Summit Hotel Properties (NYSE:INN) released first-quarter financial results and hosted an earnings call on Friday. Read the complete transcript below.
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Summary
Summit Hotel Properties reported a 0.2% year-over-year increase in RevPAR for Q1 2026, driven by a 5.6% increase in average rates, particularly in March.
The company successfully closed the sale of a Hilton Garden Inn and is in the process of selling two more hotels, aligning with its strategy to recycle capital from lower-growth assets.
Summit Hotel Properties raised its full-year guidance for key operating and financial metrics, reflecting an improved outlook driven by strong demand trends expected to continue into the second quarter.
Operational highlights include strong performance in urban markets like San Francisco and Miami, with significant RevPAR growth driven by high-impact events.
Management remains focused on optimizing profitability, prudent capital allocation, and maintaining a strong balance sheet, with no debt maturities until 2028.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Summit Hotel Properties first quarter 2026 conference call. At this time all participants are in a listen only mode. After the speaker’s presentation there will be a question and answer session and to ask a question during the session you would need to press Star 11 on your telephone and you will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised and to withdraw your question please press star 11 again. Please be advised that today’s conference is being recorded. I would like now to turn the conference over to Kevin Mellotta. Please go ahead.
Kevin Mellotta
Thank you operator and good morning. I am joined today by Summit Hotel Properties President and Chief Executive Officer John Stanner and Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Trey Conklin. Please note that many of our comments today are considered forward looking statements as defined by federal securities laws. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties both known and unknown as described in our SEC filings. Forward looking statements that we make today are effective only as of today May 1, 2026 and we undertake no duty to update them later. You can find copies of our SEC filings inearnings release which contain reconciliations to non-GAAP financial measures referenced on this call on our website at www.shpreit.com. Please welcome Summit Hotel Properties President and Chief Executive Officer John Stanner. Thank you Kevin and good morning everyone. Thank you for joining us today for our first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. We are pleased with our first quarter financial results which were driven by a meaningful sequential improvement in operating fundamentals throughout the quarter. RevPAR in our pro forma portfolio inflected positive in the first quarter, increasing 20 basis points year over year which exceeded expectations communicated during our fourth quarter 2025 earnings call by over 200 basis points. Importantly, operating strength was broad based across the portfolio, particularly in March with growth in multiple high rated demand segments driving increases in average rates and RevPars. In many of our markets, operating fundamentals improved each month as the quarter progressed. While RevPAR declined in January and February, those declines were more than offset by 4.1% RevPAR growth in March which was driven by a robust 5.6% increase in average rate. We were especially encouraged with March results which represented a relatively clean calendar comparison for our portfolio despite the lingering government shutdown and highly publicized TSA wait times. We believe March trends are more indicative of the underlying demand strength in our business and have been pleased to see these trends continue in April. While demand strength and pricing power were broad based across our portfolio, our best performing demand segments were our highest rated segments which allowed us to yield out a portion of lower rated business in a reversal of the prevailing pricing trends we experienced for most of last year. In particular, the ongoing recovery in business transient travel is driving better midweek performance as RevPAR growth increased 3% for the quarter and 10% in March in our negotiated segment. This helped drive double digit RevPAR growth in a dozen of our markets in March, including urban centric markets such as Baltimore, Charlotte, Cleveland, Miami, Pittsburgh, San Francisco and Washington dc. As a reminder, we expected our first quarter to be the most challenging of the year given multiple headwinds faced in our portfolio, notably a difficult super bowl comparison in New Orleans where we own six hotels and continued weakness in government demand with Doge related travel cuts not lapping year over year comparisons until the March April timeframe. In addition, disruption related to winter Storm Fern and civil unrest in Minneapolis further reduced first quarter reported RevPAR growth. In total, these events created an approximately 140 basis point headwind to our first quarter RevPAR growth, most significantly in January and February. Our outlook for the remainder of the year has improved driven by strengthening demand trends that have persisted into the second quarter. We are also approaching what is expected to be a robust summer of special events driven demand. We expect April RevPAR to increase approximately 3.5% and our second quarter revenue