Sun Communities - Q2 2023
July 27, 2023
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Sun Communities' second quarter 2023 earnings conference call. At this time, management would like me to inform you that certain statements made during this call, which are not historical facts, may be deemed forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although the company believes the expectations reflected in any forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, the company can provide no assurance that its expectations will be achieved. Factors and risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations are detailed in yesterday's press release, and from time to time in the company's periodic filings with the SEC. The company undertakes no obligation to advise or update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this release.
Having said that, I would like to introduce management with us today, Gary Shiffman, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, and Fernando Castro-Caratini, Chief Financial Officer. After their remarks, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. For those who would like to participate in the question and answer session, management asks that you limit yourselves to one question, so everyone who would like to participate has ample opportunity. As a reminder, this call is being recorded. I'll now turn the call over to Gary Shiffman, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Shiffman, you may begin.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Good afternoon, and thank you for joining our call to discuss second quarter results and our updated 2023 guidance. We are pleased to share some continued strong operating results. Core FFO per share of $1.96 for the quarter was in line with guidance, supported by strong 6.3% year-over-year growth in Same Property NOI, and 3.4% growth in Recurring EBITDA. Our properties share the compelling fundamentals of resilient demand and low to shrinking supply, which, when combined with the unparalleled customer services our teams deliver, historically generate high, durable cash flow streams throughout economic cycles. Same Property NOI growth in the quarter exceeded the high end of guidance by 150 basis points and was driven by solid revenue growth and the successful implementation of ongoing expense management.
In Manufactured Housing, Same Property NOI grew 5.7% compared to 2022, driven by strong rental rate growth and bolstered by occupancy gains. In RVs, Same Property NOI growth of 3.2% reflected our continued focus on converting transient guests into annual residents, which increases our stream of stable revenue and improves operational efficiencies. At the end of the quarter, Same Property adjusted occupancy for our combined MH and RV locations was 98.7%, a year-over-year increase of 170 basis points, that reflects the resilience of demand for our properties. Additionally, across our total portfolio, we gained over 1,000 new revenue-producing sites during the quarter, which represents 9.4% growth compared to last year and brings total gains for the year to nearly 1,850 sites.
Same property marina NOI grew 11.9% compared to the prior year, exceeding our expectations. The outperformance was fueled by robust demand for wet slips and dry storage from boaters who increasingly discover the convenient, unmatched locations and premium amenities offered throughout our best-in-class network of marinas. On a trailing 12-month basis, our Same Property portfolio generates 91% of total real property NOI and is a powerful engine for EBITDA and cash flow growth. We intend to remain internally focused on optimizing our embedded portfolio growth. By reinvesting in our properties and providing the highest level of customer service, we preserve and increase value for the residents, guests, and members, and help ensure predictable long-term revenue growth. Portfolio optimization includes completing select property expansions and, in the case of marinas, dock reconfigurations to enhance property returns and to scale property operations.
In the second quarter, we delivered over 100 expansion sites across three communities. In May, we published our 2022 ESG report, highlighting our significant achievements, including the expansion of our GHG inventory to cover marinas and the U.K., and our board's commitment to achieving net zero emissions. These other important initiatives reinforce our dedication to being responsible stewards of all resources toward a shared goal of improving the communities in which we live, work, and serve. I would like to thank all Sun team members who have been instrumental in our accomplishments in the first half of the year. As we progress through the second half of 2023, I look forward to realizing even greater achievements that will further enhance Sun's platform and the value we deliver to all of our stakeholders.
I'll now turn the call over to Fernando to discuss our results in more detail. Fernando?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Thank you, Gary. During the second quarter, Core FFO of $1.96 per share was in line with guidance. Real property revenue growth, as well as efficiencies in property and corporate level expenses, drove the quarter's performance, partially offset by higher interest expense. Our Same Property results were solid, as demand for our properties remained strong. Total Same Property NOI grew 6.3% in the quarter as compared to 2022, which outperformed the high end of our guidance by 150 basis points. Total Same Property revenues grew 6.2% and exceeded property operating expense growth of 6%. The lower expense growth was broad-based, with moderate year-over-year growth realized in payroll, utilities, real estate taxes, and other expenses. Same Property Manufactured Housing NOI increased 5.7% during the quarter, exceeding internal expectations.
