Which NOI lever goes in the model across 12 parks, and which is upside?

Working through a hypothetical aggregation of 12 parks, roughly 1,050 pads, mostly 1970s builds in secondary midwest and southeast markets, master metered water, expense ratio coming in around 44 percent on the seller's trailing.

The pitch decks I've read all stack four levers and count all of them. I don't think you get to count all of them, and I can't decide which one belongs in the base case.

Lot rent to market. Say in-place is $340 and comparable parks are at $415. That's $75 a pad, $945k a year across the portfolio, and it needs almost no capital. It's also the lever that gets you in the newspaper and in front of a city council, and 20 percent increases across 1,050 households in one year is a real collections and reputation event. Some sponsors phase it over five years, some do it in the first 90 days.

Utilities and water loss. Master metered parks routinely run 20 to 30 percent unaccounted water. Submetering plus a repair program on the worst laterals recaptures expense rather than raising rent, and residents understand paying for what they use better than they understand a rent letter. Capital is real though, and in some states the billing method and whether you can pass through a service fee is regulated, so that has to be checked jurisdiction by jurisdiction before it goes in a model.

Pad fill. Vacant pads are pure margin because the infrastructure is already paid for. But landing and setting a new home is a big check per pad, and you're now in the home sales business with financing, repossession, and inventory sitting on your balance sheet.

Expense professionalization. Insurance rebid, property tax appeals, payroll consolidation across a region, moving from three part time managers to one regional plus one on-site. Least glamorous and the most controllable.

My problem is that these fight each other. Push rent hard and your delinquency and turnover assumptions break, which kills pad fill absorption. Do the water program first and you've spent capital before you've proven you can collect. I'd rather hear which one people actually underwrite as the base case, with everything else sitting as upside that doesn't affect the price they'll pay.