What's In Store?

By Cathy Jett

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Fredericksburg area is experiencing a room boom

July 8, 2009 5:36 pm

The Fredericksburg region is experiencing a hotel building boom.

There were 89 hotels with a total of 8,274 rooms as of this past May, the most recent month for which HotelNewsNow.com, which tracks the hotel industry, has figures. That's four more hotels and 334 more hotel rooms than last May, and 17 more hotels and 1,722 more hotel rooms than were here in May of 2004.

And it doesn't include the Courtyard by Marriott that opened at the corner of Charlotte and Caroline streets in downtown Fredericksburg last week.

The region, in this case, includes the city of Fredericksburg and the counties of King George, Prince William, Spotsylvania and Stafford. Of these, Spotsylvania accounts for 14 hotels, including a Residence Inn by Marriott that opened near Spotsylvania Towne Centre late last year and a Holiday Inn that opened in Thornburg at the end of March. That number will increase once the Candlewood Hotel under construction at Massaponax is finished.

Area hotels are doing comparatively well. The occupancy rate last May was 65 percent, and 57.9 percent year to date. While that was, respectively, a 4.8 percent and 4.4 percent decrease from the same time periods in 2008, it beat the state average. Virginia hotels had a 59.1 percent occupancy rate last May and a 57.9 percent occupancy rate year to date.

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Cathy Jett is the assistant business editor at The Free Lance-Star, and specializes in covering the area's retail scene.

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"What's In Store?" is about what's new with area businesses.