Marriott, Hilton, and IHG continue to dominate the U.S. hotel construction pipeline at Q2’20 close

In the recently released quarterly United States Construction Pipeline Trend Report from Lodging Econometrics (LE), the franchise companies with the largest construction pipelines at the end of the second quarter of 2020 are Marriott International with 1,487 projects/195,952 rooms, followed by Hilton Worldwide with 1,395 projects/160,078 rooms, and InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) with 920 projects/94,499 rooms. Combined these three companies account for 68% of the projects in the total pipeline; roughly the same percentage as the Q1’20 close.

Hilton’s Home2 Suites and IHG’s Holiday Inn Express continue to be the most prominent brands in the U.S. pipeline with 415 projects/43,336 rooms and 371 projects/35,539 rooms, respectively. Hampton by Hilton follows with 304 projects/31,365 rooms and then Marriott’s Fairfield Inn with 302 projects/29,251 rooms. These four brands combined represent an impressive 25% of the projects in the total pipeline.

Other notable brands in the pipeline for each of these franchise companies are Tru by Hilton with 298 projects/28,863 rooms; Marriott’s Residence Inn with 208 projects/25,520 rooms, SpringHill Suites with 184 projects/20,842 rooms, and TownePlace Suites with 207 projects/20,802 rooms; and then IHG’s Avid Hotel with 189 projects/17,090 rooms.

In the second quarter of 2020, LE recorded 580 conversion projects/66,852 rooms. Of these conversion totals, Best Western dominates with 150 conversion projects/13,482 rooms, alone claiming 25% of the conversion pipeline by projects. Following Best Western is Marriott with 79 projects/13,721 rooms, Hilton has 69 projects/11,279 rooms, and IHG recorded 50 projects/5,382 rooms. Best Western and these three franchise companies combined account for 66% of all the rooms in the conversion pipeline across the United States.

In the first half of 2020, 313 new hotels with 36,992 rooms opened across the United States. Of those openings, Marriott, Hilton and IHG collectively opened 69% of the hotels. Marriott opened 90 hotels 11,036 rooms, Hilton opened 82 hotels/8,728 rooms, and IHG opened 44 hotels/4,190 rooms.

One of the hardest decisions multifamily developers and their design teams have to make is what mix of amenities they’re going to put into each project. A lot of squiggly factors go into that decision: the type of community, the geographic market, local recreation preferences, climate/weather conditions, physical parameters, and of course the budget. The permutations are mind-boggling.