St. Croix's Winter in Numbers for Villas and Hotels

Updated 19 October 2026. After a source check by the standards desk, 2 quotations were set as plain text because the source gave them as its own paraphrase. Corrections log.

On Saturday 31 October 2026 a United Airlines Boeing 737-700 with 126 seats is scheduled to land at Henry E. Rohlsen Airport on St. Croix from Newark. The U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism announced the weekly nonstop on 1 June. It arrives on an island that received 185,349 air visitors in the whole of 2025, according to the territory's Bureau of Economic Research, and where a 150-room resort is shut for a rebuild that its developer expects to finish in the fourth quarter of 2027.

This report sets out the island's ledger for the winter of 2026-27: air arrivals, airline seats, hotel rooms, rental estimates, the monthly calendar, cruise passengers, taxes, platform fees and risks. Each figure is given with its publisher and its date. The Bureau's sheets carry the note “Data subject to revision”, and in three places they contradict themselves. Those places are marked.

The worked example is The Cerulean, a five-bedroom villa on the island's East End that sleeps twelve and is managed and booked through SP Vacations, the rental brand of Sterling Point Real Estate. It is used here to show how one large rental's published terms sit inside the island's figures. Its rates, occupancy and revenue are not public, and none is given or implied in this report.

Air arrivals by island

St. Croix had 185,349 air visitor arrivals in 2025 and St. Thomas and St. John, which the Bureau reports together, had 723,563. The figures are from the Bureau of Economic Research sheet “Air Visitor Arrivals, January 2025 to May 2026”, dated 13 July 2026. By our arithmetic on the two island columns, St. Croix took about one in five of the air arrivals that year.

The first five months of 2026 widened the gap. St. Croix had 89,026 arrivals from January to May, up 1.5% from 87,678 a year earlier. St. Thomas and St. John had 404,896, up 16.9% from 346,401. St. Croix's gain came late: January brought 16,690 arrivals, down 25.7% from 22,464, and May was up 19.1%. The Bureau's first-quarter line for St. Croix is 56,370 against 59,531, down 5.3%, while St. Thomas and St. John rose 17.4%.

Air visitor arrivals

St. Thomas and St. JohnSt. Croix

Period	St. Thomas and St. John	St. Croix	St. Croix, change on a year earlier
2025 full year	723,563	185,349	-
Jan-May 2025	346,401	87,678	-
Jan-May 2026	404,896	89,026	+1.5%
Q1 2025	213,086	59,531	-
Q1 2026	250,232	56,370	-5.3%

Data subject to revision. The Department of Tourism's release of 8 April 2026 gives St. Croix 56,616 arrivals for the first quarter of 2026 and calls it a 2% increase.

Source: USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Air Visitor Arrivals, January 2025 to May 2026, dated 13 July 2026

The Department of Tourism published a different first quarter. Its release of 8 April 2026 gives 303,388 arrivals for the territory, up 12% on 2025, with 246,772 on St. Thomas, up 15%, and 56,616 on St. Croix, which it describes as a 2% increase. For March alone it gives St. Croix 23,432, up 20%, where the Bureau's later sheet has 21,543, up 10.6%.

The two agencies' 2026 counts for St. Croix's first quarter are 246 apart. The disagreement is over the year before: the Bureau's 2025 base is 59,531, and the Department's release does not print its base, say whether it counts air arrivals only, or name its data source. Both are shown because neither can be checked against the other. By either count St. Croix's first quarter was roughly flat while St. Thomas grew by double digits.

Two cautions apply to the Bureau's sheet. Its header says the figures are “in Thousands”, and they are whole counts. And its territory total for April 2026, 106,083, is 11,344 more than the two island columns beside it, so the territory's year-to-date total is overstated by that amount and is not used here.

Seats and routes for winter 2026-27

United's Newark flight adds 126 seats a week in each direction, 12 of them in business class, on Saturdays from 31 October 2026. The figures are from the Department of Tourism's release of 1 June 2026, in which the commissioner called the route “a major milestone for St. Croix”. VI Consortium reported on 29 May that the last Newark nonstop to the island was flown by Continental in October 1994.

The rest of the winter map is American and Delta. Schedule checks on Google Flights on 8 October 2026, which broadly agree with the 2026-27 schedule published by The Buccaneer, a St. Croix hotel, show the following.

