is it highlights areas where there's opportunity that we've been able, in many cases, to move forward and implement and thereby reduce costs. And we expect that to continue with the use of AI corporately. And then, over time, as technology and robotics property level, we think we'll see more and more advantage at the property level as well.

Raymond Martz, CFO

Yeah, to me, just to put a finer point of that, as we look at our FTEs this year versus, you know, last year, even with the occupancy increase, our FTEs remains about constant. So if you look, if we lose the same operating model we had last year, that would have meant we would have had 12 more FTEs across our portfolio this year versus last year. But through those efficiencies, between technology, between our asset managers, really getting into detail with each of our properties or hotel teams, finding efficiencies and using things like AI to identify where do we reduce overtime, how do we do scheduling better. There's a lot of these things that we're just on the cutting edge of right now, but we expect to make more and more progress as we go forward.

Smeeds Rose, Analyst — Citi

Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Ari Klein of BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Ari Klein, Analyst — BMO Capital Markets

Thanks, and good morning. Just on pricing power, it kind of feels like a switch was flipped there. Can you talk about the strategy on that front, what you're seeing, because previously you had a little more of an occupancy-focused strategy. And I think you also mentioned less price sensitivity at the high end and less discounting. I hope you can elaborate somewhat on that. Thank you.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Yeah, so I think on the first part of your question, I don't know if it was a switch flip, but it certainly happened faster than we thought. But we just started to see a lot more compression midweek from material increases in corporate travel. As you know, and have seen with the third quarter GDP, the preliminary GDP report that came out, the economy accelerated in the third quarter, and we saw the same thing with travel, particularly corporate travel, in the third quarter, and that shows up in all of the weekday numbers, and I think what happened as the period went on and people recognized that The short-term demand was so much stronger than what it had been. People started to price more aggressively and then more aggressively on a forward basis. I mean, it's interesting as we track our pickup on a monthly basis, in the month, for the month pickup, up until probably September, the beginning of the month, our average rate would go down from the beginning of the month. the end of the month to the end of the month. And as you go back further into last year, we could go down as much as $15 or $20 in average rate from the beginning to the end when demand was not outpacing supply. As it began to outpace supply, that started to improve. And in September, In October, it actually did flip. It actually went up in September from the beginning to the end of the month. We're seeing that again in October, which is obviously one of the stronger occupancy months of the year for us and the industry. And so I think it just comes from its human behavior, its confidence, corporate travel because of corporate, not restricted. We're getting to a point where we can close out corporate accounts again. Gosh, I haven't said that in a long time. We used to do that. We push our corporate accounts into higher categories. We've certainly, as your customer, leaned back towards suites and demand, it's meant we haven't had to discount as much. We haven't had to push in OTA channels or We've never had that scenario. We've been saying we think we're at the very beginning of this because by human nature, it just takes time not only to see what happens when you do these things. And so it's a learning period of time, and that's going to continue and hopefully accelerate into next year.

Raymond Martz, CFO

And Ari, just to add to that, so John talked about increased confidence. So when you have increased confidence, people in these markets or hotels are able to increase prices more because they feel good. And when you have feeling better, that's because we're having also more compression nights. So for our example, in our portfolio, our compression nights are up about 12% either day from last year. It's predominantly in San Francisco and LA showing the bigger increases, but it's across other markets as well. And as you know, we don't really have many big box hotels. Most of our hotels, particularly in markets like San Francisco, cater to the business transient side. So like we saw last cycle, when those compression nights went up, our properties benefited the most because that's where we play in that space. So that's another reason why we get increasingly confident in the next couple of years as compression nights increase, demand increases, and prices further rise.

Ari Klein, Analyst — BMO Capital Markets

Thanks for all that detail. Ray, just a quick one I had on the impairment charge. I know the Zags is in there. Any other detail you can share about that?

