US Hotel Industry Performance Outpacing Expectations

Amanda Hite, President of STR, noted that her team is pleasantly surprised they were wrong with their overall pandemic recovery forecast for quarter one of 2021. The rollout of vaccinations and increased stimulus spending has been extremely helping for the hotel industry. However, experts remain concerned regarding the ADR recovery and where that will lead the industry rates. If the ADR does not drop, recovery for the industry will move faster. Another key factor will be the comeback of transient demand, which Hite explained is predicted to be down 40-50% of 2019 levels in the fourth quarter of 2021. The industry must continue to see an uptick in transient demand to survive this challenging period.