PORTSMOUTH, New Hampshire—As seen in the third quarter United States Construction Pipeline Trend Report from Lodging Econometrics (LE), the top five markets with the largest hotel construction pipelines by projects in Q3 2023 were led by Dallas with an all-time high of 189 projects/21,840 rooms; followed by Atlanta with 140 projects/17,775 rooms; Nashville with 122 projects/16,046 rooms; Phoenix with 119 projects/16,455 rooms, and the Inland Empire, with 117 projects/11,784 rooms.
At the Q3 close, New York City continued to have the greatest number of projects under construction, with 46 projects/8,386 rooms. Phoenix followed with 26 projects/5,353 rooms, Atlanta with 26 projects/4,354 rooms, Dallas with 25 projects/3,178 rooms, and finally the Inland Empire with 23 projects/2,386 rooms.
Dallas had the most projects scheduled to start in the next 12 months with 80 projects/9,021 rooms, followed by Atlanta with 60 projects/7,311 rooms, Austin with 47 projects/5,683 rooms, the Inland Empire with 47 projects/4,668 rooms, and then Los Angeles with 46 projects/7,113 rooms.
Dallas also led the top five markets with the greatest number of projects in the early planning stage at the end of the third quarter with 84 projects/9,641 rooms, then Nashville with 59 projects/7,176 rooms, Atlanta with 54 projects/6,110 rooms, Los Angeles with 53 projects/8,699 rooms, and Phoenix with 51 projects/6,425 rooms.
Orlando had the highest number of new projects announced into the pipeline in the third quarter with 10 projects/2,217 rooms, followed by Phoenix with 9 projects/1,457 rooms, Dallas with nine projects/1,003 rooms, Nashville with 8 projects/900 rooms, and Atlanta with eight projects/782 rooms.
Renovation and conversion pipeline activity remained strong in the United States with 1,912 hotels/285,568 rooms under renovation or conversion. Forty of the top 50 markets in the U.S. had 10 or more hotels undergoing renovation or conversion at the end of the quarter. Atlanta had the greatest number of renovation or conversion projects in the pipeline in Q3, with a total of 40 projects/4,307 rooms.
In the first three quarters of 2023, the United States opened 345 new hotels with 41,115 rooms. Forty-nine percent of the new hotels opened through Q3 are within the top 50 U.S. markets. The markets with the highest number of new openings through Q3 were New York City with 14 hotels/2,407 rooms, Atlanta with 11 hotels/1,108 rooms, Detroit with 10 hotels/1,292 rooms, Houston with eight hotels/1,154 rooms, and Austin with eught hotels/1,001 rooms.
U.S. markets forecasted to open the greatest number of new hotels in 2023 are New York City with 30 projects/5,706 rooms, Houston with 13 projects/1,660 rooms, Atlanta with 13 projects/1,279 rooms, the Inland Empire with 13 projects/1,141 rooms, and Dallas with 11 projects/1,775 rooms. For the past three years, New York City has opened the most hotels per year and is forecasted to do the same through year-end 2024. In 2025, LE analysts expect Atlanta to surpass NYC and have the greatest number of new hotel openings, with 24 new hotels/2,874 rooms forecast to open by year-end.