Raymond Martz, CFO

No, just because we historically just don't provide detail because that shows you maybe what properties we're looking to sell. We want to talk about that after it happens. And then if that happens, we're also saying the price. So we like to be just cautious there. But just to provide you the confidence, the reason for that should be we continue to be active looking to sell additional properties. No guarantee we're going to sell, but it's multiple. It's not just the hotel Zags. And as the transaction market continues to improve and the economy improves and results, hopefully that's a better environment going forward for more transactions.

Jon Bortz, CEO

And Ari, for your benefit and others on the call, you know, keeping the names of any other properties that we might be looking to sell or active in the market is not to keep information from you. It's because it has a negative impact on the operations of our properties. The teams can get concerned if they believe a property is being sold. Maybe they lose their jobs. Other properties tend to pick off our better salespeople or our operating people, and a transaction may or may not happen. So we really don't want to create a negative environment down at the property level. It doesn't have anything to do with it.

Ari Klein, Analyst — BMO Capital Markets

Understood. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Gregory Miller of Truist Securities. Please go ahead.

Gregory Miller, Analyst — Truist Securities

Thank you very much, Donna. I thought to ask about the L.A. mayoral race, given tight polls as of late. If the left-leaning candidate wins, would that change your view of your capital allocation in the market, and not just for hotels, but for other real estate asset classes, given you have been very active in the business community in L.A.? Thanks.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Yeah, thanks, Greg. So we don't get a lot of questions about our views on elected races, but I think as it relates to LA, I don't think the mayor is going to change our view on the city. I think the key part of what's happening in LA is we have a community of business and community groups. And keep in mind, you know, one of the candidates is the incumbent mayor. The other was on the city council, but both are responsible for what's been happening in the city. And so in one way, I suppose it's not great choices there, but where we're more focused is on trying to improve the council in LA and in other markets. And I think we're going to have some bringing on more confident, moderate, business-friendly, similar to what we did in San Francisco. In a way, we're more excited about investing in LA than we were 12 months ago because we see the progress being made. We know it's going to take multiple cycles, but the reason the council is more important is it's really the council that legislates. The mayor in LA, and again, I think the general population in a lot of markets don't understand this, the mayor in LA doesn't have a whole lot of power. Most of the power sits with the council. And so the council is where we're focused. It's really not been on the mayoral election. Okay.

Gregory Miller, Analyst — Truist Securities

Thank you very much, John. I appreciate it.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Michael Belisario of Baird. Please go ahead.

Michael Bellisario, Analyst — Baird

Thanks. Good morning, everyone. John, one more on pricing. I think you mentioned 4% compounded growth last cycle, and sort of looking ahead, you see similar potential. Just sort of like your thoughts on the total cost increases to customers versus the last cycle. I mean, it seems like we haven't really had the room's inflation, but we've certainly had it outside the room, higher parking fees, resort amenity fees, et cetera. We'd just like your thoughts sort of on the holistic cost of a room night for a customer, what's left for you to push, and then sort of digging deeper into that, where you see leisure and group trending, which are certainly more price sensitive than BT. Thanks.

Jon Bortz, CEO

So, you know, I wouldn't be focused on the 40 basis point premium over inflation because we are running at a higher inflation rate. And so, I mean, we have this tendency to think about GDP and think, gee, that's what revenue ought to go up. But GDP is net, right, of inflation. So your nominal growth in the economy is running, you know, much closer to 60%. And so, in a way, revenue growth at that level shouldn't be all that surprising. So I think that's where the opportunity is, particularly as we go through more and more periods of time, it continues to get bigger, whereas supply is not getting bigger. So demand's going up, supply is not, more fresh at night. And so, while, yes, we, like a lot of other industries, I would say the hotel industry continues to run at a lower rate of growth in pricing overall. Lodging is a much smaller part of something when you get into business travel because that has a lot more to do with.