Outperformance was driven by strong occupancy gains, bolstered by a rental rate increase of 5.7%, and lower than expected expense growth, especially in payroll and benefits. In RV, Same Property NOI for the quarter increased by 3.2%. We achieved strong 8.6% growth in weighted average annual rents over the prior year, and operating expense efficiencies that resulted in modest 4.1% expense growth over the prior year. These partially offset a 6.1% reduction in growth in transient RV revenue. Our RV communities delivered solid results during the July 4th holiday weekend. Same Property RV transient revenue increased by 8.4% compared to 2022, even as we had 5.7% fewer transient sites available. July Fourth fell on a Tuesday this year, whereas last year it fell on a Monday.
Adjusting for just the Friday to Monday period, Same Property RV transient revenue still increased by 2.7%. While we continue to see strong holiday and weekend demand, during midweek periods, transient RV revenue growth continues to moderate from recent record levels. Strategically, we remain focused on increasing our stable annual property revenues through increased transient to annual site conversions. In addition to increasing the percent of revenues derived from annual residents, conversions result in higher NOI margins over time by decreasing the higher level of variable expenses associated with transient guests. During the second quarter, we converted over 750 transient sites across our total RV portfolio, bringing first half conversions to nearly 1,300 sites.
Since the start of 2020, we have converted over 6,000 transient sites to annual, and we intend to continue driving transient to annual site conversions to optimize long-term returns. In the second quarter, marina same property NOI increased 11.9%. This outperformance was driven by a 9.2% increase in revenue from stronger demand overall and lower expense growth of 3.4%, that significantly surpassed our internal expectations for mid-single digit expense growth. Lower expense growth was most significant in marina payroll and benefits, utilities, and supply and repair. In terms of home sales, we were in line with our expectations in North America and are on track to achieve our guidance. Continued demand is demonstrated by an average price for new homes of $210,000 and higher margins.
In the U.K., economic headwinds continue to impact vacation home sales. Home sale NOI margins, while 5.7% below prior year margins, were in line with our expectations. The approximately 840 homes sold in the second quarter were 8% below our expectations. Inflation in the U.K. has remained higher for longer than anticipated, and in late June, the Bank of England implemented an unexpected 50 basis point increase in its base interest rate. We have seen the time home purchasers take to buy a vacation home continue to lengthen, and the margins on those home sales remain under pressure. Our experienced U.K. team continues to successfully navigate this challenging market environment with a focus on optimizing volume and margins while these conditions persist.
On the real property side, we are seeing higher retention rates for park holiday homeowners, which leads to higher average resident tenure approaching eight years. We remain enthusiastic about the growth opportunity in this segment of the business. As of June 30, 2023, our $7.6 billion in debt outstanding or interest at a weighted average rate of 4% and had a weighted average years to maturity of 7.1 years. Our trailing 12-month leverage ratio was 6.2x. Based on our operating cash flow expectations for the remainder of the year and potential capital recycling opportunities, we anticipate deleveraging towards our long-term leverage target.
As detailed in our supplemental, we are revising our full year guidance range for Core FFO per share downward by 2.2% to a revised range of $7.09-$7.23, and established guidance for the third quarter. Our revised guidance is primarily reflective of lower expected home sales in the U.K. and higher interest expense expected in the second half of the year, predominantly from the flexible variable rate sterling-denominated debt that funded our U.K. business. Since our last guidance update in April, short-term interest rates have increased meaningfully. We are evaluating opportunities to refinance and pay down floating rate debt over the second half of the year. We expect continued strong Same Property performance and are increasing our total Same Property NOI growth for the year to a range of 5.3%-6.1%.
The 20 basis point increase at the midpoint is driven by outperformance in Manufactured Housing and Marinas, moderated by revised expectations for same property RV. We also expect additional G&A savings over the second half of the year. Our revised Same Property NOI growth ranges for the year are 5.2%-5.8% for Manufactured Housing, representing a 50 basis point increase at the midpoint. 3.4%-4.6% for RV, representing a 100 basis point decrease at the midpoint. The largest driver for the decrease is revised growth expectations for transient RV revenue, which is now forecasted to be a 3.9% decline for the full year. 8%-9% for Marina, representing a 110 basis point increase at the midpoint.
