Luxury Beach Resort Shortage Sends Spring Break Costs Soaring

The Naples Beach Club, a Four Seasons resort on the Gulf Coast of Florida, opened in November as a lodging industry rarity: a new luxury hotel built directly on a US beach.

It’s also a useful starting point for explaining why spring break vacations have become so expensive.

Americans — especially wealthy ones — are spending more on travel, and hotel developers are struggling to keep up. There are currently no new luxury beachfront hotels under construction in the US, according to data from CoStar Group Inc. The imbalance is driving room rates higher and feeding fierce competition among ...