Data show Trump's DC hotel was pricier and emptier than peers in 2017
Washington (CNN)Just a few months before President Donald Trump moved into the White House, his presence was already firmly established in downtown Washington, only a few blocks from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, at the newly opened Trump International Hotel.
New information obtained exclusively by CNN offers a rare glimpse into the business operations of what quickly became one of the President's most highly scrutinized businesses and a de facto clubhouse for his administration's officials and supporters. The numbers don't shed light on the hotel's profitability, but they do illustrate how Trump's property operates differently than some of its competitors when compared to an industry analysis also obtained by CNN.
Trump's hotel had an average monthly occupancy rate of about 50% through November 2017, according to data provided to CNN covering the first 11 months of 2017. That occupancy rate is about one-third below an industry average for a broad group of luxury hotels in Washington over the same period.
CNN compared the Trump hotel's monthly occupancy and room rates to a report by lodging industry research firm STR, which surveyed nearly two dozen high-priced, luxury hotels in the city that likely includes the Trump International Hotel. The hotel might measure itself against an even smaller, more elite subset of those rivals.
Despite the low occupancy, the Trump hotel charged nightly room rates that were 40% higher on average than those same nearly two dozen hotels.
According to STR's analysis, top-tier hotels in Washington reported an average monthly occupancy of 77% -- 27 percentage points higher than Trump's hotel. Those competitors charged an average of $334 per night versus Trump's $559 average daily rate.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/27/politics/trump-hotel-occupancy-rates-data/index.html
But countries like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia who want to curry favor with Trump are okay with the higher rates I guess.
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