For our U.K. operations, we're lowering our full year forecast for home sales NOI to a range of $65.7 million-$75.4 million. The revised range represents a $10.2 million decrease to prior guidance at the midpoint, and assumes we sell between 2,800-2,900 homes for the full year, an approximate 11% decrease in volume from April expectations. For additional details regarding our updated full year guidance, please see our supplemental disclosures. As a reminder, our guidance includes acquisitions and dispositions and capital markets activity through July 26th, and the effect of a property disposition under contract that is expected to close during the third quarter. Our guidance does not include the impact of prospective acquisitions, dispositions, or capital markets activities, which may be included in research analyst estimates. This concludes our prepared remarks.
We will now open the call up for questions. Operator?
Operator (participant)
We will now open the call for questions. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing these star keys. Again, we ask all participants in the queue to please limit yourself to only one question to allow others to participate. One moment please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from the line of Josh Dennerlein with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.
Josh Dennerlein (Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Yeah. Hey, guys, thanks for the time. I guess this is the second time in a row you've taken down U.K. home sale profits, and I think the, the volumes as well. What, what's to say this is the bottom? Can you kind of walk us through how you forecast or come up with that guidance range for the home sales and the profit?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Sure, Josh, thanks. you know, to really look at how we're thinking about the fact that we've had to re-guide before on the U.K., I'd underscore that the home sales forecasts are built really from the bottom up at the community level, taking into account all available sites to sell home, homes on, which include vacant sites, sites to be delivered from expansion activity and rental home higher fleet, sites that we can convert to be able to sell homes and create an annual fee on. This exercise is completed with a lot of oversight, but built up from the property level. Our revised range really incorporates current market conditions as we understand them.
It doesn't assume any major decline in inflation or interest rates in the U.K. for the remainder of the year. We think even if we were to see them, the lag between those changes and improvements wouldn't impact results for the balance of this year. Certainly, they would into 2024. The high end of our range currently indicates what we believe is the most likely of outcomes, and the low end of our range really handicaps that outcome further to what we would consider a worst-case scenario. As Fernando mentioned in his remarks, since we met in Nareit, certainly the conditions since then have changed in the U.K. Much slower reduction of CPI, although there has been some modest reduction.
The Bank of England's 50 basis point rate increase was unexpected, and it does have ramifications on the buyers of our vacation homes. From the best insight that we can see, we feel that we've done a good job really thinking through what the scenario should be through 2023, and that's how we adjusted guidance and came up with the range.
Josh Dennerlein (Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Okay. Then, could you walk us through how most people finance or pay for their Park Holiday homes? Do a lot of people use, like, a second lien on their primary home to pay for it?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Sure. Josh, about 30% of our homeowners are purchasing with financing that would be akin to chattel loan here in the U.S. The other 70%, we see it as cash. In some instances, they are, right, using proceeds from refinancing their primary home in order to purchase their vacation home. Certainly, refinancing rates are higher for primary homes, so that, you know, that's going into the equation as far as lower volume expected of sales.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
The only thing that I would add that in the U.K., the single-family residential primary home mortgages tend to fix rates for a shorter period of time here in the U.S., three to five years. Certainly, those potential vacation home buyers are experiencing a reset to their mortgage rates, and that probably is a factor on why we're seeing a slower conversion to buy homes from our potential customers. The interesting thing I just would add is that the Park Holidays platform really continues to play strong to a market through the changes in Brexit, the location of the units, the work of the properties, the work from home that's taking place there.
There's still, when we talk about the real property activity, still high demand, high tourism, high usage, and a high anecdotal interest remains in buying homes. It is definitely influenced by a slower pace of sales, as I think they're experiencing the financial ramifications in the U.K.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Brad Heffern with RBC Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.
Brad Heffern (Director)
Yeah, thank you. Sticking with the, the U.K. home sales, can you talk about what underlies the guidance for the rest of the year in terms of the ASPs and the margins, compared to last year?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Sure. Brad, our 2,800-2,900 home sales expectations for the full year have us having a margin of between $24,000 and $25,000 NOI margin, as you see, as you would see it reported for us. We do have a moderation to margin expected, as on a year-to-date basis, we have been achieving about a $26,000 margin.
