Tourist boom blows Singapore’s hotel room crunch out of proportion

Backpacking to turn to tent-hopping.

Touring around Singapore could go sour for some travellers as hoteliers run out of rooms and roofs to house all of them. And things could only get worse in 4 years’ time.

A recent study by Chesterton Singapore projects that hotel occupancy rates will rise from 80% now to 91% in 2014, with visitor arrivals continuing to soar at 7% per year.

“Healthy hotel occupancies typically hover around the 75% mark,” the report says, citing that the projection suggested a dire situation of room crunch.

The report also predicts that the limited supply of room will push hoteliers to increase rates thus compounding the already high hotel fees in Singapore.

Here’s more from the report:

Without any new rooms injected, the situation seems set to worsen in 2017 and 2018, when average occupancy rates spike to 88 per cent and 91 per cent respectively. It is also foreseeable that hoteliers would raise room rates given the severity of the developing hotel room crunch situation.

We strongly suggest that the Government review its policy and release more hotel sites for sale under the Government Land Sales programme, sooner rather than later.