The biggest winners from this year’s World Cup are poised to be those able to rent out their properties, especially in the tri-state area.
Bobby Roufaeal, who manages more than a dozen short-term rentals in New Jersey, said a luxury rental in the state could bring in $240,000 between June 11 and July 19 when the tournament runs. He said he’s tripling rates for his units in anticipation of fan inflow for the games and fielding calls from homeowners looking to capitalise on demand.
“They’re like, listen, I’ll figure it out. I’ll go stay with my relatives for the month or for a few weeks just to be able to capitalise on this revenue,” said Roufaeal, founder of Settled In Property Management.
Already listings show a surge in prices. One six-bedroom Airbnb Inc property in Princeton, New Jersey, is offered at roughly $6,000 a night during the World Cup, about 140% higher than its price a year ago. That’s despite being more than an hour’s drive from the games being played at MetLife Stadium.
The fervour is reshaping the lodging market in World Cup cities across the US, which are expecting millions of visitors throughout the course of the tournament. Matches are also being held in Mexico and Canada.
“Big events like the FIFA World Cup create meaningful economic opportunities for local hosts, many of whom use the extra income to offset the rising cost of living,” Airbnb said in an emailed statement. “At the same time, guests still have a wide range of listing options to choose from — as of late February, roughly 80% of available listings across host cities were priced under $500 a night on average.”
For those renting out their homes, it can be a lucrative prospect — especially as Airbnb has offered as much as $750 in cash for first-timers to incentive new listings. For travellers, the cost of attendance adds up as prices surge for tickets, hotel rooms and flights. The tourism boom is expected to lift hotel rates in the host cities by an average of 300% around opening matches, the New York Times has reported. Those expenses are causing Mehdi Salem, the founder of French soccer fan association Les Baroudeurs du Sport, to find ways to save money as he organises accommodations for 80 of his members to see France play at MetLife.
He’s squeezing eight people in a room designed to sleep four and booked hotels in Manhattan more than a year before the games when prices were lower. Now, he is looking at spaces in New York City’s outer boroughs like the Bronx and Queens, as well as Airbnbs in less-travelled New Jersey neighbourhoods.
“Some prices are totally ridiculous,” Salem said.
Montclair, New Jersey, a well-off suburb, has seen a 169% increase in short-term rental occupancy during the group stage compared to the same dates last year, according to data as of March 26 from analytics platform AirDNA, which tracks rental demand, rates, and occupancy across host cities. Nearby towns of Clifton, Newark, Paterson and Jersey City, have also seen surges, the data shows.
Jamie Lane, chief economist at AirDNA, said that as the games grow closer — prices are poised to increase.
“When bookings start, people typically aren’t booking the properties that are priced really high,” he said. “Other properties that are more reasonably priced do get booked and then we see the delta between the available rates and the booked rates begin to merge.”