Brad Heffern (Director)
Okay, got it. How do you think about what needs to happen for that business to recover? Is it just, you know, rates need to stabilize or, or go down? Does the U.K. economy need to improve? How long do you think about that potentially taking?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
I'd like to think we had a crystal ball, and if we went on our assumptions, we would have thought earlier we would start to see some improvement, but that hasn't taken place. Clearly, when you look through Europe, U.K. has the most challenged economy right now. I think the steps that have been taken by the Bank of England have begun to show some improvement in CPI, which was right around 10% a year ago. As recently as a little while ago, it dropped to 7.9, so it still has a ways to go. I think as we see that improvement, we would expect there would be commensurate rate decreases in conjunction with that over time.
As we look out into 2024, we think that's when we'll begin to see the change and realization that we go back to more normalized sales.
Brad Heffern (Director)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Just as a reminder, anyone who needs to ask a question is star one, please limit yourself to only one question, so we can accommodate everyone to ask a question. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Keegan Carl with Wolfe Research. Please proceed.
Keegan Carl (Analyst)
Well. Just curious, one, what you're seeing on the Safe Harbor platform. Two, how you're thinking about underwriting the long-term, you know, view of the space. Three, what the marina performance does to your views on long-term capital allocation going forward.
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Keegan, the, the first, I would say, five seconds of your question, 5-10 seconds of your question did not come through. Can you repeat? Can you just start over?
Keegan Carl (Analyst)
Yep. Just focusing on the marina business, because obviously the outperformance is really impressive, and I think people should be focusing on that. One, you know, given what you're seeing in the Safe Harbor platform, you know, how's that trending versus your initial expectations? How are you thinking about the long-term underwriting the space because of this? What does it mean from a capital allocation standpoint going forward?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
I'll start out, Keegan, just suggest that the Safe Harbor outperformance really was driven by strong demand for slip and drive storage rental across the entire board, from small to medium, all the way through to the super yachts. The peak season rate increases were passed through, occupancy remained very strong. We're seeing increased demand for slips across the board. A lot of it, we really do attribute to the value of the Safe Harbor membership, which includes such things as, you know, an unmatched network of locations out there today to travel between, best-in-class facilities and amenities for the members to use, and really a best-in-class customer service that we talk about, and then the perks, passing on fuel at basically our cost.
We noticed that fuel usage is up 13% year-over-year on a per gallon basis. Some of the impact as our BE, which was a decision we made intentionally to sacrifice that margin, is really paying reward in the more important slip rental. We're very, very pleased at how things are performing at Safe Harbor Marinas, and we've seen it in performance quarter after quarter. With regard to our long-term outlook, I think we have shared with you that capital allocation is very restricted at the company today. We're very internally focused on using our capital in a very disciplined way within our portfolio, and marinas are a great example.
We have identified 27 opportunities to reconfigure marina slips, and when we invest in reconfiguring these slips, we get about a 10%-12% return on that investment. Of the 27 opportunities, seven reconfigurations have taken place, three are under construction right now, and about 10 others are in the permitting process, and three or four are still being worked on. That's where we'll see capital allocation. If we're looking for external growth, it will be restricted to a really accretive opportunity in a situation like a Savannah Yacht marina, where strategically, it has a lot of benefit to the network effect that we're trying to achieve within the marinas. I don't know if you have anything to add. Hopefully, that addresses the questions.
Keegan Carl (Analyst)
Can I just follow up? Just because Fernando called out capital recycling as an opportunity, is it fair to assume you might sell some MH, RV assets and recycle the capital into that, the higher cap rate, higher return marina business? Is that the right way to think about it?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Keegan, I think that as we look at our portfolio and evaluate, right, there is a bottom tier of assets, always when force ranking. We'll look to selectively and strategically look to recycle out of some properties that maybe aren't meeting the long-term growth profile that we're looking for. You know, today, any immediate use of that capital would likely go towards deleveraging. Certainly, right, we'll evaluate all opportunities in front of us.
Keegan Carl (Analyst)
Got it. Thanks a lot. Back to the queue.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Eric Wolfe with Citi. Please proceed with your question.