• Miami, American: every day all year, with two nonstops on most days.
• Charlotte, American: Saturdays from 7 November, then daily from 17 December 2026.
• Atlanta, Delta: Saturdays from 14 November, then daily from 19 December 2026.
• Chicago O'Hare, American: Saturdays from 19 December 2026 to 2 January 2027, then again from 13 February 2027.
• Newark, United: Saturdays from 31 October 2026.

Airline schedules change, and these dates are as they stood when read. One route has gone. Spirit Airlines ceased operations on 2 May 2026, OPB reported, and its Fort Lauderdale nonstop went with it. Against a year ago the island has therefore gained one mainland gateway and lost one. No published count of scheduled seats into St. Croix was found. The Bureau counts arrivals, not seats, so the 126 a week from Newark is a route figure and cannot be read as a net change in capacity.

The pattern matters as much as the count. Newark and Chicago are Saturday-only all season, Charlotte until 17 December and Atlanta until 19 December, which pushes fly-in stays toward Saturday-to-Saturday weeks. The Department of Tourism's view, as VI Consortium reported it on 2 March 2026, is that St. Thomas is at saturation for airlift and hotel development while St. Croix has room to expand.

Hotel rooms and occupancy

St. Croix's hotels filled 50.3% of their room nights in 2025, against 61.3% on St. Thomas and St. John, on the Bureau's sheet “Hotel Occupancy Rates, January 2025 to June 2026”, published in July 2026. The year before, St. Croix's figure was 49.7%. The Bureau's definition is printed on the sheet: “Occupancy Rate equals the reported number of room nights occupied as a percentage of reported room nights available.”

The first half of 2026 was level. Table 1 of the Bureau's Monthly Hotel Occupancy Report, dated 30 July 2026, gives St. Croix 94,126 room nights occupied of 183,773 available from January to June, or 51.2%, against 51.5% a year earlier. The types of accommodation moved apart. Large hotels were at 45.8%, down from 50.3%. Small hotels were at 67.1%, up from 59.6%. The class the Bureau calls condominiums and other was at 43.4%, against 42.5%.

The same table gives a room count, indirectly. In June 2025 St. Croix had 30,420 room nights available, which over 30 days is 1,014 rooms a night by our arithmetic: 551 in large hotels, 282 in small hotels and 181 in condominiums and other. St. Thomas and St. John had 84,450, or 2,815 rooms. The accommodation the Bureau tracks on St. Croix is about 1,000 rooms, a little over a third of the number on the other two islands.

June 2026 is where the sheets disagree. Table 1 gives St. Croix 10,989 room nights occupied of 31,434 available, or 35.0%, against 50.0% in June 2025. The Bureau's one-page monthly sheet prints 63.1% for the same month, which repeats its March figure. This report uses Table 1, whose own room nights produce the 35.0%. There is a second oddity. The 31,434 room nights available in June 2026 equal the same 1,014 rooms multiplied by 31 days, and June has 30. On that evidence the room count behind the table did not change between the two Junes.

That matters because one resort left the market in between. VI Consortium reported on 2 March 2026 that Carambola Beach Resort, on the north-west coast, was expected to stop guest operations by summer. The St. Croix Times reported on 13 May that the hotel would leave the Marriott system on 26 May and take no reservations after 1 June, and that about 100 employees would be affected. A local guide, GoToStCroix, in a page updated in June, described it as closed behind construction fences. A joint announcement by VICI Properties and Club Med, carried by Hotel Executive, says VICI acquired the 150-key resort and leased it to Club Med.

PAX News reported on 17 July that a first-stone ceremony was held on 15 July for a US$75 million redevelopment into a 150-room Club Med, scheduled to reopen in the fourth quarter of 2027 and expected to create about 200 full-time jobs.

So 150 resort rooms are out for this winter, and on the developer's own target for most of the next year. Set against 1,014, that is a large share of a small base. The Bureau's table does not list properties, so it cannot be said from the sheet whether those rooms were still counted as available in June 2026. If they were, part of the fall in large-hotel occupancy that month, to 25.5% from 44.3%, would be closed rooms in the denominator. The table cannot settle the point, and this report does not.

