As usual, we have been talking to many hoteliers and vacation home managers in the Orlando area. We do this to get some forecasted near term travel outlook in the local Orlando tourism and convention markets.

Many of the hotels we spoke to have had an okay December 2008 with an unusually strong Christmas. January 2009 was below par when compared to last year. However, February 2009 numbers appear to be way down when compared to last year, and the bookings the pace for spring break (March/April) is significantly slower.

On the bright side, guests are making reservations, but they are booking at the very last minute. As an example, race week for the Daytona 500 in February 2008 filled Orlando three months in advance. This year, hotels were not getting a significant portion of their reservations until 3 days in advance.

Many short term rental management companies we spoke to last week think a general decline of 15-20 % in the number of visitors to Orlando would be realistic for 2009 as the United States and much of the world teeters on the edge of an economic recession, and possible severe recession.

In conclusion, 2009 short term rental bookings in Orlando will be off significantly from 2008. In addition, long term booking windows will become a thing of the past.

Much to the delight of those persons who still decide to visit the Orlando area in 2009, they will benefit from dramatic rate cuts, free upgrades and whatever else short term rental companies can do to entice visitors to stay with them over the competition.

Using our independent exclusive vacation reviews and ratings as a guide, we checked a few websites for vacation home rental rates. Here is what we found for a generic 4 bedroom/Sleeps 8 home:

* Good/Best Rated Subdivisions –  The mean rate in mid season was in the $133 per night range

* Fair/Average Rated Subdivisions – The mean rate in mid season was in the $108 per night range

Using our example above, there does appear to be a 22% rate differential to move into the better communities. We checked the low season rates as well and the price differential was very similiar. However, we did find that in the peak season and holidays, pricing patterns became very erratic and it became difficult to find any correlations between community quality and rates. This would be most likely explained by the surge in demand over supply during these time periods.

While this aspect of our brief analysis might lead us to believe there is some aspect of pricing efficiency, a deeper review of the rates advertised within each community varied widely. For instance, one of the examples was at least one home advertised for $140+ per night in what we consider to be the lowest rated subdivision based on amenities, common areas and quality of homes. In fact, in that same community, rates varied 40% for roughly the same accomodations at the same time of year. This was not unusual when we pulled up vacation villas within other neighborhoods as well. As we stated from the beginning, buyer/renter beware of what is out there for your Orlando vacation. Orlando villa rates are not priced efficiently .

Again, as we stated on other posts, it pays to shop around. We hope our community ratings section will help you as a consumer make a better decision. As always, the quality of the interiors of individual homes will vary within each community, so utilize the reviews as a guide.