Nick Joseph (Head of US Real Estate and Lodging Research Team)
Thanks. It's actually, Nick Joseph here with Eric. You know, Gary, if I think about kind of really over the last 10 years, I think the company's really benefited from a stability of results. You know, if we go back to kind of the guidance questions earlier, definitely seems like things are a lot more volatile now. Obviously, part of that's probably the recent acquisitions, but, you know, at the end of the day, it's, it's missing guidance and calling into question, kind of the forward guidance from here. You know, as you think about, what, what do you think needs to change from the corporate side, you know, to forecast results more accurately?
You know, are these just growing pains, I guess, with the U.K. and maybe some of the macro volatility that you cited, and ultimately we get back to kind of how it was traditionally, or is the range of outcomes just a bit broader given the new businesses?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
You know, I'll give some thoughts that I have, and Fernando certainly can share his thoughts. We have shared with our stakeholders that complexity is something we're working very hard to reduce, taking all the steps that we possibly can to get back to helping and assisting with simplification in the modeling forward guidance. There is no doubt, the headwinds we're experiencing in the U.K. have caused, you know, a lot of challenges with regard to guiding forward. When we think about things, we use the best tools that we have at the time, whether it be the forward curve, whether it be reading everything we can with regard to.
The outward look on the economic challenges there, obviously, we've had to reguide, that makes things difficult. All in all, when we think about 91% of the entire contribution from real property is what we're trying to guide to. We have a lot of work to do in the U.K. that we're working on. On the marina side, we've worked very hard to be able to put together the same site marina data that we can measure going forward. I know that Fernando, in the disclosure and supplemental, has been working to simplify a lot of things and present a lot of benefits that can help the modeling. I don't know if you have anything you want to add from there.
We are very, very attuned and aware of the complexity that has been created in large part through the acquisitions, both marinas and the U.K. recently. As a company that's been around 30+ years in the public marketplace, we listen to our stakeholders, and we're very, very focused on step-by-step reducing that complexity and making the modeling and the forward guiding as good as possible.
Nick Joseph (Head of US Real Estate and Lodging Research Team)
Thanks. Maybe just to follow up on that, what can you do to reduce the complexity kind of in the near, medium, and longer term, right? Is it, you know, selling the U.K. home sale business? Is it somehow restructuring it? You know, how are you thinking about actually reducing that complexity?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Well, certainly one piece of it is the fact that strategically, we have shared with the market that our long-term goal in the U.K. was to de-emphasize contribution from the home sales margins and focus on the very, very stickiness of real property contribution like we do in the U.S. That was a kind of a five-year strategic plan. We're slowly making progress out there. Ironically, as a percentage, with home sales down, that real property side % is up. We're working on that over a long period of time. I think that we've already increased the average stay in the U.K. to around eight years. We're expanding our licenses to stay in the U.K. properties for from 20 years to 30 years.
We expect that eight years to continue to grow and look more similar to the 15 years, if you will, in North America Manufactured Housing. De-emphasize the margins on home sales and really focus on the real property contribution. We've taken similar steps in the marina side to accomplish that as well, as we convert some of the SRD&E, in particular, the service over to rental income from third parties. All that, I think, as we look out over a period of time, will help to simplify things going forward.
Nick Joseph (Head of US Real Estate and Lodging Research Team)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Anthony Powell with Barclays. Okay, we'll see what you.
Anthony Powell (Director of Equity Research)
Thanks. Good afternoon. A question on, I guess, the normalization of various leisure-adjacent businesses. It's been a topic of a lot of calls the past few days. Transient RV and marina, you're still seeing growth in transient RV, I guess, on holidays, not necessarily midweek, and then marinas have been pretty strong. Do you see any risk of normalization impacting these revenues in the next few years as people return to maybe more older habits post-COVID?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
I would say, Anthony, I, I think we're overall on the transient RV side, we're seeing that normalization from record years over the last, you know, two to three years, given the bump over the second half of 2020 and into 2021. We continue to see a lot of demand for our properties. I think you see that with the record number of conversions that we have, having converted over 6,000 sites over the course of the last three and a half years, which greatly outpaces what we were averaging on a per year basis prior to the pandemic.
