Local hotel occupancy rate rises in August

The Orlando hotel market saw increases in occupancy rates and revenue per room during August, according to figures supplied by STR, a company that collects lodging data.

The August occupancy rate for the market — defined as Orange, Osceola and Seminole counties — reached 72.3 percent, an increase of 4.5 percent from August 2016. That was the highest August rate in at least six years, according to STR data, and the increase was the greatest among the 25 largest markets in the U.S.

The room revenue, aka RevPar in hotel parlance, for the Orlando market in August was $71.83, an increase of 5.3 percent.

Among the nation’s major metros, Central Florida’s RevPar increase trailed only Nashville, Tenn. (13.4 percent), St. Louis (8.8 percent) and Phoenix (6.3 percent).

For the year to date, Orlando’s occupancy rate is up 3.1 percent, and the room revenue is up 7.2 percent.

Nationally in August, occupancy was 70.7 percent, an increase of 0.9 percent. RevPark was up 2.5 percent to $90.31.

Less than a full week of August data would have been significantly affected by Hurricane Harvey, according to Jan Freitag, STR’s senior VP of lodging insights.

“We anticipate fundamentals to be higher in September due to increased demand and a number of properties going offline amid the aftermath of the two hurricanes,” Freitag said.

Houston had the second-largest drop in revenue per room (5.2 percent) and New Orleans experienced the second-largest decline in occupancy (down 5.9 percent). Philadelphia had the deepest dips for August in both categories, down 6.4 percent in occupancy and 13.9 percent in RevPar.