NYC’s strong hotel pipeline pushes down occupancy, revenue: report

UPDATED, Jan. 2, 2020, 9:05 a.m.: New York City’s booming hotel inventory includes 113 new developments set to open in the next few years, with just over half located outside Manhattan.

That’s according to the latest hotel development report from NYC & Company, the city’s official official marketing, tourism and partnership organization. The report projects that New York’s hotel inventory will reach 144,000 rooms by the end of 2021 — up 65-percent from the 87,000 rooms the city had in 2010, the New York Post reported.

Soaring tourism numbers have contributed to developers’ optimism, as 2019 saw a record of nearly 70 million tourists visit the Big Apple. But all of this new supply, as well as competition from Airbnb, has pushed occupancy down 1.3 percent, average room rates down 2.7 percent, and RevPAR down 4 percent year to date, according to November data from STR.

The city’s recent moves to restrict hotel development — above and beyond restrictions in manufacturing zones instituted in 2018 — may lead to another burst of activity to get projects in before the deadline.

Last week, The Real Deal used data from the same NYC & Company report for its ranking of Manhattan’s largest hotel projects. In that ranking, David Marx’s 450 11th Avenue and Sam Chang’s 140 West 28th Street tied for the No. 1 spot with 531 units each.

But New York already has a new No. 1. On Friday, Chang — who earlier this year claimed to be leaving the business to focus on pigeon racing — filed plans for his biggest hotel yet. The 34-story, 974-room development at 150 West 48th Street will be the ninth-largest in the city, and largest to be built in the past 35 years, according to CityRealty. [NYP] — Kevin Sun

Update: This story has been updated to clarify that the data regarding year-to-date changes in occupancy, room rates and RevPAR is from November.