Now we're taking that transient guest, and they're choosing to stay with us, for, call it, on average, about a five-year period of time, and on an annual basis, getting a rental, predictable rental, increase from our standpoint. On the marina side, we've certainly seen very high demand on the transient side as well, in the first half of this year. I would say, right, we're not underwriting double-digit transient growth for that line item. What I'll remind our stakeholders, the percentage of rental income coming from transient on the marina side is much smaller. It's about 5%, 4%-5% of total rental income.
We have seen outperformance on that line item, but are not underwriting double-digit growth for over the course of the mid to long term.
Anthony Powell (Director of Equity Research)
All right, thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Jamie Feldman with Wells Fargo. Please proceed with your question.
Jamie Feldman (Managing Director and Head of REIT Research)
Great, thank you. Appreciate all your commentary on Park Holiday and simplifying. But if you think about some of the other areas where you took down guidance, you know, how do you create more visibility on that and simplify that? Then, along the same lines, you know, your credit line balance is up above $800 million. Can you talk about plans to either keep it there or, or, you know, refinance that to bring it back down?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Sure. Thank you, Jamie. We, we modestly brought down expectations on the, on the SRD&E side. That is, as Gary mentioned earlier, we are looking to de-emphasize that over time as we, especially on the marina side, we convert the service business over to third parties paying us rent, at the property level. I think you'll continue seeing that over time, and that ultimately will benefit real property NOI and rental income that we receive, not just from our members, but then, third parties that pay us rent to be at our properties to provide that service.
As it relates to our line of credit, we have mentioned over the course of the last couple of months pursuing various strategic alternatives, whether that's capital recycling from operating assets, that the immediate use of that capital would be to pay down debt. I think as you look towards the second half and into 2024, there will be a moderation in capital investments as well, that will convert more free cash flow towards deleveraging. But we are evaluating transactions in the capital markets as well in order to to bring those balances down and delever towards our long-term target of being in the mid 5s.
Jamie Feldman (Managing Director and Head of REIT Research)
Okay, thank you. If I could just ask a follow-up on that. The interest expense, guidance reduction, is that because you used the credit line and didn't expect to, or because rates are higher than you thought they would be? If you did use it more than you expected, what was the reason for that?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Sure. On a forecast-to-forecast basis, and I would say, primarily would be expectations from the forward curve, where, in general, ending the year, rates for both SOFR and SONIA are up on average about 70-75 basis points from our last forecast in at the end of April.
Jamie Feldman (Managing Director and Head of REIT Research)
Okay, it's not balanced. It was really just forecast?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Mm-hmm.
Jamie Feldman (Managing Director and Head of REIT Research)
Okay. All right. Thank you very much.
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Samir Khanal with Evercore ISI. Please proceed with your.
Samir Khanal (Equity Research Analyst)
Yeah, good afternoon. I guess, Gary, just on maybe switching gears a little bit on the MH side, pricing is still strong on that end. I guess, how do you think about rent increases in the next year with inflation moderating here? I mean, more of a question kind of in the next 18 months. Thanks.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
It's a great question. Certainly at overall 98.7% occupancy, MH annual, there will be the opportunity to continue to pass through all inflationary pressure. I'd suggest that what we did last October in advance of providing guidance in February with fourth quarter interim results, we will again share with the market our forecast on rental rate increases across the board. Our expectation is that we will be able to pass through a solid rental increases throughout the businesses, and we'll share those with everybody in October.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of John Pawlowski with Green Street. Please proceed with your question.
John Pawlowski (Managing Director)
Thanks for the time. Fernando, I wanted to follow up on the revolving credit facility question. I guess it's been, you know, well over a year where you've leaned heavily on the revolver. Why wasn't debt properly termed out, long ago to more closely align the duration of the debt with your assets? When, specifically, should we expect you to lock in longer-term financing?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
John, you'll, you'll see us over the course of the next couple of quarters, look to extend our maturities, not just what's in our line of credit, but what is coming due from a secure debt standpoint. That is, that's something that we are actively working towards. You know, as far as bringing balances down, it, it's really evaluating the multiple strategic alternatives that we have in front of us as far as being able to execute on those transactions and bring balances down.
We've been, since our, since our initial investment grade rating in the summer of 2021, we've been very active in the bond market, having done about $2.2 billion of long-term debt between 7 and 10 years of tenure. Our most recent transaction was back in January of this year, and that would be expected to continue over the course of the next couple of quarters.
