Saudi Arabia and Egypt Lead Middle East’s Hotel Construction. The UAE Trails.

Hotel construction in the Middle East continues to increase despite the demand-side disruption caused by the U.S.-Iran war, according to a new report from Lodging Econometrics. A record 724 projects and 178,003 rooms were currently under construction in the region at the end of the second quarter. This was up 11% by projects and 10% by rooms year-over-year, the report found. This signals that developers are betting on the region’s structural growth and are willing to ride out the war-driven temporary market dip. “Our pipeline in the Middle East, 90% of it is in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey,” IHG CEO Elie Maalouf said during an earnings call on August 11. “We do have some of it, of course, in the UAE, very little in the other countries, but 90% in KSA, Egypt, and Turkey, which are far less affected, sit in the front line of where the conflict is today.” Development activity continued in Saudi Arabia in the fir