“We have not been able yet to attract a new hotel coming to St. Croix”Senator Kurt Vialet, as reported by VI Consortium, 2 March 2026

The Legislature's response is priced in tax. Bill 36-0259, as VI Consortium described it, amends the Hotel Development Act so that qualifying St. Croix hotel developers keep the designated hotel room occupancy tax, casino tax and Economic Recovery Fee, with a minimum investment of $25 million and 25% more rooms, or 70% retention at $10 million. It had advanced out of committee by early March. The St. Croix Times reported in May that it had passed the Legislature and was awaiting the governor's signature. Whether it was signed was not confirmed for this report.

Rental estimates from data vendors

The data vendor AirROI estimates 438 active short-term rental listings in the market it calls Christiansted, with 36.6% occupancy and an average daily rate of $323 over the twelve months from August 2025 to July 2026. The figures are from AirROI's market page, updated on 12 September 2026 and read on 11 October. They are a vendor's modelled estimates, and “Christiansted” is the vendor's market boundary, not the town.

The rest of AirROI's page carries the same caution on every line: revenue per available night of $115; average annual revenue of $26,135 a listing; supply up 17.1% and revenue down 2.1% on a year earlier; 29.2% of listings with three or more bedrooms; 11.0% professionally managed. AirROI's peak season, January to March, shows 55.1% occupancy at $312. Its low season, August to October, shows 30.5% at $288.

No government count exists to test it. No official tally of villas or short-term rentals on St. Croix was found, and the Bureau's occupancy tables leave private villas out. Other vendors publish their own estimates for the same market. None of their pages could be opened and read for this report, so none is quoted, and 438 should be read as one vendor's number and not as a census.

Percent of available room nights or listing nights sold

Series	Publisher	Period	Occupancy
Hotels, 2025	Bureau of Economic Research	2025 full year	50.3%
STT/STJ hotels	Bureau of Economic Research	2025 full year, St. Thomas and St. John	61.3%
Hotels, Jan-Jun	Bureau of Economic Research	January to June 2026	51.2%
Large hotels	Bureau of Economic Research	January to June 2026	45.8%
Small hotels	Bureau of Economic Research	January to June 2026	67.1%
Condos and other	Bureau of Economic Research	January to June 2026	43.4%
Rentals, 12 months	AirROI estimate	August 2025 to July 2026, Christiansted market	36.6%
Rentals, Jan-Mar	AirROI estimate	Peak season, Christiansted market	55.1%
Rentals, Aug-Oct	AirROI estimate	Low season, Christiansted market	30.5%

The hotel rows are government estimates from hotel reports and exclude private villas. The rental rows are one vendor's modelled estimates for a market it defines. Read side by side, not as like for like.

Source: USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Hotel Occupancy Rates and Monthly Hotel Occupancy Report Table 1, July 2026; AirROI, Christiansted market page, updated 12 September 2026

Side by side, St. Croix's hotels ran at 50.3% in 2025 on the Bureau's count and its short-term rentals at about 37% on AirROI's estimate. The periods differ by five months, one figure is a government estimate built on hotel reports and the other is a vendor's model, and a hotel room and a whole house are different units. The comparison shows the order of size and no more. AirROI publishes no cut for houses of five bedrooms or more, so its market average says little about a twelve-guest villa.

The monthly calendar

St. Croix's busiest month for air arrivals in 2025 was January, with 22,464, and its quietest was September, with 5,868. By our arithmetic that is 3.8 times as many. December brought 20,194 and March 19,480. July, at 18,270, was the summer peak.

Air visitor arrivals

Air arrivals, 2025Air arrivals, 2026

Month	Air arrivals, 2025	Air arrivals, 2026	Hotel occupancy, 2025	Hotel occupancy, 2026
January	22,464	16,690	54.6%	56.8%
February	17,586	18,136	65.0%	65.2%
March	19,480	21,543	52.3%	63.1%
April	11,668	13,034	47.5%	49.4%
May	16,479	19,622	40.6%	38.7%
June	16,374	-	50.0%	35.0%
July	18,270	-	49.9%	-
August	14,100	-	40.6%	-
September	5,868	-	41.2%	-
October	9,392	-	53.4%	-
November	13,471	-	50.5%	-
December	20,194	-	59.0%	-

Data subject to revision. A dash means not yet published. June 2026 occupancy is from Table 1 of the monthly report; the one-page sheet prints 63.1% for that month.

