PulteGroup, Inc. (NYSE:PHM) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

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Bob O’Shaughnessy: Yes, Mike, I think I understand your question. Hopefully, you appreciate, when we provide commentary on our results, if there are unusual things happening, we tell you about them, whether it’s in the form of an adjustment or when we present adjusted data. And to answer your question as directly as I can, there’s nothing unusual happening in our margin in the fourth quarter. We are not projecting anything unusual to happen in our margin in the first quarter other than the homes that we are closing. I think if you reflect on the answer that Ryan gave, and I can’t comment on the relativity to other people’s margins, what they’re doing pricing lines, what we’re doing pricing wise. We can only comment on what we are doing, which is trying to run a thoughtful business, get to a point where we can offer affordability to the consumer where we can earn a return.

So I don’t know if that gets where you need to be, but there’s nothing unusual happening in our margins.

Ryan Marshall: Yes, Mike, and let me maybe just pick up on the comment you made about the comment I made last quarter about not being margin proud, that’s still 100% accurate. And we’ve tried to reflect that in the way I laid out, we are going to be operating our business, which is to find a market price that will allow us to maintain a predictable and consistent turn of our inventory. It’s the way that we can keep this business running efficiently and deliver the high returns that Bob talked about. So while we are — we would certainly endeavor to do much better from a comparable sales standpoint than what we had in the fourth quarter. I think relative to our peer set, you can see that we are selling homes. And we are going to continue to make sure that we are priced competitively with our market offerings.

Michael Rehaut: Yes. No, I appreciate that. I mean, I guess, I was trying to get to something you don’t want to give, which is second quarter guidance, and we understand that. But I think people would kind of think, okay, you have a significant positive gap here as there were drop maybe in the backlog that might allow that gap to revert to normal, but it doesn’t sound like that’s the case. I guess secondly, the SG&A guidance was pretty encouraging as well given the decline in closings yet the midpoint being similar to a year ago. So just wanted to delve into that a little bit. If you could kind of talk about what you’re doing on the cost side there in terms of either headcount or other cost management? And if we were to expect a similar type of percentage decline in the coming quarters, given what you’ve been able to do in the first quarter, is that something where we could see a similar SG&A in spite of a 5%, 10% or, let’s say, 10%-ish decline in closings?

Bob O’Shaughnessy: Yes, Mike, hopefully, you can appreciate we — on our most recent call, had highlighted we would be looking at our overheads to make sure that they are efficient given the scale of the business that we are operating today. We have taken actions on costs, and they are varied by market depending on how that particular market is performing. I think you can and should expect us to always do that, right? I mean we are always looking at it. Are we running an efficient business? As it relates to beyond the first quarter, like everything else, there’s — it’s a volatile — not a volatile, but it’s a market in flux. We haven’t provided a guide on that. But I can tell you, we will be looking at our overheads as part of — as we see the business develop, we will develop our plans around overhead spend as well.

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