Tough times for hoteliers in the US

Growth for US hotel operators has come to a crashing halt, industry analysts say.

Rising wages, taxes, insurance premiums, and other costs are outrunning revenue growth at many hotels - and tourist numbers are heading down,

Nearly six years after the pandemic, US hotels are still struggling to regain lost occupancy: spending more to operate while taking in less revenue.

Labour costs alone have soared 9% this year on a per-available-room basis, industry analyst CoStar's survey of about 6,000 hotels shows.

Hotels took in 0.4% less revenue per available room in 2025 than a year earlier, estimates from CoStar and Tourism Economics show.

"Luxury class hotels were the only ones getting close to increasing average daily rate to the level of inflation," said Jan Freitag, national director, hospitality analytics at CoStar Group told news hub Skift.

"All other classes saw flat average daily rate growth or even a contraction."

This year's US hotel EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization) is forecast to decline 2.8%, Lodging Analytics Research & Consulting (LARC) reported.

Many travellers from overseas cancelled trips in response to President Trump's trade war and "America First" policies.

From January to October, travel to the US from Western Europe fell about 3.5% year-over-year, the US National Travel and Tourism Office reported.

But the trend varies by destination. The nation's capital of Washington D.C., New York and California are seeing fewer visitors, while Tennessee, home to Elvis Presley's Graceland estate, has welcomed 24% more people from Western Europe this year.

Among the top 25 markets, Tampa, Florida (top image), reported the steepest decreases with occupancy down 20.5% to 66.1%.