Vacation Rental Occupancy on the Rise

Vacation rentals statewide continue to be on the rise. All counties saw a rise in vacation rental supply.

In December 2019, the total monthly supply of statewide vacation rentals was 856,800 unit nights and monthly demand was 645,600 unit nights, resulting in an average monthly unit occupancy of 75.3%. The unit average daily rate (ADR) for vacation rental units statewide in December was $234, lower than the ADR for hotels ($352).

In December, Maui County had the largest vacation rental supply of all four counties at 293,000 unit nights, which is an increase of 27.6% compared to a year ago.

Unit demand in Maui County was 231,400 unit nights, resulting in 79% occupancy (+1.8 percentage points) with an ADR of $278 (+15.1%). Maui County hotels were 76.8% occupied with an ADR of $540.

For the month of December, Hawaii County had 204,400 available unit nights (+10.6%). Unit demand was 146,800 unit nights (+18.1%), resulting in 71.8% occupancy (+4.6 percentage points) with an ADR of $181 (+14.9%). Hawaii Island hotels were 79.5% occupied with an ADR of $330.

In comparison, Hawaii’s hotels were 80.2% occupied in December 2019. Unlike hotels, condominium hotels, and timeshare resorts, vacation rental units are not necessarily available year-round or each day of the month.

HTA’s Tourism Research Division issued the report’s findings utilizing data compiled by Transparent Intelligence, Inc. The data in this report specifically excludes units reported in HTA’s Hawaii Hotel Performance Report and Hawaii Timeshare Quarterly Survey Report. In this report, a vacation rental is defined as the use of a rental house, private room in private home, or shared room/space in private home. This report also does not determine or differentiate between units that are permitted or unpermitted. The “legality” of any given vacation rental unit is determined on a county basis.