Las Vegas fell well short of surpassing 43 million visitors that was anticipated at the beginning of the 2017, but analysts said they expect a rebound in 2018 as more renovated hotel rooms come back online.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority released statistics Tuesday showing 42.2 million people visited Las Vegas, a decline of 1.7 percent.
Some 42.9 million people visited Las Vegas in 2016, and it was highly anticipated the 43 million mark would be broached.
The Oct. 1st mass shooting that left 58 dead and more than 500 injured at a country music concert took a toll on visitation during the fourth quarter. In December, Las Vegas had 3.2 million visitors, down about 76,000 or 2.3 percent from December 2016.
Kevin Bagger, executive director of the LVCVA Research Center, said that while part of the dip is “tied to the fourth-quarter tragedy,” most of the drop off was due to a reduction in the city’s room count.
“Several properties are going through major renovations and upgrades,” Bagger said. “There were just fewer rooms available to sell during the year. All the other indicators (including gaming revenue) were really positive.”
Casinos took hundreds of rooms out of the pool in 2017 and many won’t be fully back online until the end of 2018, Bagger said. Hotels with 2017 renovations included Caesars Palace, Planet Hollywood, Harrah’s, Linq and the Cosmopolitan. Park MGM and Luxor will have renovations completed in 2018, Bagger said.
The city’s room inventory at the end of December was 148,897, down from 149,339 at the end of 2016.
There will be 1,600 new rooms coming online across the Las Vegas Valley, including 600 in the fall when Palace Station opens a new tower, Bagger said.
Occupancy rates in 2017 held steady at 88.7 percent citywide, down slightly from 89.1 percent in 2016, Bagger said. The midweek occupancy rate was 86 percent, and it was 94.5 percent on the weekends. The U.S. average is 65.7 percent.
The average daily room rate, meanwhile, was $129.45, a 2.8 percent gain over $125.97 in 2016.
Brent Pirosch, director of gaming consulting for CBRE, agreed that the drop in visitation is primarily attributed to rooms being off the market.
“To say we had a decline in 2017 after three years of record growth, it’s hard to complain it’s slightly down,” Pirosch said. “U.S. household net worth is a leading indicator for the Strip, and all the economic numbers point to another good year for the Strip in 2018.”
The visitation numbers are based on hotel occupancy and not on auto or air travel, Bagger said. The reason is some of those travelers are part of commercial travel or residents who live in Las Vegas.
When McCarran International Airport finalizes its numbers for 2017, airport officials said they expect to set a record.
While visitor volume was down, convention attendance set a record in 2017 at 6.6 million, up from 6.3 million in 2016 or 5.5 percent, Bagger said. All the attention goes to events like the Consumer Electronics Show that has an attendance of more than 170,000, but Bagger said the shows of less than 10,000 people represent two-thirds of the total.
