21 percent of tourist activity in Delaware//Photo courtesy of Rehoboth Beach-Dewey Beach Chamber of Commerce.
If home-rental spending were subject to the state’s public accommodation tax, the state could have raised an extra $86.1 million in revenue in 2014 because the rental home market hit the $1 billion market for the first time, according to a tourism report.
The public accommodations tax brought in $22.3 million in 2014, up 11.4 percent from 2013.
About 8 million tourists visited Delaware in 2014, about 500,000 more than in 2013. Delaware’s $3 billion tourism industry accounts for 5 percent of the state’s gross domestic product, according the report issued by the state’s tourism office. Tourism brought in $470 million in taxes and fees in 2014, about 10 percent of tax revenues.
The average Delaware tourist is 52 – six years older than the U.S. average. That tourist’s household income is higher, too – $101,372, compared with $86,292 nationally. The average visit is 2.46 nights, and average daily per-person spending is $102.
About 34 percent of Delaware tourists come from states with their own beaches – 18 percent from New Jersey and 16 percent from Maryland. About 15.5 percent come from Pennsylvania, with a large chunk of those from Harrisburg. More than 12 percent are homebodies – Delaware residents. More than 12 percent hail from New York. Only 1.8 percent come from the District of Columbia.
Visitors spend 25 percent of their budgets on food, 18 percent on shopping, 14 percent on entertainment and 15 percent on accommodations.
The most popular activities are shopping (30 percent), dining (25 percent) and the beach (21 percent).
Tourism employment is up. About 7.4 percent of Delaware workers are employed in the tourism industry. In Sussex County, 16.7 percent of workers are tourism workers.
Rental home revenue rose 8.8 percent in 2014, with an estimated 38,422 seasonal second homes rented for approximately $1.07 billion. More than 96 percent of the homes are in Sussex County.
