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Research Update: 2025 Start with Two Record Months

Monday, March 24, 2025 Research

Rental Visitors Spread over more Regions

Discover Puerto Rico conducts an ongoing visitor profile study to gain deep customer insights and adapt tourism strategies effectively. This study is facilitated by Future Partners, who works with local research vendor Gaither International and generates critical insights into visitor characteristics, including origin, purpose of visit, mode of transportation, and accommodations.

For the 2024 Puerto Rico Visitor Profile, visitor data was collected via an online panel and in-person intercept between January and December 2024, in multiple waves during each quarter of the calendar year. A total of 2,342 completed visitor surveys were collected in 2024.

A majority of visitors (66%) came to Puerto Rico for vacation, with visiting friends/relatives (15%) and business/convention/group meetings (7%) being other notable reasons. A substantial percentage of business travelers (60%) and cruise travelers (56%) were likely to extend their visits to Puerto Rico to accommodate further leisure.

The San Juan Metro Area and the East Region were the most popular areas of the Island visited. Hotel guests were less diverse in their geographic dispersal than vacation rental visitors, while Diaspora visitors were the most diverse in the geographic areas of the Island they visited. They accounted for 24% of total visitors.

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Hotel and Rentals with Increased Demand

The lodging demand in February, as monitored by STR (Smith Travel Research) and AirDNA, closely mirrored the results of January. Current estimates show a 9% increase in accommodation demand compared to the same month last year. Hotel room nights booked slightly increased by 1%, while available hotel room nights increased by 2% compared to February 2024. Overall, hotel occupancy reached 79%, representing a 0.5% decrease from 2024.

In contrast to the hotel segment, rental bookings increased by 20% in February compared to the previous year. Over 320,000 rental room nights were booked across the Island, marking a record 48% of total accommodation demand for this month.

Year-to-date, accommodation demand has increased by 8.5%. Future hotel and rental reservation pacing has not presented any significant changes for the next six months. Discover Puerto Rico continuously monitors travel metrics to report any impacts on the Industry.

Reseach update 2

Record Lodging Income

Like in January, lodging revenues reached record levels this past February, reaching $206 million, a 14% year-over-year increase. This was driven by a 25% ADR growth in the Puerto Rico Regional Luxury and Upper-Level hotels and a slight growth in overall hotel demand. All this pushed hotel revenues to $132 million (11%) and occupancy to 78.7%. Rentals saw an 18% year-over-year increase in revenue, reaching $74.6 million.

As of February (year to date), the lodging industry has produced $414 million in revenue, a 16% increase from a year ago and 33% more than in 2023.

According to Smith Travel Research (STR), the U.S. Lodging Industry Performance for February 2025 (percentage change from February 2024) was:

Occupancy: 59.1% (+0.5%)
Average daily rate (ADR): US$159.39 (+1.4%)
Revenue per available room (RevPAR): US$94.24 (+1.9%)

Arrivals with an 8% YOY increase

Arrivals with an 8% YOY increase

San Juan International Airport (SJU) continues to see record passenger arrivals. In February, the airport welcomed 539,000 passengers, an 8% increase from last year. Year-to-date arrivals have reached 1.14 million through February, with a forecasted growth of 11%-12% for Q1 compared to last year, despite some changes in flight itineraries from Canada, Mexico, and Washington D.C.

New services will begin on March 21, 2025, from San Antonio, Texas via Spirit, and on March 31, 2025, from San Jose, Costa Rica via Avianca.

Due to the damaged Pier 3, Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas has canceled its cruise transits into the San Juan ports. This has impacted the overall number of cruise passenger arrivals this season. As of February, the port of San Juan has welcomed 354,000 passengers, marking a 6% decrease compared to last year.

Due to scheduling changes, the Port of Ponce will host the Icon of the Seas during select dates in May and June. In preparation, the Puerto Rico Tourism Company (PRTC) and the city of Ponce are evaluating excursion options for visitors.

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