NY Times: Migrant Hotels Make Visiting New York City More Expensive than Ever

The cost of illegal immigration is bearing out in the Big Apple and tourists are the latest to foot the bill.

New York City is more expensive than ever to visit, primarily due to Mayor Eric Adams (D) converting tons of hotels into shelters for newly arrived migrants, the New York Times reported Saturday. As Breitbart News has chronicled, Adams currently has about 65,000 migrants living in more than 16,500 hotel rooms across New York City.

WATCH — Mayor Eric Adams Floats Giving NYC Lifeguard Jobs to Migrants Because They’re “Excellent Swimmers”:

NYC Mayor's Office

The result has been skyrocketing hotel room costs for tourists who pay the price while hotels, often owned by the largest conglomerates, are raking in up to $185 per hotel room per night, whether migrants are staying in the room or not.

“The average daily rate for a hotel stay in New York City increased to $301.61 in 2023, up 8.5 percent from $277.92 in 2022, according to CoStar, a leading provider of commercial real estate data and analysis,” the Times reported:

During the first three months of 2024, when prices traditionally dip, the average stay was still 6.7 percent higher than during the same time period last year: $230.79 a night, up from $216.38 in 2023. [Emphasis added]

About 135 of the city’s roughly 680 hotels entered the shelter program, with many congregated in Midtown Manhattan, Long Island City in Queens and near Kennedy International Airport — all traditional magnets for tourists. Participating hotels are paid up to $185 a night per room, according to the city. Not a single one has converted back into a traditional hotel. [Emphasis added]

…

Beginning in late 2022, the city entered into a contract of up to $980 million with a hotel trade group to pay hotels that decide to shelter migrants under its “Sanctuary Hotel Program.” City officials said the hotels receive between $139 and $185 a night per room, whether or not the room is occupied, guaranteeing them a fixed stream of income. (Those rates do not include money the city is spending on food and other services for migrants; there have also been reports of hotels being paid more than $185 a night.) [Emphasis added]

Today, New York City — a city of almost nine million residents — has fewer than 122,000 available hotel rooms for tourists to compete for. Over the next three fiscal years, New Yorkers are projected to pay about $10 billion for migrants arriving in the city.

WATCH — NYC Democrat Mayor Eric Adams Yelled at on Flight by Woman Angry over City’s Problems:

Pro-Palestine Flyer / LOCAL NEWS X /TMX

Like hotel rooms, rents have continued to soar across New York City as waves of migrants pour in undeterred by the prospect of being jobless and in shelters.

Most recently, Bloomberg reported that rents in New York City are “so high that only five percent are affordable for the average salary.”

“Soaring rents and high upfront costs mean that fewer than 5 percent of New York City apartments were affordable for the average local worker last year,” Bloomberg reported:

New Yorkers earned on average just under $89,000 last year, meaning they could afford up to $2,216 per month on housing without spending more than 30% of their annual income, according to a new report by Zillow Group Inc.’s StreetEasy and tech:nyc. Factoring in average upfront costs, which includes the first month’s rent, a security deposit and broker fees that amounted to $10,454 last year, the average worker could only afford 4.4% of rentals on the market without breaching that affordability threshold, the report said. [Emphasis added]

Despite illegal immigration sending hotel and housing costs to record highs, Adams has pleaded with President Joe Biden to more quickly get work permits to migrants who arrive at the nation’s southern border and are subsequently freed into the United States interior.

Experts have previously told Breitbart News that handing out work permits en masse to newly arrived migrants would serve as a pull factor for more illegal immigration at the southern border rather than a deterrent.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.