STR Weekly Insights: 14-20 September 2025

Analysis by Isaac Collazo

All financial figures in U.S. dollar constant currency. 

Highlights

• U.S. weekly RevPAR down again
• U.S. occupancy down 118 days since May, ADR only up over inflation five times
• Top 25 Markets causing U.S. RevPAR decrease
• Global RevPAR positive; ADR growth slowed due to calendar shifts
• Germany posted a growth week due to events
• Canada’s growth streak continued across all markets except Montreal
• Coming weeks don’t look any easier for the U.S.

Occupancy pulling down U.S. RevPAR

Unfortunately, revenue per available room (RevPAR) fell again in the week ending 20 September, and the decline of 1.4% was only slightly less than the previous week. Occupancy once again pushed the decline, falling 0.7 percentage points (ppts), although average daily rate (ADR) also dipped (-0.3%).  

RevPAR has fallen year over year in 16 of the 20 days processed for September and in 100 of the last 143 days (1 May to 20 September). Like this week, the primary culprit has been occupancy, which has fallen 118 days since 1 May. ADR has been a bit more resilient, declining 60 times since May, but that’s relative since it has only surpassed 1% growth 40 times during this period and has only surpassed the rate of inflation (~2.7%) five times in 143 days.

Houston impacting Top 25 Markets and national RevPAR change

No surprise, but the Top 25 Markets (T25) were again largely responsible for the RevPAR decrease, retreating 2.8% as the remainder of markets were collectively flat.  Different from past weeks, Houston (-20.1%) did not represent the largest T25 decrease—that spot was held by New Orleans (-22.4%). While Houston didn’t report the largest T25 decline, its size still had a notable impact on the T25 aggregate, accounting for 50 basis points (bps) of the T25 decrease and 30bps of the national drop. 

Other T25 markets seeing a significant RevPAR decline included Oahu, Miami and Washington, DC, where the measure fell by more than 10% during the week. 

For New Orleans, the story was a weekend fall (-41.5%) due to 2024 football comp whereas the other large decliners saw their declines on weekdays. Weakening occupancy was mostly responsible for all the large T25 RevPAR decliners. However, ADR also decreased in both day types among those markets.

New Orleans wasn’t the only T25 market to see a significant weekend decrease. Boston, Dallas, Orlando, San Diego and four other markets saw weekend RevPAR fall by more than 10%. T25 weekend RevPAR has decreased in each of the past four weeks, and the most recent week’s drop was the largest of the four. The decrease in T25 weekend RevPAR accounted for 80bps of the national weekly RevPAR decline

After seeing RevPAR gains in the prior two weeks, and in most weeks of this year, San Francisco had an off week with RevPAR falling 7.2% on an 11.5% ADR decrease as occupancy increased for a third consecutive week (to 86.7%). San Francisco tied New York City for the nation’s highest occupancy in the week. Altogether, 10 markets saw weekly occupancy top 80%, including Boston, Denver, Seattle, and Louisville. 

Outside of the Top 25 Markets, the Louisiana North market posted the highest RevPAR gain of any market (+22.5%) on strong occupancy gains. The largest hotel cities in the market are Shreveport, Bossier City, and Alexandria. Bossier City and Alexandria saw double-digit occupancy gains during the week that continued into the weekend. Nearly all cities in the market had strong occupancy growth during the entire week. Overall, the market has seen strong RevPAR growth since the end of May.

Buffalo was also a big winner (+21.7%) on strong gains Wednesday and Thursday due to a Thursday night NFL game. 

The annual movement of college football games also impacted many markets with Columbia, SC, RevPAR falling 45.5% this week after a similar gain in the prior week. 

In total (all U.S. markets), 87 saw RevPAR fall for the week as compared to 93 in the prior week. Most of those saw RevPAR fall by less than two percent. 

No change in class trend

The trend by hotel class was unchanged as RevPAR in Luxury hotels was up 1.3% and all others down with the sharpest decrease in Economy (-5%). Weekday RevPAR was better for most hotel classes. Weekend RevPAR was down for all hotel types, including Luxury. 

Group demand in Luxury and Upper Upscale hotels was down again for an 11th consecutive week, but the decline was the smallest so far (-1.2%). Large weekday Group gains were seen in several key markets, including Denver, New Orleans, San Diego, and San Francisco. Group ADR was also up again, but the gain was the smallest (+1.8%) of the past five weeks. 

Global ADR slowed, but RevPAR continued to grow

Weekly global same-store RevPAR, excluding the U.S., increased 5.6%, which was slightly less than a week ago. Unlike the prior week, the week’s gain was driven almost entirely by occupancy growth as ADR was held to +1%. 

China was mostly responsible for the slowdown in global same-store ADR. Excluding China, ADR was up 3.8%. 

China’s lower ADR growth was due to last year’s Mid-Autumn Festival, which was celebrated on Tuesday, 17 September 2024. The country’s ADR declined Sunday through Tuesday this year, increasing thereafter. Occupancy rebounded strongly, up 9.9ppts this year against the easy comp from last year. Overall, weekly RevPAR in China was up 13.1%.

Also contributing to the slower global ADR growth was Singapore, where the measure fell 37%. A year ago, Singapore hosted the Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix that led to a more than 100% ADR increase over the weekend.

France and Germany had a good week with same-store RevPAR up by more than 14% each on increasing ADR. Germany's strong week was event-driven. Munich led the country in RevPAR growth, with the quadrennial drinktec trade fair lifting market RevPAR (+52.3%). Düsseldorf followed with 36.4% RevPAR growth as a result of two trade fairs. Finally, Berlin welcomed more than 55,000 runners to the 2025 BMW Berlin Marathon on Sunday, 21 September. Ahead of the race, weekend RevPAR rose 72%.

Canada continued its RevPAR streak with the measure rising 3.4%, in line with previous weeks, and again driven mostly by ADR growth. On a total basis, all hotels, RevPAR in the country was up 4.6% with all major markets, except Montreal, seeing solid growth. 

Australia, Italy, and Mexico were down. Mexico saw a sharp decrease (-16%) due to a significant decline in Mexico City. Sydney and Milan contributed to their respective country’s RevPAR drop.

U.S. short-term outlook not favorable

As we feared, U.S. RevPAR failed to rebound even though the week had no significant comparable challenges. The next two weeks will be more challenging given the annual occurrence of two key Jewish observances (Rosh Hashanah & Yom Kippur). Additionally, the southeast will begin to see difficult comps to last year’s Hurricane Helene. 

While September MTD RevPAR still shows a 0.8% gain, we don’t expect the month to end on a positive basis. The only reason it is positive is due to a calendar shift from last year; we lost a Sunday and gained a Saturday in the first 20 days of the month. On a day-matched basis, U.S. September RevPAR is down 1.3%. Outside of the U.S., we expect global RevPAR to rise.