Author of www.HotelLawBlog.com
3 June 2007
Hotel Lawyer in New York at the Hotel Investment Conference. It is Sunday night, June 3, 2007, and the New York Hotel Investment Conference is officially under way with its gala reception. It boasts an all time record number of attendees, which always signals good times in the hotel industry. And although the weather in Manhattan tonight involves a lot of rain, it is not dampening this parade!
We had a bit of a prelude to the investment conference at the Lodging Industry Investment Council (LIIC), the hospitality industry think tank, session before the party got under way, and Mark Lomanno, President of Smith Travel Research gave us some very encouraging news. I think you are going to like this and the statistics that under pin his analysis. Listen to this . . .
Showers for Manhattan, but sunny skies for the hotel industry for at least two more years.
Mark Lomanno summed it all up pretty well when he said, “We think that people should have been more worried six months ago than they were then, and they should be worried less today than they are now.”
In short, Smith Travel sees the second half of 2007 being much stronger than the first half, and sees 2008 going up from there.
Mark says that STR thinks our current place in the cycle looks a lot like the mid 1990s with a lot of peaks and valleys. There is a fair amount of volatility, but we are at the “intermission” poised for things to go up from here. He thinks that the next couple of years will look a lot like 1997 and 1998 — two of the best years in hospitality industry history.
Mark’s comments were based on STR’s analysis of the numbers. They see occupancy continuing to subside gradually , and ADR continuing to grow, but at a moderating rate. And he notes that in the late 1990s there were 45 months of consecutive occupancy declines with increased ADRs that led to the best times the industry has ever enjoyed.
As to the increasing supply, Mark Lomanno says that the approximately 190,000 rooms in the current pipeline are still less than the peak of 250,000 rooms in the supply pipeline in the 1990s, and he says that it is taking almost twice as long for these rooms to come on line today compared to 2000, and the supply increases are generally not overly concentrated in any geographic market and segment, so the increased supply poses less of a concern than it might in other times.
What does this all mean?
I find Mark’s comments consistent with a lot of other expert views we have aired here on www.HotelLawBlog.com, going back for many months. It is time for the Chicken Littles to take a rest. The sky is not falling (soon) because things are too good to stay this way for long. Let’s not talk ourselves into a recession.
I will post some of STR’s latest data and other information on this phenomenon soon. Stay tuned, and enjoy the sunny skies!
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Our Perspective. We represent developers, owners and lenders. We have helped our clients as business and legal advisors on more than $125 billion of hotel transactions, involving more than 4,700 properties all over the world. For more information, please contact Jim Butler at jbutler@jmbm.com or 310.201.3526.
Jim Butler is one of the top hotel lawyers in the world. GOOGLE “hotel lawyer” or “hotel mixed-use” or “condo hotel lawyer” and you will see why.
Jim devotes 100% of his practice to hospitality, representing hotel owners, developers and lenders. Jim leads JMBM’s Global Hospitality Group® — a team of 50 seasoned professionals with more than $87 billion of hotel transactional experience, involving more than 3,900 properties located around the globe. In the last 5 years alone, Jim and his team have assisted clients with more than 90 hotel mixed-use projects, all of which have involved at least some residential, and many have also involved significant spa, restaurant, retail, office, sports, and entertainment components — frequently integrated with energizing lifestyle elements.
Jim and his team are more than “just” great hotel lawyers. They are also hospitality consultants and business advisors. They are deal makers. They can help find the right operator or capital provider. They know who to call and how to reach them. They are a major gateway of hotel finance, facilitating the flow of capital with their legal skill, hospitality industry knowledge and ability to find the right “fit” for all parts of the capital stack. Because they are part of the very fabric of the hotel industry, they are able to help clients identify key business goals, assemble the right team, strategize the approach to optimize value and then get the deal done.
Jim is frequently quoted as an expert on hotel issues by national and industry publications such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Forbes, BusinessWeek, and Hotel Business. A frequent author and speaker, Jim’s books, articles and many expert panel presentations cover topics reflecting his practice, including hotel and hotel-mixed-use investment and development, negotiating, re-negotiating or terminating hotel management agreements, acquisition and sale of hospitality properties, hotel finance, complex joint venture and entity structure matters, workouts, as well as many operating and strategic issues.
Jim Butler is a Founding Partner of Jeffer, Mangels, Butler & Marmaro LLP and he is Chairman of the firm’s Global Hospitality Group®. If you would like to discuss any hospitality or condo hotel matters, Jim would like to hear from you. Contact him at jbutler@jmbm.com or 310.201.3526. For his views on current industry issues, visit www.HotelLawBlog.com.