Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Thank you. [Operator Instructions] We will take our first question from Celeste Brown at Morgan Stanley.
Celeste Brown - Morgan Stanley
Hi, good morning.
Ed Walter
How are you doing?
Celeste Brown - Morgan Stanley
Good. Just first on your guidance, and maybe I am understand it wrong here. It looks like you are implying a potential for RevPAR to be positive in the fourth quarter, is that because of group business or is that now what is implied in the fourth quarter number?
Ed Walter
It depends a little bit upon what your perspective is on what happened in the third quarter, and how you had got to the plus 1 scenario. I would say overall, we expect RevPAR to be negative in the second half of the year. We do think that there are some opportunities for the fourth quarter to be better than the third quarter, which I think you correctly surmised. Those would come from a combination of the fact that the group bookings for the fourth quarter are stronger.
We also had much more construction disruption in 2007 in the fourth quarter, and so we are optimistic that having more of those rooms available for customers will ultimately result in slightly better occupancies and consequently better RevPAR in Q4.
So, a lot that is going to depend ultimately on, due to the trends that we are seeing from a standpoint of weaker corporate business and slower group pickup, do they accelerate further into the fourth quarter, or having stepped down a bit in the May/June period, do we remain at that level going forward through the rest of the year?
Celeste Brown - Morgan Stanley
Okay. Then, given the contingency plans you have implemented at your hotels, what RevPAR do you need to maintain your margins?
Ed Walter
I think at this point we probably assume that we need to be in the mid-3 range, probably about 3.5 in order to maintain block margins.
Celeste Brown - Morgan Stanley
Okay. Thank you.
Operator
We will take our next question from Chris Woronka at Deutsche Bank.
Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank
Hey, good morning.
Ed Walter
Okay, Chris.
Chris Woronka - Deutsche Bank
Could you maybe give us some guidance on how much of your group bookings for either full-year '08, or maybe just first-half '08 were booked in prior years?
Ed Walter
Chris, could you repeat that for some reason you are breaking up as we try to hear that.
- To read the full transcript on Seeking Alpha, click here »
