from the San Diego Business Journal, September 5, 2011:

Robert Rauch, president of San Diego-based hospitality consulting firm R.A. Rauch & Associates Inc., said local hotel revenue, as well as occupancy and room rates, continue to improve, and the San Diego region generally has a strong year-round tourism climate, as well as barriers to entry for new properties.

Those factors will likely make hotels attractive to investors for the foreseeable future, although under current conditions, Rauch said he is generally not as bullish about the investment market as he was a few months ago. He said acquisition momentum will likely slow because available trophy properties have been snapped up.

The larger real estate investment trusts that wanted to go shopping have already done so, and others are finding that there aren’t the same number of lending sources as there were when the buying season was at its peak.

“The lenders are out there, but it just takes some work to find them,” Rauch said. “It’s going to be a market-by-market, asset-by-asset situation.”