Here are some excerpts from Daily Lodging Report of the past week. If you’re not a subscriber, you should be. Get updates on hotel deals, development, inventory and career changes. Register here, now.
Sunday August 7
Pebblebrook Hotel Trust closed on the sale of 306 rooms Sofitel Philadelphia at Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, PA, for $80 million to a third party. Proceeds from the sale of Sofitel Philadelphia at Rittenhouse Square will be used for general corporate purposes and to reduce outstanding corporate borrowings associated with recent hotel acquisitions.
Extended stay in America announced that the subsidiaries of ESH Hospitality, Inc. convert more than 100 recently acquired Wood Spring Suites hotels at the Extended stay in America family of brands later this year. With the addition of these properties, Extended Stay America will have a portfolio of 762 hotels, comprising nearly 85,000 rooms in 45 states.
Certified hotels Just Launched Graduate houses, a short-term vacation rental service. The program is quite similar to Airbnb, but a graduate stay includes access to graduate hotel services, from hotel concierges to on-site amenities like pools and gyms.
Skift Rating: The Graduate Hotels test of providing branded short-term rental accommodations is another example of “the big merger” that Skift talked about.
monday august 8
The CBRE Hotels Research State of the Union presents current demand trends, as well as fundamentals by segment, location type and chain scale. Key takeaways include: CBRE expects average daily rate (ADR) growth to moderate in the US in the second half of the year and beyond. Revenue per available room RevPAR growth in June continued to exceed 2019 levels. All location types exceeded 2019 RevPAR levels, with the exception of city hotels. Overseas spending continued to increase. Bookings through brand.com continued to gain market share in the second quarter, growing from 19% to 21% compared to 2019.
According to Lodging Econometrics Q2 2022 U.S. Construction Pipeline Trends Report, at the end of the second quarter, the top five markets with the largest hotel construction pipelines are Dallas with 173 projects/20,707 rooms; Atlanta with 140 projects/18,131 rooms; Los Angeles with 124 projects/20,365 rooms; New York with 113 projects/19,238 rooms; and Phoenix with 108 projects/14,964 rooms. The top five markets with the most projects currently under construction are New York, Atlanta, Dallas, Phoenix and Los Angeles.
Skift Rating: It should be noted that Atlanta has the most projects scheduled to start next year and Marriott International has the most projects under construction scheduled to start next year.
tuesday august 9
“More than 50 luxury hotels are expected to open in Jakarta and Bangkok in the next five years“, Nikkei reported. The last was the Park Hyatt Jakarta which opened on July 8, billed as the Indonesia’s first six-star hotel. A Nikkei study found that 13 four-star and higher-rated hotels are scheduled to open in Jakarta from 2021 to 2026. Germany Tophotelnews suggests that Bangkok expects a faster pace of high-end hotel openings with 28 four-star and 13 five-star hotels set to launch in the Thai capital from 2021 to 2024.
We start on a sad note as it has been announced that Corry W. Oakes IIICEO, also co-founder, of OTO development died suddenly on August 7. Oakes, Todd Turner and Jim Ovenden provided the initials for the hotel development and hotel management company they founded alongside George Dean Johnson Jr. and the late H. Wayne Huizenga in May 2004. OTO Development is part of The Johnson Group.
The second half of the earnings season included a sparkler of Hyattwhile IHGbegan returning money to shareholders with dividends and up to $500 million in stock buybacks. Marriott Vacations also added $500 million to their buyout, while Hilton Grand Vacations met on revenue, beaten on adjusted EBITDA by a wide margin.
Hersha Foster Trust entered into a definitive agreement for sell seven of its non-core Urban Select Service properties outside of New York for gross proceeds of $505 million. The following hotels are included in the transactions: Courtyard Brookline; Hampton Inn, Philadelphia; Hilton Garden Inn M Street; Hampton Inn, Washington D.C.; Sunnyvale Court; Los Angeles West Side Court; and TownePlace Suites Sunnyvale. Hersha intends to use the proceeds from the sale of the USS portfolio to provide immediate cash for a major net debt reduction of approximately $460-480 million. In addition to approximately $390-410 million in corporate debt, the company plans to reduce mortgage debt associated with the USS portfolio by approximately $75 million. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2022.
Skift Rating: Implicitly, in the long-term luxury hotel boom in Bangkok and Jakarta, these cities are expected to become “second cities” for meetings and conventions as Asia-Pacific alternatives to Singapore.
Wednesday August 10
Ennismore announced his continuation expansion across New Zealand and Australia with the signing of four new hotels in New Zealand with CP Group. The partnership will see the opening of four new hotels including a JO&JOE in Auckland, two TRIBE hotels in Auckland and a Hyde in Queenstown. The hotels are expected to open in 2023 and 2024. The new hotels will be located in the heart of distinct New Zealand cities and will join the rapidly expanding Ennismore collective in the Pacific region.
Aimbridge Inn announced the growth of its Latin America division with the addition of three new hotels in Mexico and a world-class restaurant based in Guadalajara.Properties include the AC Hotel Monterrey Valley, which opens this month with 166 rooms; Aloft Guadalajara Sur, opening fall 2022 with 175 rooms; and the 167-room Aloft Playa del Carmen is slated to open this winter. Aimbridge LatAm also announced that Zibu Guadalajara at the JW Marriott Hotel Guadalajara opened this summer.
owner and proprietor, Amit Pateldeclared The Chelsea Hotel should open by the end of the year at Norwich, Connecticut. Construction of the nearly 200-year-old building is taking place in three phases, the first being the 24 rooms and the lobby, the second being a banquet hall and kitchenette, and a bar in the third phase. In the future, Patel may also rent space for a ghost kitchen. The building has been in the possession of Patel’s family since May 2019, when it was purchased by Ganesha Hospitality, LLC.
Skift Rating: Meet Ennismore Co-CEO and Founder Sharan Pasricha at the Skift Global Forum in New York in September.
Thursday August 11
STR reported Sydney, Australia, hotel occupancy dipped in July from June. Occupancy in July 2022 was 65.8% while the ADR was A$239.96 resulting in a RevPAR of A$157.80. compared to June 2022, compared to July 2019, ADR and RevPAR levels were higher. Occupancy was -16.1% compared to July 2019. For the month, there were only two days when occupancy fell below 50%.
The Business Times reported business has picked up so much in Singapore that hotels are frantically looking for employees as staffing levels have not yet matched the recovery in tourism. The Singapore Hotel Association said Singapore’s hotel workforce has shrunk by 25-30% over the past two years. In June, Changi Airport’s passenger volume exceeded 50 percent of pre-pandemic levels, reaching the year-end target ahead of schedule. Reception staffing levels have lagged. Resorts World Sentosa is looking to fill more than 1,500 positions across all areas of the integrated resort, while Marina Bay Sands is looking to fill 1,750 positions. In June, Singapore hotels recorded the highest RevPAR since the start of the pandemic with average room rates hitting a 6-year high and average occupancy at a 6-month high of 76.9%.
Choice Hotels Asia Pacific said business travel has returned to a new normal. Capitals and regional cities are seeing a surge in corporate bookings, with business travelers opting for longer stays. Choice even said that their the figures for the first half of 2022 show that this segment eclipses the figures for 2019.
Skift Rating: Asia-Pacific’s uneven recovery, with some places, like Singapore, thriving, while others, like China, are underperforming, may have lasting effects on hotel capital spending, business traveler habits and business planning decisions.
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