Michael Bellisario, Analyst — Baird

Understood. Appreciate the thoughts.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Sean Kelly of Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Sean Kelly, Analyst — Bank of America

Hey, good morning. Thank you, everyone, for taking my question. John Array, it's been a long time since we've been able to talk about this type of environment, but I wanted to return back on the pricing dynamic to the discussion a little bit earlier and just talk about occupancy. John, I know you're a student of all the cycles and you've lived them as well. So just your thoughts on two things. One, where do we sit industry-wide relative to sort of preceding occupancy levels when you had that confidence to push rate? And second of all, could you just walk us through a couple of Pebblebrooks markets, particularly San Francisco, but just remind us of where some of your occupancy levels are, maybe how that's a little different this time around, because I think industry-wide, we're still seeing a couple hundred basis points below where we were in 2019, but we're back to levels that weren't that far away from where we got to. Back in maybe 2007. Thanks.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Yeah, so I think, you know, it's interesting. It's a little like the investment world, thinking about the second derivative of growth. I think pricing confidence doesn't just – pricing confidence is on top of compression. You know, we're not going to have the same level of compression that we were at in 19 or 16 in some of our markets. that peaked in 16, like L.A., for quite a while, right? We're still, you know, somewhere between 700 and 900 basis points, maybe 1,000 basis points below where we were from an overall occupancy, particularly the urban markets. Even the resorts are still running, what, 600 basis points or so below where we got to pre-pandemic. But when you have an environment where demand, where growth in demand is well outpacing supply, that's where the other side of it comes from. That's where you get pricing growth from changing your mix, from doing the kinds of things I mentioned with your corporate accounts, from doing more experimenting with price increases. You shouldn't get hung up, at least in my experience. It's really what's going on in the environment. The other thing is, I mean, the reality is the industry is way behind, and that does motivate owners. Now, you need an environment for it, but I think we have that environment that we would have, again, in a level of occupancy, demand outpacing.

Raymond Martz, CFO

And, Sean, just to provide some numbers there, just as a reference, in 2019, our urban markets, our major urban markets, which we define as Boston, San Fran, San Diego, LA, and D.C., ran about 85% occupancy in 2019, and on a 12-month basis in Q3, we're at 76%, so, you know, about just under 10 points down, which represents a lot of growth. And also recall in 2019, supply growth nationally was, you know, 2% to 3%, and in the urban markets, maybe not San Francisco, but a lot of the urban markets, it was in the 3% to 4% range or higher. So it's a much different dynamic we're heading into, and as I think John mentioned earlier in the call, we're not expecting supply increases for the rest of the decade.

Sean Kelly, Analyst — Bank of America

Thank you both.

Operator

Thank you. The next question is coming from Jay Kornreich of Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

Jay Kornreich, Analyst — Cantor Fitzgerald

Hey, thanks. Good morning. Appreciate all the colors so far. I just wanted to follow up and ask, you know, you had a lot of broad-based demand with, you know, both resort and urban markets performing, you know, extremely well lately. And so as you think about next year, do you expect kind of a similar broad-based demand approach to continue, or do you see demand tailwinds or comps favoring one side of the portfolio over the other?

Jon Bortz, CEO

Yeah, I mean, we do expect it to be broad-based next year. Again, I wouldn't want to assume that international turns around next year. Maybe a couple more years until that happens. Although, again, let's see what happens with the dollar. If the dollar were to weaken, that should help a little bit, at least in terms of international inbound. But I think if the economy continues to hum along, I mean, both the consumer and businesses benefit. And so we would expect, you know, convention calendars can have a positive or a negative impact on a year-to-year basis. But generally, what we're seeing is pretty healthy levels of overall convention business, and the growth is really being driven on an overall basis in the industry from corporate travel, both transit and group meetings. Certainly, getting people back to the office has been a help, and we think that trend will continue. And on the leisure side, everybody's employed. They may not be as well employed as they'd like to be, but as the economy continues to hum, there should be more opportunity there. And the wealth creation thing, it's hard to – it's a big, big factor in broadening and increasing the number of higher-end customers out there. And I would think next year would be very broad, but, again, above.

Jay Kornreich, Analyst — Cantor Fitzgerald

Okay. Appreciate the caller.

