With an average occupancy of 63.5%, the first quarter of 2024 closed for Athens hotels, recording an increase of 5.9% compared to the corresponding quarter of 2023.
The Average Room Rate (ADR) for the 1st Quarter of 2024, moreover, remained approximately at the same levels as last year, recording an increase of 3.9%, as it did not exceed 98.47 euros against 94.75 euros in the 1st quarter 2023, while the Revenue per Available Room (RevPar) increased by 10%, reaching 62.48 euros, compared to 56.79 euros in the first quarter of 2023.
March 2024 performance in terms of average occupancy did not differ much from March 2023: The increase was in the order of 1.5% (71.5% vs. 70.4% last March). The March 2024 Average Rate (ADR) increased by 7.4% as March 2024 reached €107.86 from €100.43 in March 2023, while the Revenue per Available Room (RevPar) in March 2024 reached up 9% to €77.08 in March 2024 – up from €70.72 in March 2023.
As noted by the Athens, Attica and Argosaronic Hotel Association (EXAAA), which provided the above data, 2024 tends to develop well, although especially for hotels in Athens – Attica, performance and prices could develop even better – in all sizes considered.
On this occasion, the Association makes special reference to some additional data related to the bed capacity and performance of the Athenian hotels, “both for the information of all, and to answer those who tend either to over-multiply the revenues of the hotels , or to downplay the chronic problems that are gnawing away at the destination’s top performance – and Athens’ hotel prices against its competitors.” These elements are:
- The hotel beds that pertain exclusively to the Municipality of Athens, i.e. are located within its boundaries, are absolutely specific and counted: Until 14.04.2024, they related to 295 hotel units, corresponding to 18,198 rooms and 34,790 hotel beds.
- Therefore, it cannot be true that the population of Athens increases tenfold every day, due to the tourists who “burden” the city and the Municipality of Athens. In the event that we had the maximum average hotel occupancy (i.e. 100% occupancy, in all the hotels of the Municipality of Athens), the city would be “burdened” with their accommodation every day by around 35,000 visitors (only 5.44% of the population of Athens based on the 2021 census).
- As, the Association emphasizes, we are also reading reports on hotel revenues related to past decades, it is an opportunity to remind everyone of the following:
-In the period 2007 – 2013 only in the center of Athens, 31 hotels (2,621 beds) were closed, out of a total of 83 hotels that were ‘closed’ throughout Attica.
-From 2013 to today, the hotel units that operate, changed hands, reappeared or first appeared in the center of Athens, did not increase the number of hotels as much as we might think or assume: Of the 227 hotels of all categories of the Municipality of Athens in 2013, we reached 295 in 2024, and the 27,569 hotel beds in 2013 increased to 34,790 in 2024, which essentially corresponds to 68 units – of an average of 106 beds and 50 rooms in the center of Athens. - The number of new hotel beds in this period, of 11 years, cannot even be compared with the multiple beds acquired by e.g. Barcelona in the corresponding period, or with the leapfrogging and anarchic growth of short-term rental beds in Athens, which reach 56,000 – according to data from Lighthouse (ex-Transparent). So how much more do hotels and hotel tenants burden the environment and the cleanliness of our city?
- And to what extent are the “so many hotels” that appear on our street really hotels? Is it time to look elsewhere for the beds and the causes and the extra taxes and fees of all kinds?
- The ‘Bearing Capacity Study’ of the EXAAA/ITEP destination (2022) proves our practical and substantial interest in the subject. We rang the ‘danger bell’ for the destination in time and pointed out that Athens must as soon as possible fully ‘map’ its supply and demand – both in terms of quantity and quality, set strategic goals and combat a series of chronic problems, weaknesses and pathologies.
- And the revenues of the hotels not only in Athens but in the whole of Attica do not exceed 2.5 billion euros annually. These are revenues recorded throughout the territory of Attica, in which, according to the most recent (14.4.2024) XEE/ITEP capacity data, 701 hotels are active, corresponding to 34,808 rooms and 67,350 hotel beds of all categories. Of this total, the 406 units corresponding to 16,609 rooms and 32,559 hotel beds are scattered throughout the Municipalities of Attica and of these, 7939 beds belong to the 4087 rooms of the 190 Hotels of the Argosaronic Islands.
- And concludes the comment of EXAAA:
- “We absolutely understand the desire, the need and the effort of both the Municipality of Athens, as well as the state in general, to improve their income from Tourism. But will this only be done ‘collectively’? By constantly increasing taxes, municipal fees and payments every hotels pay daily increased investment and operating costs and of course they also pay municipal fees, as well as municipal tax through electricity bills / basis of declared square meters etc., which we have already mentioned.
At EXAAA we believe that revenues from Tourism – something common to all of us – increase only by following a long-term and targeted strategy of further development (not only numerical but mainly qualitative) and by adopting a healthy framework of coexistence and fair participation of all businesses, and of all Tourism professionals not only in taxes and fees but also in the decisions about the future of the destination, without seals, and with a ‘compass’ of objective data and scientific research” _
