August broke the three-month run of strong results, with state RevPAR up just 1% over last year. Rate carried the month as ADR rose 3% while occupancy slipped 1.3 points. Maui led the islands with RevPAR up 5%, helped by a 10% gain in Wailea. Hawaii Island was up 1%, Oahu was flat, and Kauai was the only island to go backward at -2%. On Hawaii Island, the Kohala Coast pushed ADR up 14% to offset a 3.4 point drop in occupancy.

Meanwhile, the lower end hotels that had been keeping pace with their luxury and upper upscale brethren gave back some ground in August. Midscale and economy RevPAR fell 4% statewide and 8% on Oahu. At the top end, luxury hotels lost 5.5 points of occupancy but held RevPAR roughly flat by pushing rate up 9%.

Oahu’s run of RevPAR growth stalled in August, with Waikiki slipping 1% even as Maui and the Kohala Coast kept climbing.

Total arrivals were down 6% for the month, with the US down 4%, Japan down 10%, and Canada up 1%. That is a sharp reversal from July’s 1% gain, although year to date arrivals are still 2% ahead of last year. The airlines did their part. Total seats were down only 1%, but load factors fell to 85.5% from 89.2% a year ago. The planes were there, the passengers weren’t.

The length of stay story continued in August. Average length of stay was down 11% from last year to 7.6 days, and combined with fewer arrivals, total visitor days fell 16%. Year to date, the average stay is 8.1 days compared to 8.8 days last year. Once again the hotel numbers don’t line up with the visitor numbers. Occupancy fell only 1.3 points while visitor days dropped 16% and visitors planning to stay in a hotel were down 8%. I’m still not convinced the visitor day figures are telling the whole story. One small clue is that the “Other” accommodation category is down more than 80% from last year in both July and August, which looks more like a change in how responses are coded than a change in how people travel. If anyone has insight into what changed, I’d like to hear it.

Kamehameha Schools sold the land under the Kona Village Resort to an affiliate of the lessee, Kennedy-Wilson, for $246 million. If you are keeping score at home, that is $1.64 million per key for the land. After buying it via foreclosure in 2016, the owners invested $400 million in a complete redevelopment of the property. With this purchase the owners have a total investment of over $4 million per room.

In more modest news, the Manago Hotel is rumored to have sold for $2.6 million. The hotel has been shut down but their James Beard Award-winning restaurant remains open.

I enjoyed joining an esteemed panel at the Hawaii Tourism Conference, where we covered the inventory of Hawaii visitor accommodations. Despite some recent headwinds, there will be continued hotel development both ground up and conversions. Ping us if you want to discuss these opportunities.

I’m wondering what’s been going on in the hotel investment market where hotels on the market don’t trade hands. Over the last couple of years, there have been at least a dozen hotels test the market with only one or two very small hotels trading. Whose fault is that: the seller, the buyer or the broker? Obviously, it’s not the broker on our listings, but why the major disconnect? And what is the solution? Asking for a friend.