Hotels.com’s latest Hotel Price Index, issued late last week, claims Asia gained a 4% increase in revenue per room per night last year when compared with 2009.
It identified substantial rate increases in China, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and South Korea. Thailand hotels did not register rate increase substantial enough to figure in the top results.
According to HPI, the destination that gained the highest rate in Asia was Singapore, up 33% last year when compared with 2009. This was followed by China, with an increase of 19%, Malaysia 17%, Indonesia 13% and South Korea 10%.
Bali reported a surge of 35% in rates with rooms averaging a yield of US$188 per night during 2010. The island’s five-star hotel rooms were earning as much as US$341 a night and three and four-star properties around US$150 per room per night or less.
Hotels in China’s main destinations including Hong Kong, reported more than 20% increase year-on-year in rates paid per room per night. However, Beijing remained relatively flat with a slightly 1% improvement.
Hotels.com, a hotel booking website, released the HPI noting that in the past two years, the site has seen a steady increase in US travellers using the site and mainly in the higher hotel categories.
HPI also provided a ranking of cities based on rate increases: Bali in Indonesia was top of the list (US$139.28 to US$187.80; +35%), Singapore ranked second (US$147.14 to US$196.25; +33%), Tsuen Wan in China ranked third (US$62.14 to US$81.66; +29%), Penang in Malaysia ranked fourth (US$96.88 to US$125.97; +29%) as well as Guangzhou in China which has the same growth rate of 29% (US$11.78 to US$144.38).
Bali and Singapore were also seventh and ninth on the list of the most expensive cities in Asia.
In the value-for-money category the top destinations were: Hoi An, Vietnam (US$62.53 to US$66.72; +7%), followed with Hue also in Vietnam (US$78.30 to US$72.62; 7%) and Phom Penh in Cambodia (US$86.39 to US$73.52; -15%).
Thailand gained a reference under the value category.
Pattaya was cited for its rates of US$76.02 to US$82.96 and Chiang Mai province for US$81.01 to US$83.18. They ranked seventh and eighth in the 10 best value priced cities in Asia, although they had a slight increase in rates last year of around 9% and 3% when compared with 2009.
Two cities in Japan reported a drop in hotel prices – Osaka ranked fourth (US$148.95 to US$125.64) and Nagoya ranked fifth (US$150.93 to US$127.85).
The Hotels.com Hotel Price Index™ (HPI), established in 2004, is a regular survey of hotel prices in major city over 18,300 destinations across the world. The HPI is based on bookings made on Hotels.Com and prices shown are those actually paid by customers rather than advertised rates in 2009 versus 2010.
Source: TR Weekly