Raymond Martz, CFO

Thanks, Jay.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Jamie Feldman of Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

Connor, Analyst — Wells Fargo

Hi. This is Connor with Jamie. Thank you for taking my follow-up. Maybe from a higher level, your commentary paints a pretty positive 2027 setup as long as macro conditions remain supportive. I guess looking past midterms, are there any regulatory or policy changes you're watching And if possible, how could they affect hotel demand or operating costs for your portfolio or the lodging industry more broadly?

Jon Bortz, CEO

Anything that we're really focused, assuming that we get to, I don't think we're going to see what we have right now. I think from an industry perspective, one of the things we've been focused on is trying to eliminate a lot of the fraud and complain to Hilton. And so we're trying to be focused on that. I think it's bipartisan. I think that's what's really important.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Chris Darling of Green Street. Please go ahead.

Chris Darling, Analyst — Green Street

Hey, thanks. Good morning. I'm hoping you could elaborate on any trends in the transaction market since the move up in rates here the last several months. It would be helpful if you could speak to the level of buyer interest, different types of buyers, how that's evolving, and then any impact of pricing that you're seeing and how that may differ depending on the profile of specific Yeah, well, thanks, Chris.

Tom Fisher, Other

Listen, I think as we've talked about all year, the transaction market continues to be constructive, certainly with the backdrop of the improving fundamentals. You know, as we've said all year, capital follows performance. And I think the difference between previous years and this year has been investors can start underwriting growth. And I think you You just look at second quarter results, you look at third quarter results, you know, that I think there's more conviction, and so you're going to continue to see, I think, strong bids for luxury, as you've seen all year, strong bids for resorts, upper upscale properties, and then obviously, you know, yielding assets. I think the pivot that we've seen over the course of the year, given the backdrop in terms of the underwriting of growth, is there's been more of a trend towards what I'll call pro forma or reposition deals or assets that have been maybe, you know, their capital structure is challenged or, you know, they've been starved of capital and there's a reinvestment opportunity or a potential rebranding or taking an independent hotel and putting it within a We've seen more opportunities like that, which I think, again, is kind of a broadening of the investment market from that perspective. As it relates to your question on debt, you know, I would say that overall there's still a lot of debt liquidity. There's a lot of availability out there. It's obviously, they're focused on sponsors, etc. They're focused on debt yield. I think that there's starting to be some chatter as it relates to increasing rates. But I think there's kind of that healthy tension right now between the growth and the operating fundamentals and the elevated financing cost. And I think right now, at least what we're seeing, is if there continues to be the accelerated demand, you know, acceleration in demand and pricing that we've seen, We think that the growth side of that is going to outweigh, and people and investors right now are getting comfortable with the growth prospects and dealing with the increased costs. But I would also say that, you know, lenders have become more competitive, and you're starting to also see a little more spread compression for the right deals. We are also seeing a broadening of the investors. We're seeing more bidders, and I think brokers would tell you that there's more bidders, and they're varied bidders. I mean, certainly on the upper upscale and luxury stuff, you're seeing high net worth. You're seeing family office. You've seen a number of private equity groups get into the business or get back in and put their equity to work. We're seeing owner operators, and we're actually seeing some offshore groups. So everything, there's a lot of momentum, and I feel as if everything's kind of working, but I think there is a watchful eye just in terms of what the Fed does in the future. But the growth, the backdrop of the macro is winning the day today.

Chris Darling, Analyst — Green Street

Understood. Thanks for the detail there. That's it for me.

Operator

Thank you. At this time, I'd like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Bortz for closing comments.

Jon Bortz, CEO

Well, thank you, everybody, for participating today. We appreciate your interest, and we hope you have a great Halloween this weekend, a great New Year, and while I'm sure we'll talk to many of you down in Atlanta next month, in a couple of weeks. If not, have a great New Year, and we'll speak again in February next year.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's event. You may disconnect your lines or log off the webcast at this time and enjoy the rest of your day.