John Pawlowski (Managing Director)
Okay. Then another question on Park Holidays. At your Investor Day over there, we toured properties with four or five of senior leaders from Park Holidays. Have any senior leaders left, since left or retired? Who's overseeing the day-to-day operations from the Sun mothership here in the States?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Yeah. John, generally, everybody is still there, and there's a really well-seasoned team looking to work on pulling every single lever as they have these challenging economic times. That group of talented people are still there, and we're very pleased that they are there.
John Pawlowski (Managing Director)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of John Kim with BMO Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.
John Kim (Managing Director)
Good afternoon. I had a question on Ingenia. If I'm not mistaken, your development joint venture had a five-year initial term, that would be up for renewal later this year. I was wondering what your appetite is to keep it going, or could this be a potential use, sorry, potential source of funds?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Great question, John. I think the fact is that technically, the Sungenia, as we call it, JV, five-year period of time is up at the end of November. We are always assessing our businesses, if you will. To remind everyone, Sun owns a 10% interest in Ingenia headstock, and we really have had a successful JV, which is performing. We're happy with the partnership relationship there, although there is no doubt COVID and the pandemic put kind of a two-year crimp in the plan. The Sungenia JV now has four developments. Two are in fill-up phase, and they're filling up nicely. The other two are just about to break ground. With the JV expiring, we will continue to review how we will think about moving forward.
One of the factors is that as these four developments are moving forward, we wanna make sure that we have the best opportunity to maximize those results once they're filled up and stabilized. We also are reviewing all optionality that relates to capital recycling and the options that we can do to bring down some of our variable rate debt. We'll continue to keep you advised as we think through how we're going to focus on the period of time where that does expire.
John Kim (Managing Director)
Okay. If I could just follow up on U.K. home sales, just given the third quarter is the most crucial quarter of the year. Out of the number of homes that you had planned to sell for the third quarter, how many have already been sold or are currently in negotiations? I was wondering how sensitive this is to mortgage rates. There was an article that came out in the FT just a couple of hours ago of three of the largest U.K. lenders reducing mortgage rates, so I'm wondering if that's been factored in at all.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Yeah, I would start to say that, as I shared in the comments earlier, we're not sitting here anticipating the benefit of reduced mortgage rates or anything like that going forward. That would definitely be a positive, but we do think there will be a lag before we see the benefits of things like that. The underwriting that we talked about in the 2,600-2,900 unit range for the year, is kind of our downside to our view in the market right now. I don't know, Fernando, do we have any information on how many sold this quarter?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
John, we'll provide updates on homes sold over the course of the quarter when we meet during investor presentations and any other potential updates. We are, as you identified, we're heading into a busy period as the holidays do pick up in August. We'll be able to report back to the market over the course of the next couple of weeks.
John Kim (Managing Director)
Can I just squeeze in one more question? The seasonality has shifted a little bit, but you also provided more clarity or more disclosure on the seasonality of U.K. home sales. Is this a good run rate going forward, where roughly, you know, a third is sold in each of the second and third quarters?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Yeah, the seasonality shift would say, you know, due primarily to the changes in volume. Yes, this would be the best run rate to use from a seasonality standpoint.
John Kim (Managing Director)
Okay, great. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Wes Golladay with Baird. Please proceed with your question.
Wes Golladay (Senior Research Analyst)
Hey, everyone. I just want to maybe address maybe a few more of the moving parts that you may have in the future. Can you comment on the loan book? Is that mostly fixed rate, rates that you're charging, or is it floating? Do you expect the size of the book to stay the same over the next few years?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Wes, our wholly owned notebook note portfolio is about $62 million today. That is in active repayment as residents make payments on their loans. We do have a joint venture where we are a 40% partner where we are underwriting a run rate, call it, you know, $7 million-$10 million of financing per month as we as our residents finance their homes in our communities. That is fixed. Those are fixed rate financings. Chattel loan rates have historically been in the 8%-10% range. Those haven't moved significantly.
There's been an uptick, but they are call it plus minus at the high end of the range today for for customers.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
I would only suggest with a slowdown of capital allocation to development of new sites, which is where most of that chattel loan is used, probably a reduction in usage as we go forward.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Michael Goldsmith with UBS. Please proceed with your question.
