October Hotel Statistics Reflect Continuing Rebound

Occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room for U.S. hotels in October showed significant increases compared to October 2003, offering further evidence that 2004 is shaping up as the best year for the lodging industry since the banner year of 2000.

Smith Travel Research yesterday released results for the week ending Oct. 30th, allowing analysts to piece together a preliminary picture of the month's performance.

The deluxe segment continued to outperform other lodging categories, posting 12.6 percent RevPAR growth with ADR increases of 4.7 percent and occupancy gains of 7.4 percent. New Orleans and Orlando were among the top performers of the country's major markets, with RevPAR up 32.3 percent and 20.2 percent, respectively. JP Morgan analyst Harry Curtis attributed the gains to increases in the number of citywide meetings in these two group-oriented destinations. By contrast, hotels in Houston and Chicago showed the lowest RevPAR gains for the month.

RevPAR at urban, downtown hotels also outperformed hotels in the suburbs and in highway locations, rising 14.2 percent versus 10.3 percent and 7.9 percent. Will Truelove, analyst at UBS Global Equity Research, said this underscores the strong performance of full-service versus midprice hotels, since most full-service hotels tend to be in urban locations.