Manama: Rooms in hotels overlooking the Grand Mosque in Makkah have fetched SR98,000 (Dh95,981, around $26,133) a night in the last ten days of Ramadan, reports from the holy city said.
Tourism experts attributed the record prices to the role of middlemen who abuse the accommodation markets during the Muslim sacred month in the most sacred city for Muslims.
Hundreds of thousands of worshippers from around the world flock to Makkah to perform prayers, pushing up the demand for hotel rooms, particularly in the vicinity of the Grand Mosque.
“We have had a room occupancy rate of 100 per cent during the last ten days of Ramadan,” Majdi Younis, from the tourism and heritage commission in Makkah, said. “This has been a highly successful Ramadan.”
Prices for rooms in five-star hotels overlooking the Grand Mosque varied between SR1,400 and SR2,000 in the first 20 days of Ramadan, Al Hayat daily reported.
However, prices went up to between SR28,000 and SR40,000 in the last ten days. The figures rocketed in some cases to close to SR100,000 after middlemen created a black market taking advantage of the huge demand.