pace is currently trending approximately 4% ahead of the same time last year. Pace trends in June are particularly strong supported by a favorable event calendar highlighted by our significant exposure to major demand catalysts including the 2026 FIFA World cup where we have exposure to six US host markets representing approximately 1/3 of our total room count and 44 scheduled matches. In addition, we expect strong incremental demand from the US 250th anniversary celebrations in Boston, Washington D.C. and Baltimore as well as several other major summer travel and event driven demand drivers. As we’ve discussed on previous calls, government and government related demand has been a significant headwind for our portfolio since the creation of DOGE in the first quarter of last year and the lapping of these comparisons is expected to improve our year over year growth rates going forward. While first quarter government related demand declined 12% year over year, this represented a meaningful improvement from the 20% plus declines we experienced through most of 2025. Encouragingly, March government revenue increased approximately 3% and our outlook for this demand segment has improved, demonstrated by second quarter government pace currently trending up mid single digits. Government demand represents approximately 5% to 7% of our total guest room and revenue mix and we believe this could serve as a potential modest tailwind to our year over year growth rates in the last three quarters of the year. Given our strong first quarter results and our improved outlook for the remainder of the year, we’ve increased the guidance ranges for our key operating and financial metrics which were outlined in our earnings release yesterday. Trey will provide more details on our updated guidance ranges later in the call, but we believe the revised ranges strike the appropriate balance of reflecting a more positive outlook and while acknowledging that our most meaningful quarters are still ahead and macro and geopolitical uncertainty persists while near term performance trends are driving our improved outlook. Longer term lodging fundamentals suggest an improved demand environment has the potential to create an extended period of attractive top line growth. More specifically, supply growth remains meaningfully below historical averages and still elevated construction and financing costs create an impediment to a meaningful near term recovery. Acceleration in construction starts. In addition, consumer prioritization of travel and experiences remains paramount which has driven resilient leisure demand finally, improved industry demand has increasingly been driven by the ongoing recovery and acceleration of business travel which uniquely benefits our urban centric portfolio. We believe these dynamics create a favorable operating environment as as we move through the balance of 2026 and beyond from a capital allocation standpoint in the first quarter we successfully closed on the previously announced sale of the 122 room Hilton Garden Inn in Longview, Texas, a non core asset owned in our joint venture with GIC. The hotel was sold for $12.3 million representing a 6.8% capitalization rate based on trailing twelve month net operating income. After consideration of foregone near term capital expenditures. In April we entered into an agreement to sell our wholly owned courtyard and residence in Dallas Arlington South Hotels for a combined sale price of $19 million. The two hotels total 199 guest rooms and the transaction reflects a 5% capitalization rate based on trailing 12 month NOI. After factoring in near term capital expenditures that we would otherwise have been required to, we expect the Arlington transaction to close in the third quarter which will allow us to capture the demand generated from the FIFA matches in the market. These dispositions are consistent with our ongoing strategy to selectively recycle capital out of lower growth assets, reduce future capital requirements, enhance the overall quality and growth profile of our portfolio. Proceeds from asset sales support our broader capital allocation priorities including enhancing liquidity, reducing leverage, repurchasing shares and maintaining the physical condition of our portfolio. During the first quarter we remained active under our share repurchase program, repurchasing 1.4 million common shares for an aggregate purchase price of $6 million or a weighted average price of approximately $4.17 per share. As of March 31, 2026, we had approximately $29 million of remaining capacity under the program. Since launching the program in 2025, we’ve repurchased approximately 5 million shares, representing roughly 4% of total shares outstanding at an average price of $4.26 per share. We believe these repurchases represent an attractive use of capital and reflect our continued confidence in the intrinsic value of the portfolio and the long term earnings power of the business. In summary, we’re encouraged by the start to the year and remain optimistic about the improved outlook for our industry broadly and our company specifically. While the operating environment remains dynamic, the breadth of demand improvement we are seeing across the portfolio combined with favorable industry supply conditions reinforces our confidence in Summit’s ability to outperform its fundamentals Strengthen Our priorities are unchanged. We remain intensely focused on optimizing profitability at the property …
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