China for the Value-Minded Traveler

          The Year of the Dragon might just be the year to travel to China and take advantage of the hotel deals that abound there.  With many hotel chains opening up new venues throughout the country, there are many more rooms than guests to fill them, at least for the time being.  As an example, the hotel boom in Shanghai on the run up to the World Expo in 2010 gave visitors a wide array of luxury hotel rooms to choose from and the occupancy rate was 64.4 percent that year.  Just a year later that rate was down to 54.4 percent according to consulting and research group STR Global.  With hotel chains such as Hilton, Marriott and Hyatt expanding their operations, four in ten hotel rooms in China are now empty.

Popular Tourist Destination

          As the third most visited travel destination, behind the United States and France, China is expected to see a steady increase in the number of hotels during the next several years and many will be ultra-luxury facilities like the new Waldorf Astoria that opened in April 2011 in Shanghai.  While much of the demand for hotel accommodations in China comes from the increasingly affluent citizens of that country, visitors will still have an opportunity to take advantage of the glut of hotel rooms in the short term.  If you’ve been thinking of that trip to China, now may be the time to take the plunge.  See our series on China for more information about what to see and check our Awesome Accommodations pages above for some of our favorite hotels in China.