Business travelers are missing: summer business may not save German Hotels

Business travellers are missing
Summer business may not save German Hotels

The Corona-crisis has hit the German hotel industry with full force. The summer business with many domestic tourists can’t close the gaps, the lack of business travel in the profit and loss accounts of the operator have ripped.

Among other things, large exhibitions and small conferences are missing, so that the first houses of the “Hessischer Hof” in Frankfurt have already announced their closure.

Full of beaches, empty inner cities: Even in the peak travel month of August, the German tourism industry in the aftermath of the Corona-pandemic feel. In the accommodation with at least ten beds were registered in the month to 49.6 million overnight Stays and, thus, 14.2 percent fewer than a year earlier, as the Federal Statistical office reported on Thursday. In particular, foreign visitors did not take place: your bed, the number fell year on year by 56 per cent to 4.7 million.

Even if felt, almost everybody has a holiday in Germany, and the domestic destinations have risen, according to ADAC, once more significantly: The number of Nights spent by residents decreased by 4.7 per cent to 44.9 million. Here the lack of business could not be compensated for travel. In the first eight months, the Hotels and other establishments are now with 212.2 tax million overnight Stays 37.4 percent behind the same period last year, the normal termination of the months of January and February included.

The managing Director of the hotel Association Germany (IHA), Markus Luthe, sees a “dramatic wave of insolvencies” on the industry to curtail, if only the holiday regions have reasonably pay normal guest. In August, the average occupancy rate of the German hotel industry amounted to 38.9 percent, he said on Wednesday at a hearing in the Bundestag. The profitability of zone start, but only at 60 percent. Even with discounts, the demand for boost, so that of the Business Hotels of 14.3 per cent, with the business expected this autumn.

The Head of the German centre for tourism (DZT), Petra Hedorfer, does not believe in a quick recovery. According to forecasts, the German holiday travel sector in 2023 will grow to six percent, while in the business travel segment is still a quarter of less of the revenue will achieved, she said, also in the Bundestag. Corona is for many businesses, “financially and structurally endanger the existence,” said Hedorfer. In many cities, the tourism sector needs to be more than 50 percent of the business travelers.

In the result, the real estate market for Hotels is rapidly declining, as the consulting company Jones Lang La Salle (JLL) reported on Thursday in Frankfurt. Since the outbreak of the crisis there is less and less Deals, for the full year, the broker expects half the transaction volume on the German market.

The weak occupancy very existence are the rates for many operators hazardous, says the JLL expert, Heidi Schmidtke. It expects Bailouts, the extent of which was not exactly visible. Market uncertainty and tougher financing conditions should lead to price discounts. Currently, the seller searched but yet to find other possibilities for use: in particular, smaller objects in a Price range of up to 5 million euros would be currently purchased with the goal to turn them into residential buildings. This Trend could extend in coming months to larger houses.