SHEBOYGAN, Wisc. — Typically, you can get a room at Sheboygan’s Blue Harbor Resort for anywhere from $190 to $330 per night. For Thursday, Sept. 23, the cheapest room left on the hotel’s website is $4,500.
This is because almost all area hotels and rentals have been completely booked for the Ryder Cup, the biennial competition that brings together the best players from the United States and Europe and which this year will take place at Whistling Straits, just north of Sheboygan.
Before being delayed in 2020 due to the pandemic, the Ryder Cup was projected by Visit Sheboygan to bring $30 million to the county. Tickets are sold out and as of Wednesday were starting at $300 per day on secondary markets.
For guests and attendees who have not secured a place to stay, most local options will cost more than $1,000 per night.
A search on Airbnb shows the price increase in the rental homes. As of Wednesday, there were bedrooms in Cleveland and Sheboygan going for $450 per night, and the next cheapest option in the area was $900. One house in Kiel that advertised its nearness to the Ryder Cup was going for $5,000 per night.
A quick search for Sheboygan-area hotels on Hotels.com showed just one option Wednesday: Belgium Inn & Suites, with two rooms left at $450 per night. According to the site, “90 additional properties aren’t available for your travel dates.”
Cameron Bopp, regional manager for Pride Hospitality LLC, oversees three hotels in the Sheboygan area — Harbor Winds Hotel, The AmericInn and Holiday Inn Express. According to Bopp, reservations for the event started coming in three years ago.
A map of available Airbnb rentals and their prices over the weekend of the Ryder Cup event.
All three of the locations are completely booked for the event. Although they’ve been booked by corporations and are not taking public reservations, prices at least doubled, he said.
“With high demand comes high prices,” Bopp said.
The Fairfield Inn and Suites Sheboygan, another hotel sold out for the event, had rooms going for around $1,200 a night with a five-night minimum, according to an employee.
Even many hotels as far away as Manitowoc and Two Rivers are completely booked for the weekend.
One Airbnb host, Eric Hahn, listed his three-bedroom, two-bathroom home in Howard’s Grove for $3,000 a night. This is his first time listing his house.
“The Ryder Cup is the only reason I signed up for Airbnb,” Hahn said. “I would consider doing it again, but I need to make a decent amount of money to make it worth finding somewhere to stay for a family of five.”
Hahn said that he determined the price for his listing based off what his neighbors were listing their rentals for. Homes in his surrounding area are listed for around $2,500 a night.
Jaimie Kurtz, the host of a three-bedroom, three-and-a-half-bathroom home in Plymouth listed for $3,750 a night, said he decided to list his rental for the event when he noticed the rates for local hotel rooms.
“I took the size of my home, how many it sleeps, the amenities and the distance from Whistling Straits to determine the price,” Kurtz said. Kurtz, like most of the hotels and other rentals, has a three-day minimum for his listing.