Games frenzy boosts hotel rates
March 10, 2008
Home sharing an option. With this summer’s Beijing Olympics approaching, visitors face jacked-up prices for Western-style accommodation, although apartment rental can be an option
AILEEN MCCABE, Canwest News Service
The spectacular new air terminal is finished, the iconic bird’s nest stadium is one month from completion, an army of Olympic volunteers is already on the streets practising directing traffic and tourists, and with five months to go before the opening ceremonies, the Chinese capital’s hoteliers are dreaming in dollar signs.
Finding a place to stay in Beijing during the Olympics is still possible, but not cheap. “Only some 20 hotels in Beijing still have rooms available for reservations by foreign tourists during the period,” Tang Xiaofreng, senior hotel business development manager for Ctrip.com, China’s largest online reservation site, told the official Xinhua News Agency.
For the most part, he said, “only luxury suites are left for them to choose.”
Tang is talking about “starred” hotel rooms, taking for granted Westerners want to stay where English is spoken.
Beijing, which is expecting about 500,000 foreign visitors and more than one million Chinese tourists to descend on it during the Games, has 806 rated hotels with 220,000 beds, according to the tourism administration.
On average, these hotel rooms are going (or went) for about 10 times their usual rate for the duration of the Games.
The Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee said this year it expected the rate for a double room in a five-star hotel during the Games would be about $390 a night, $300 for a four-star hotel, $203 for a three-star and $135 for a two-star.
A very non-scientific telephone survey found a tad optimistic. Home Inn, one of Beijing’s no-star “budget” hotels, said that during the Games, its standard double is renting for $222 a night, compared with $25 today.
At the comfortable, but by no means fancy, four-star Comfort Inn and Suites in Chaoyang District, the central business and diplomatic quarter, you might be able to get a double room for August, if you move quickly. But you’ll pay $640 for a room that costs $97 a night this week.
Near the top end of the Olympic rental scale, The Renaissance Beijing is charging $1,112 a night for a deluxe room that usually goes for $222 to $305. Only longer-stay visitors need apply.
There are options for those who are ready to turn their backs on the ubiquitous marble and glass towers, notably home sharing or renting.
One rental agent is offering Olympic “deals” on vacant apartments that range from $67 a night to $1,111. Unfortunately, the website is in Mandarin only.
Piet Bos, an entrepreneurial expatriate Dutchman, knows what a barrier language can be and has set up Homestay Beijing 2008. He’s signed up fellow expats living in Beijing and is running a thriving business sub-letting apartments for the Games.
He boasts on his website that visitors will find staying in his sublets cheaper and easier than a hotel. There is more space, kitchen privileges - and a guaranteed English-speaking host.
There are Homestay rentals still available around the city. In Chaoyang district, for instance, the website shows a two-bedroom apartment for about $70, plus 20 per cent of your total rent for Homestay’s fee.
[original article at Canada.com]
