Greater Boston’s hotels saw a year-over-year increase of almost six percent in revenue per available room (RevPAR) in August, to almost $148, according to PKF Consulting USA, a hospitality industry research group.

Average daily rates (ADR) saw a boost of 5.4 percent to approximately $174 per night, with average occupancy holding steady at close to 85 percent, PKF, a division of Colliers International, found. 

Hotels in the Interstate-495 North submarket achieved the greatest increase in occupancy, jumping by 12.2 percent. The Downtown and Cambridge submarkets led ADR growth with 7.8 and 7.7 percent increases, respectively, in August. From a nominal standpoint, the Downtown submarket achieved the best overall RevPAR for August at $184.50.

The I-495 North submarket experiences 15.4 percent RevPAR growth, mainly from occupancy increases.

Year-to-date occupancy, ADR, and RevPAR improvement varied widely by location.

RevPAR improvements were greatest along Route 128 and I-495 South, each at 13.4 percent, followed by I-495 North at 8.7 percent, Cambridge at 7.2 percent, Downtown at 6.9 percent, and Back Bay at just 3 percent. RevPAR increases were driven by occupancy percentage increases more than rate increases for the suburban submarkets, according to PKF.

Conversely, for the Cambridge and Downtown submarkets, RevPAR increases were driven more by percentage increases in ADR. For Back Bay, the RevPAR increase was driven equally by occupancy and ADR percentage increases.

From a market segmentation standpoint, growth has been relatively consistent for 2011 YTD through August compared to the same period last year. The commercial segment gained one percentage point of the whole, while the group segment made up one less percentage point than in the first eight months of 2010. The leisure and other segments have remained consistent over the two periods of comparison.

In the end, most hotels in the greater Boston area finished August 2011 with strong RevPAR  results compared to the same period last year.