According to data from the Hospitality Asset Managers Association, hotel owners and asset managers are generally optimistic about revenue performance heading into the end of the year.
More than half of respondents (56.9 percent) in the HAMA Fall 2026 Industry Outlook Survey said that at least 51 percent of their hotels are expected to outperform budgeted revenue per available room in 2026, while only 15.3 percent said fewer than a quarter of their hotels would beat budget. The largest share of respondents said that between 51 percent-75 percent of their properties would exceed their budgeted RevPAR, suggesting overall portfolio strength rather than reliance on standalone assets.
Nearly two-thirds of respondents expect RevPAR increases of at least 4 percent, including 18.1 percent who anticipate gains exceeding 7 percent. Only 2.8 percent forecast a decline, while fewer than 7 percent expect flat performance. The results suggest that demand fundamentals and pricing power remain sufficient to drive growth despite ongoing economic uncertainty.
During a media presentation on the survey Emily Miller, VP of asset management for Atrium Holding Company, said that her team developed their 2026 budgets based on the survey results from a year ago, when “everything was a little bit more pessimistic,” she said.
“If you looked at the prognosticators back in last year in the fall, they were projecting very low growth into [2026],” said John Paulsen, SVP at Hotel Asset Value Enhancement (or hotelAVE). “Then, as the year progressed, we started to see those numbers and those forecasts lifted.” Paulsen also noted that the summer’s FIFA World Cup helped drive occupancy and rate in markets where matches were held.
Margin Compression
Discussing what is driving margin compression and where expenses are creeping faster than revenue, Miller highlighted labor as a significant player. “From a productivity standpoint, from a wage standpoint, it's the one most easily influenced—or not—by human error,” she said, noting that artificial intelligence may be improving the situation.
Paulsen agreed that labor is a key expense but noted that the costs of supplies as well as food and beverages have increased as well. Menu engineering can help mitigate those costs, he added—“but you can only cut so much sometimes, and it's really squeezing the middle.”
Miller also said that utilities are also increasingly expensive—“We're seeing surcharges there exponentially greater than one would have ever budgeted”—and noted that loyalty programs have become more costly for branded hotels.
Convergence
On that topic, Dina Winder, EVP of asset management at Highgate, emphasized that while brands “play a role,” the goals of owners, asset managers and brands may not always coincide. “The brands are a fee business [while] owners are a bottom-line business, so it's top line versus bottom line,” she said. “How do you converge the two?”
She noted Hilton’s recent reductions in loyalty fees for properties with high customer-service scores. “That's a recognition that the brand costs are escalating,” she said. “We see brands pushing out [property improvement plans] and [fixed renovation-cycle management] renovations more and more because they recognize that there's not an unlimited cache of money that's set aside.”
Sean Kreiman, SVP of asset management at CHMWarnick, agreed with Winder’s perspective, noting that asset managers can work with property teams to identify new opportunities for revenue—and returns for owners. “We're looking at performance, and how do you align those two views [of] what our owners need in their hotels and what the brands are trying to get to to build loyalty.”
While the relationships among asset managers, owners and brands will always be “push and pull,” Winder said, the brands “exist for a reason, and they do provide a great pipeline of business that we pay for.”