With the first quarter of 2013 behind us, we thought we should take a look at the volume and trend data. After observing a decrease in volume and cumulative value for hotel transactions at the end of 2012 compared to 2011, the trend in 2013 has reversed significantly and for the better. First quarter of 2013 saw 150 transaction worldwide and 113 in the U.S. vs. only 54 and 52, respectively, in the first quarter of 2012. That is a jump of 178% worldwide and 117% in the U.S. (Naturally, our tracking of non-U.S. transaction is still very sparse, so the real observable trend is in the U.S.).
We also decided to provide you with a summary of the distributions by property type and location type for the first quarter. Interestingly, investors are almost equally focused between Urban and Suburban properties with the focus on Upscale and Upper Upscale properties. (We recently updated our property types classifications to align ourselves with the latest STR classifications; clean up, though, is still in process).