“Do you expect me to close the tenants’ room and throw them into the street?”

Is it possible to take out hotel customers in the middle of their stay Since they do not have a green passport, just because they entered the hotel long before the demand came? This is the question that many hoteliers are facing these days, after a demand that came from the Ministry of Health requires them to decide immediately – whether they are a short-term hotel with a green or long-term mark, but there is no possibility of both.

“What are we supposed to do with the tenants who signed a one-month contract and I am obligated to keep them? What do you expect me to close their room and throw them into the street?”, The marketing manager of one of the hotels in Tel Aviv tells Ynet.

“Why do I have to decide or or? I want to do both. If I have a tenant who is vaccinated why not leave him in a hotel? This creates a situation where hoteliers are at a loss and say to themselves that they will do what they see fit.

There is a bit of a naive thinking that if the hoteliers tell us – you can open then we will open straight. Give us time to get organized. I have over 60 people that this is their home, these are people who do not go against the establishment or do not want to get vaccinated but each got his turn for other times, I have a guest who got vaccinated first ten days ago and she wants to stay.

“What am I supposed to tell her? There are families here with children who gave up their homes and found our home with us, the parents were vaccinated but what will they do with the children who according to the green mark are supposed to be checked every 48 hours? This is unrealistic,” the principal wonders. Time to get organized properly and not face the moral dilemmas of taking tenants to the street from the hotel that has become their home in order to bring in tourists in the short term, as this is the preferred model for any hotelier financially, easily and materially after the difficult year.

“The long term rental solution was good so we could keep our heads above water during the difficult period we went through but now that there is permission to open, we prefer and need to return to the short term format but also can not take out at the same time those guests who have become tenants here and want to stay. “Good – to open the hotels – so that people can breathe a sigh of relief but did not think for a moment how to do it. We are a law-abiding organization that takes care of everything but we get to impossible places in front of our guests.”

The Brown hotel chain was one of the pioneers when it turned a large part of the chain’s hotels into a kind of apartment building, only the apartments were rooms and the guests became tenants. The lobby and common spaces became work spaces and shared cooking in the kitchen and the salary became from daily to monthly. The CUCU Hotel on Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv did the same, and later large chains such as Isrotel joined the Isrotel Tower Hotel, Fattal with Leonardo Plaza Haifa and Knicks Tel Aviv, Crowne Plaza with the Hotel in Tel Aviv, Club Hotel Eilat and Spot Hostel Tel Aviv.

“In renting short-term rooms, the price is about $ 150 for one night and for long periods the price per month is about 3,000 shekels, make the calculation which is better. Probably after a difficult year like the one we went through,” they explain in one of the hotels. “So obviously we prefer to go back for short rentals but we have customers who have long-term contracts, customers who have already become like family here at the hotel, and we can not require them to get vaccinated or leave before the end of the contract.”

For example, the Spot Hostel Hotel located in the Tel Aviv port. “At a time when tourism was on hold we changed the outline of the hotel in favor of long-term housing and found that we were becoming one big family with the tenants,” says Naama Shwicki, the hotel’s marketing director who is currently in trouble because it houses tenants who have long-term contracts. Get vaccinated and get a green passport. This is different from the guests who will arrive in the short term, which the hotel intends to offer at the same time, since they will have to present the green passport.

“In the coming months we will continue to rent rooms as an alternative to regular room sales for vacationers and provided all guests follow the guidelines of the Ministry of Health. We will allow anyone who meets the guidelines to continue renting rooms for the long term, and those who do not want to get vaccinated will end their stay.” Shviki.

The Brown chain decided to leave some of the hotels they opened for the long term in this format, LIVING – that’s what they call it, meaning for monthly rentals only. When these are the hotels: Brown Seaside, Theodore, Brown TLV, Townhouse, Townhouse Residence, WOM Allenby, Dave Gordon, Dave Lewinsky, Dave Downtown.

And all the rest will be open for vacations and short vacations: Lighthouse, Brown Beach House, Polyhouse – Tel Aviv, Villa Brown, Villa Brown in the colony and the chain’s new hotel that opened yesterday – Brown JLM.

At the CUCU Hotel in Tel Aviv, we stay in the current format, which is long-term accommodation, at least until the incoming tourism opens, the hotel’s management explains. But in hotels that have just been waiting for approval to reopen and receive guests even in the short term, since in terms of economic viability this is the preferred model for hoteliers, the decision is not simple and sometimes almost impossible.

The ALLOVE group, which operates the leading resorts Zimmer Land Villa Land, reports a dramatic 200 percent increase in demand for B & Bs and luxury villas for the upcoming Passover holiday, compared to Passover 2019, since last Passover was closed and therefore not included in the comparison.

Ilana Aloni, CEO of the ALLOVE Group, which operates the group, said: “This year, due to the obvious exclusion of B & Bs and villas as safe resorts for nuclear families, Israelis have quickly internalized the consequences of closed skies and are opting for rural tourism. Already now you can see a sharp increase in demand and the Israelis have already started reserving B & Bs, villas and guest rooms for the coming Passover that are filling up. Despite the demand, vacancies can still be found, and I highly recommend people to hurry up and reserve a B&B or a guest villa for Passover. “