No surprise, Maui hotels’ occupancy drops dramatically in August, performance report shows

Due to the wildfires on Aug. 8 in Lahaina, hotels in the West Maui area experienced a drastic decrease in occupancy last month, according to the August 2023 Hawai‘i Hotel Performance Report published by the Hawai‘i Tourism Authority.

The situation has negatively impacted hotel occupancy, average daily rate (ADR) and revenue per available room (RevPAR) for all regions in Maui County.

Maui County hotels earned RevPAR of $294 (-30.4% vs. 2022, -3.8% vs. 2019), with ADR at $564 (-8.6% vs. 2022, +43.7% vs. 2019) and occupancy of 52.2% (-16.4 percentage points vs. 2022, -25.8 percentage points vs. 2019).

Maui’s luxury resort region of Wailea had RevPAR of $461 (-24.5% vs. 2022, -19.0% vs. 2019), with ADR at $817 (-20.3% vs. 2022, +30.5% vs. 2019) and occupancy of 56.5% (-3.2 percentage points vs. 2022, -34.4 percentage points vs. 2019).

The Lahaina/Kā‘anapali/Kapalua region had RevPAR of $234 (-39.4% vs. 2022, -5.9% vs. 2019), ADR at $515 (-4.2% vs. 2022, +58.1% vs. 2019) and occupancy of 45.4% (-26.4 percentage points vs. 2022, -30.8 percentage points vs. 2019).

Maui hotels made up for some of the loss of tourism by housing fire survivors and relief workers.

The Hawaiʻi Tourism Authority also released data for all other counties:

Kaua‘i:

• RevPAR of $357 (+9.2% vs. 2022, +70.7% vs. 2019)
• ADR at $444 (+6.4% vs. 2022, +56.5% vs. 2019)
• Occupancy of 80.4% (+2.1 percentage points vs. 2022, +6.7 percentage points vs. 2019)

Big Island:

• RevPAR at $302 (-2.2% vs. 2022, +33.3% vs. 2019)
• ADR at $436 (+2.8% vs. 2022, +55.7% vs. 2019)
• Occupancy of 69.3% (-3.6 percentage points vs. 2022, -11.6 percentage points vs. 2019)

O‘ahu:

• RevPAR of $246 (+5.8% vs. 2022, +8.4% vs. 2019)
• ADR at $292 (+2.3% vs. 2022, +14.2% vs. 2019)
• Occupancy of 84.4% (+2.8 percentage points vs. 2022, -4.5 percentage points vs. 2019)

Hawai‘i hotels statewide reported lower revenue per available room, average daily rate and occupancy in August 2023 compared to August 2022. When compared to pre-pandemic August 2019, statewide ADR and RevPAR were higher in August 2023 but occupancy was lower.

According to the Hawai‘i Hotel Performance Report, statewide RevPAR in August 2023 was $275 (-7.7%), with ADR at $370 (-4.1%) and occupancy of 74.2% (-2.8 percentage points) compared to August 2022. Compared with August 2019, RevPAR was 12.6% higher, driven by higher ADR (+27.6%) which offset lower occupancy (-9.9 percentage points).