Hawaii’s Recovery Slows Amid Declining Hotel Bookings

Image: Hawaiian mountain range. (Photo Credit: Philip Thurston / E+)

by Mia Taylor
Last updated: 10:00 PM ET, Tue November 21, 2023

Heading into the new year, bookings for hotels in Hawaii are slumping and at the same time, airlines are also pulling some seats to the islands, none of which bodes well for the islands.

A new Hawaii Hotel Performance Report published by the Hawaii Tourism Authority and reported on the Honolulu Star Advertiser shows that hotel occupancy in October was at 74.5 percent, which was actually an increase of 2.3 points from the same month one year earlier.

Additionally, the average daily rate for hotel rooms statewide was up 2 percent to $347 from last October. Meanwhile, revenue per available room increased 5.2 percent to $258 and hotel room revenues statewide gained 5.7 percent from last October to reach $447.8 million.

Still, the report goes on to note that the fire-related fallout, particularly in the West Maui area, has led to what amounts to a year-over-year decline in the average daily room rate, revenue per available room rates, and overall revenue.

The report notes that the average daily rate for Maui hotels in October 2023 was $506, which represents a decline from last October of 3.2 percent. The revenue per available room also fell, decreasing 2.5 percent to reach $336.

“It really shows what we had, but the report doesn’t show were we are going,” Jeffrey Eslinger, senior director, market insights, Hawaii Visitors &Convention Bureau, told the Honolulu Star- Advertiser.

Looking forward, hotel reservations statewide appear to be on somewhat of a roller coaster ride. For December, they’re down 3.3 percent, in January they increase slightly year-over-year by 0.5 percent and for February 2024, the way things stand right now, hotel reservations are down 5.6 percent compared to last year. Reservation figures remain down—or at the very least flat—throughout much of the rest of 2024 through October, which is down a full 26.8 percent, according data analyzed by the Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau (HVCB).

There are some pockets of positive movement though. In Maui, hotel room reservations as of November 5 ticked upward 1.6 percent, but are down 3.6 percent for December and down 1.4 percent for January. Come February, room reservations drop a steep 26.1 percent in Maui and by October 2024 figures are down as much as 46.8 percent.

“What we are seeing on the books is not enough to offset all the losses we had on Maui from a statewide transient accommodations tax (TAT) perspective,” Eslinger told the Honolulu Star Advertiser.

Meanwhile an HVCB look at airline data also shows that the volume of non-stop air seats statewide from some of the top U.S. source markets is also on a downward trajectory. They declined 3.2 percent as of November and will drop even further in December by 8.1 percent. Looking forward to January 2024, the air seat analysis for the Hawaiian islands shows a 4.7 percent decline.

Studying just Maui, there’s expected to be a 16 percent reduction in airline seats. Heading to Kona, the decline in seats will be about 3.6 percent, while there will be a 100 percent decrease for Hilo and a 7.4 percent reduction for Kauai.

The shrinking number of airline seats won’t be taking place across of all of the islands however,. For instance, the Honolulu Star Advertiser reported that Oahu is expected to see a 1.5 percent increase in seats.

Eslinger told the Honolulu Star Advertiser that nonstop air seats from the U.S. to Oahu are forecast as flat to positive from January to April, but the neighbor islands are seeing declines.

The Maui wildfires may still be having a significant impact on travelers who might otherwise consider vacationing on the islands, Eslinger said.