Reflecting concerns and cancellations around the COVID-19 outbreak, the U.S. hotel industry reported negative year-over-year results in the three key performance metrics during the week of 1-7 March 2020, according to data from STR.

In comparison with the week of 3-9 March 2019, the industry recorded the following:

  • Occupancy: -7.3% to 61.8%
  • Average daily rate (ADR): -4.6% to US$126.01
  • Revenue per available room (RevPAR): -11.6% to US$77.82

Performance declines were uniform across chain scales, classes and location types.

"The question over the last several weeks was 'when', not 'if' this impact would hit—well, when has arrived," said Jan Freitag, STR's senior VP of lodging insights. "Like so many other areas of the world, concerns around the coronavirus outbreak have now hit U.S. hotel occupancy hard. Not a surprise given the amount of event-related news we have seen, but group cancellations were felt across the markets and classes in addition to consistent declines in the transient segment. ADR is starting to decline as well, rapidly in the case of San Francisco. This is quite likely the beginning of a bad run that will get worse before it gets better."

Overall, 23 of the Top 25 Markets registered a RevPAR decline.

San Francisco/San Mateo, California, posted the week's steepest drop in RevPAR (-45.5% to US$134.26), due largely to the largest decline in ADR (-30.4% to US$212.61).

Anaheim/Santa Ana, California, experienced the largest drop in occupancy (-27.3% to 59.6%) and the second-largest decreases in ADR (-19.9% to US$155.14) and RevPAR (-41.8% to US$92.42).

Seattle, Washington, saw the second-steepest decrease in occupancy (-26.4% to 52.3%), which pushed the third-largest drop in RevPAR (-34.8% to US$67.94).

Of note, New York, New York, occupancy fell 13.1% to 72.1%, while ADR in the market was down 8.3% to US$188.59.

Two markets saw occupancy growth for the week: Detroit, Michigan (+1.9% to 62.2%), and Nashville, Tennessee (+1.8% to 75.8%).

Two markets reported ADR increases: Oahu Island, Hawaii (+1.7% to US$223.05), and Norfolk/Virginia Beach, Virginia (+1.3% to US$85.46).

About STR

STR provides premium data benchmarking, analytics and marketplace insights for the global hospitality industry. Founded in 1985, STR maintains a presence in 15 countries with a corporate North American headquarters in Hendersonville, Tennessee, an international headquarters in London, and an Asia Pacific headquarters in Singapore. STR was acquired in October 2019 by CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSGP), the leading provider of commercial real estate information, analytics and online marketplaces. For more information, please visit str.com and costargroup.com.