Going against the grain when it comes to location is always a risky move in hospitality real estate. There’s a reason people love places like the Costa del Sol: ease of travel, familiarity, choice. It makes it an easy sell on both the investment and demand side of the equation. But what if you’re looking at addressing a different part of the market?
Catering for high end customers means giving them something they can’t get elsewhere and that is getting tougher in an age of abundance. Increasingly it’s not what you can give them but what you can take away. Privacy is now a rare commodity when it comes to European destinations and investors like Cedar Capital Partners are trying to gain an advantage by sourcing hotels in less-well-known destinations.
Last year we caught up with Nesrine Tourqui, vice president at Cedar Capital Partners to get her take views on where the luxury market might be heading.
On what luxury travellers are really looking for
NT: If I take the example of Greece, so we saw a lot of people traveling to the Cyclades, in Mykonos, in Santorini, which are now almost overpopulated, too many hotels too many people making it too crowded, you can’t go to a beach or restaurant … you have to book months in advance. And people don't want that anymore. They want to be on their own.
On untapped markets
NT: Albania, which is very close to Greece, and has no real infrastructure yet, but when the infrastructure comes I think it could be could be a nice potential [destination] for investors.
On ESG
NT: We want to make sure when we invest, we partner with the right brand, and part of ESG, as well as making sure we work with the local people.