The London hotel market remained buoyant in October
and hotels in the regions also experienced further growth, according to
preliminary figures released today by PKF hotel consultancy services.Amongst the key cities, Liverpool topped the charts with Leeds,
Birmingham and Manchester not far behind.

In London the average room rate rose to £125.79, 10.7% higher than the
October 2005 figure of £113.67. Daily room occupancy was also up 7.6% on
2005 resulting in an overall increase in rooms yield of 19.1% to
£104.51.

The regions as a whole performed well with an overall yield increase of
5.9% to £56.73. Both occupancy and average room rate were higher
compared to the levels seen last October.  Liverpool enjoyed the highest
growth in yield, up 7.7% from the same period last year, driven solely
by higher average room rate as occupancy fell by 4.2%.

The cities of Leeds, Birmingham and Manchester also showed healthy
growth rates in either room rate or occupancy driving rooms yield
increases of 1.6%, 4.2% and 3.4%, respectively.

Robert Barnard, partner for hotel consultancy services at PKF, said:
“This month’s figures are encouraging and we are confident that in 2006
the UK hotel market will see the best performance in a decade. Occupancy
in London hotels has reached a level not seen since 1997 whilst average
room rate is at record levels. Meanwhile we expect regional hotels to
continue delivering steady growth rates.”
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