More than 30,000 foreign residents will arrive in Puerto Vallarta during the winter period, to stay an average of three months in residential homes and condos owned by the winter traveler or rented through online platforms, according to Ramón González Lomelí, municipal director of tourism.
Lomelí noted that this year “there were security situations sadly for some destinations and favorable for Puerto Vallarta, a destination strengthened as a number one travel option, we have been talking and planning strategies, and have been working all this year just to work on the negative image generated by some parts of Mexico, the first was insecurity, the second was the sargassum and the third is that right now Puerto Vallarta is staying attractive by lowered rates”.
This, he said, greatly affects the other destinations, however, and fortunately, he said that Puerto Vallarta has been recognized as a very safe place, which has allowed an important number of foreign residents to remain in the city for extended times.
Starting November, he said that a large number of foreign tourists have been seen to arrive, and even hotel occupancy is around 62 percent, which is surpassed by the condominium occupation that is currently above 80 percent.
“Right now, the condominium and residential offer has generated such interest that we already have many foreigners in Puerto Vallarta, and if last year we reached around 33,000 foreign residents during most of the five or six month season, now I think we are going to exceed that because every day we are increasing the offer of condominiums. ”
Lomelí insisted, many long-stay tourists are arriving at the destination, and many of the snowbirds range between 45 and 60 years old with very good economic potential.
For this reason, currently you can see in the restaurants of the Emiliano Zapata neighborhood a large influx of foreign visitors, mainly from the United States and Canada, and not only in this area but this same situation can be seen in Marina Vallarta.
In this context, González Lomelí pointed out that although last year at this time the hotel occupation was almost 80 percentage points and today it is lower, the reality is that the destination, in general, is around 85 percent occupied, this insisted, derived from the high number of visitors staying in condominiums and residential homes.
The report is positive for Puerto Vallarta and especially because winter travelers are largely outside of the all-inclusive hotels, these people go out and consume in the town, being an economic advantage for all sectors of the city.
Finally, he said that undoubtedly Puerto Vallarta will live a splendid winter season, “because we are still very presumptuous in the fact that everything is safe and very clean, and that is giving us a very good incentive,” he concluded.