Michael Goldsmith (US REITs Analyst)
Good afternoon. Thanks a lot for taking my question. Gary, earlier you were talking about, you know, the how the U.K., you're looking for a mix shift, you know, away from the NOI generator from the home sales and more from the rents. You know, in the second quarter, U.K. home sales, the quantity was up 11%, selling price down 11%. Have you been able to pass along greater rents along with the lower selling prices, so maybe you get a little bit more income over the long tail as people pay their regular rents?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Yes, I mean, when we talk about the U.K. management team, as they shared with us on one of our update calls recently, they are fully attuned with that strategy and very, very focused on it. We expect to see the ability to pass on those rental increases. In fact, it's a little bit accelerated right now as we adjust our home price margins to move volume in this challenging economic time and sell more homes, are able to put it onto the monthly real property fees. We expect to continue seeing that, as we said, strategically over the next four or five years, would expect to see accelerated growth on the real property monthly fee side as we reduce operating margins. Not operating, sale margins, sorry.
Michael Goldsmith (US REITs Analyst)
As a follow-up, are you able to kind of quantify if the increase in the rents is offsetting, you know, the pressure on the home sale? Like, are you just getting back what you're losing in the near term? Are you getting that back over time as part of the consistent cash flow? Is it just kind of a more careful balance as you navigate a pressured consumer, and then over time, you look to navigate it further?
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Yeah. At this time, I think it's the latter. First of all, it would be too soon to draw and share any conclusions at this time because we're just adjusting to a very challenging economic environment there. We do believe over a period of time, just as we do in North America, we would sell a home at a very low margin to be able to create a sticky rent in one of our manufactured housing communities, that with less than a half a percent of homes leaving on an annual basis, generally generate uninterrupted rent for, you know, 40, 50+ year period of time. Obviously, that predictable, steady cash flow is what we're looking for because it does tend to get the better multiple.
Understanding that management and our stakeholders are looking for that over a period of time, we're very focused on achieving that. Is the team over there. We are aligned on that.
Michael Goldsmith (US REITs Analyst)
Thank you very much.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from the line of Anthony Hau with Truist Securities. Please proceed with your question.
Anthony Hau (VP of Equity Research)
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Can you guys talk about the trends that you guys are seeing on the holiday rental side in the U.K.? I heard that some of the competitors are lowering their rates. Just curious if you guys are doing the same thing as well?
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Anthony, good question. We have seen the competition bringing down rates to capture demand, but we're actually seeing we're holding rates fairly steady and are capturing market share from the market on that segment. That's the outlook. That is the conversations that we're having today.
Anthony Hau (VP of Equity Research)
Gotcha. Just a separate question, can you guys go over the current, like, RV, MH, and holiday park expansion opportunities and other initiatives such as solar arrays and slip configurations? It'd be great if you can like, quantify the size of each opportunity and also, like, the potential return.
Fernando Castro-Caratini (CFO)
Anthony, in any of these projects from an expansion or growth potential, an expansion will typically be that MH or RV will typically carry returns, in, you know, low teens, about 10%-13%. Historically, that has been the case. Any solar arrays would carry slightly higher ROIs in the mid-teens, from that standpoint. And then in the U.K., any expansion opportunity carries a slightly higher ROI, call it in the 20% range, given that, you know, payback period, when building in, let's call it a home sale, and the usage of a, of the rental unit, it pays back much faster. We can, you know.
Offline, we can go through in detail, for any of these buckets, what the capital spend would be. I think as we mentioned earlier, we are looking at each of these investment buckets, as we head into 2024 and would expect a deceleration of spend, as we focus on converting more free cash flow towards debt repayment. We can review those buckets, offline.
Anthony Hau (VP of Equity Research)
Okay. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
We have reached the end of the question and answer session. I'll now turn it back over to management for closing remarks.
Gary Shiffman (Chairman, President, and CEO)
Well, we appreciate everyone joining us for our second quarter call. We look forward to speaking on the third quarter and also sharing how we're viewing the implementation of rental increases going into 2024. Thank you, operator.
Operator (participant)
Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude today's company remarks. You may now disconnect your line.
Speaker 15
Goodbye.