Put to: Daniel H. Lesser and Cindy Estis Green.
Why it matters to buyers: A reporting-compliant set still needs an investment rationale. CoStar’s STR Benchmark rules address participation, composition and protection against isolating individual hotel data; they do not substitute for the buyer’s property-fit analysis. That distinction is the desk’s analytical interpretation of the published rules. (costar.com)
Draft framing of a good answer: Ask the expert to distinguish three sets: hotels competing for the same guests, properties supporting achieved revenue benchmarks, and transactions supporting valuation. Do not force all three purposes into one list.
Require a property-by-property explanation covering micro-location, room configuration, service level, affiliation, amenities, demand segments, seasonality and renovation status. Ask how the analysis changes when the subject has materially fewer rooms or less meeting space than its peers.
Separate observed asking rates from verified achieved performance. Where licensed data is insufficient, the answer should identify the gap and widen the underwriting range rather than manufacture precision.
Sharp follow-up: “Which comparable contributes most to the projected rate premium, and what happens if we exclude it?”
Evidence to request: Inclusion/exclusion matrix, observation periods, data permissions and sensitivity to alternative defensible sets.
Interview status: No expert response has been recorded.