Japan's construction boom deflates hotel rates
A boom in construction and growing competition among hotels is causing rates for rooms in Japan to ease. The average rate for a room per night in Osaka for the last quarter was down 3.2% on the year to $140, reported British research firm STR. Meanwhile, the number of guest rooms in Osaka will this year rise to more than 10% higher than 2016's levels, according to CBRE data. Room rates may continue to ease as more hotels open ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

TOKYO -- International tourists keep flocking to Japan, but hotel rates are softening thanks to a construction boom and intensifying competition.

Hotel Villa Fontaine Osaka-Shinsaibashi saw its average rate dip several percent on the year for the April-June quarter. The figure was still 60% above the same period six years earlier, right after the catastrophic March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. But business is "entering the doldrums," said Shoji Kumagai, president of Sumitomo Fudosan Villa Fontaine, the hotel's operator.