Those waiting around for lower interest rate policy are likely to be disappointed, but experts say creative borrowers and lenders across the hotel industry are being rewarded.
Recent coverage from across CoStar News Hotels has highlighted the current state of lending for the industry, including how many borrowers have had to look beyond traditional options. Here are highlights from that coverage.
Expanding options
The most recent meeting of the U.S. Federal Reserve's Federal Open Markets Committee showed that despite a new chair, interest rates weren't likely to immediately take a downward turn.
A recent panel at the NYU International Hospitality Investment Forum highlighted the importance of alternative sources of capital, such as EB-5 and CPACE lending.
Rachael Sery, managing director and national head of operations at George Smith Partners, a commercial real estate finance advisory firm, noted EB-5 is increasingly being used as senior debt after years of primarily being used as mezzanine or preferred equity.
During a recent podcast appearance, Peachtree Group CEO Greg Friedman noted creativity is increasingly important in hotel financing.
This is because traditional bank lenders largely remain sidelined.
"If an asset has great in-place cash flows, there's no challenges on refinancing," he said. "It's when they lack the cash flows and the asset performance isn't fully recalibrated to this new interest rate environment where they're starting to have struggles because the asset values dropped and in a lot of cases they need to bring in additional liquidity."
Experts believe broadly that transactions activity will pick up, buoyed by the overall availability of capital.
"I do think you're going to continue to see capital formation around the space and significant pickup in activity across" mergers and acquisitions, said Michael Bluhm, managing director and global head of real estate, gaming, lodging and leisure for Jefferies.
Meanwhile, elongated project times are decreasing the potential for new hotel development in California.
“That’s what I think is dampening investors’ appetite for new construction, that almost doubling the amount of time you’re paying the carrying costs of your financing,” Atlas President Alan Reay said.
Abroad, lender confidence seems to be increasing, leading to elevated activity in the Asia-Pacific region, in particular.
Deals activity
A Marriott development that is part of a recent $828 million convention district redevelopment in Cincinnati recently got a $540 million financing package, roughly half of which came in the form of public support, development firm Portman Holding announced.
CoStar News' Bryan Wroten recently compiled a list of the most noteworthy deals in the first half of 2026, including the $835 million sale of the JW Marriott Marco Island Beach Resort.
Internationally, Paris-based Tikehau Capital and Lisbon-based Quest Capital secured €200 million ($228 million) in alternative funding from Maslow Capital to launch an in-house operator called Selecto.