Source: USVI Bureau of Economic Research: Air Visitor Arrivals (13 July 2026), Hotel Occupancy Rates, January 2025 to June 2026, and Monthly Hotel Occupancy Report Table 1 (30 July 2026)

Hotel occupancy moves less than arrivals do. The fullest month of 2025 was February, at 65.0%, and February 2026 was 65.2%. The emptiest months of 2025 were May and August, both at 40.6%. September, with barely a quarter of January's air arrivals, still showed 41.2%. The Bureau does not explain the difference. Its occupancy table rests on room nights the hotels report and its arrivals sheet counts people at the airport, so the two series need not move in step. January 2026 shows it from the other side: arrivals fell 25.7% and hotel occupancy rose to 56.8% from 54.6%.

Length of stay is the other half of the calendar. The Bureau gives the average hotel guest stay on St. Croix as 3.5 nights for January to June 2026, against 3.8 a year earlier. A rental with a minimum stay longer than that is selling a different trip, and the Saturday-only flights point the same way.

The Bureau also publishes where hotel guests come from, by what it calls U.S. sales regions. For St. Croix from January to June 2026, the Miami region supplied 25.9% of U.S. and Puerto Rico guests, New York City 23.7%, Chicago 17.5%, Washington D.C. 17.3%, Los Angeles 10.4% and San Juan 5.2%. These are regions and not cities. The new Newark flight serves the region that already ranks second.

Cruise passengers

St. Croix received 241,612 cruise passengers in 2025 and St. Thomas and St. John 1,553,170, on the Bureau's sheet “Cruise Passenger Arrivals, January 2025 to June 2026”, dated 17 July 2026. By our arithmetic St. Croix had 1.3 cruise passengers for every air arrival that year. St. Thomas and St. John had 2.1.

In the first half of 2026 the two diverged as sharply as they did by air. St. Croix had 132,499 cruise passengers from January to June, against 132,407 a year earlier, a rise of 0.1%. St. Thomas and St. John had 1,133,028, up 47.1% from 770,474. St. Croix's months ran unevenly, from a 20.7% fall in January to a 79.5% rise in May. Its largest cruise month in the table is December 2025, with 34,237.

Cruise is a separate business from lodging because its customers sleep on the ship. They add to the day's visitors and not to the night's occupied rooms. They also land at the far end of the island. VI Consortium reported on 16 September 2025 that the Port Authority's schedule for October 2025 to September 2026 peaked from December to March, with several dual-berth days in the winter months bringing “more than 10,000 passengers and crew” into Frederiksted in a day. The schedule for 2026-27 was not found for this report.

The cruise sheet has its own caution. A note says the island totals count first and second ports of call while the territory total counts the first port only, yet the 2025 territory total of 1,794,782 equals the plain sum of the two island columns. As with air arrivals, this report quotes the island columns.

What the government takes

The hotel room tax in the U.S. Virgin Islands is 12.5%, and it applies to villas. A Bureau of Internal Revenue release, as reported by VI Consortium on 23 December 2015, says the rate rose from 10% for stays beginning 1 January 2016 and covers every guest in a hotel, villa, time share, inn, or any other sleeping accommodations for a period of less than 90 days. It says the hotel room tax is 12.5 percent of the gross room rental, a base that includes energy surcharges and maintenance fees. The statute is Title 33, section 54, of the Virgin Islands Code, whose text was not opened for this report. The release does not say whether a cleaning fee is part of that base.

Who collects it depends on the channel. Airbnb's 2017 announcement called its agreement with the territory its first tax collection agreement in the Caribbean. The Department of Licensing and Consumer Affairs, in a release of 1 July 2021, dated that agreement from 1 June 2017 and said that collection from other rental groups and from independents rested on an honor system. A booking taken on Airbnb has the tax collected by the platform. A booking taken any other way leaves the operator to collect and remit it.

The same release created a licence. “Effective July 1, 2021”, the department issues one for “accommodations for less than ninety (90) days tourist/vacation rentals in private homes, condominiums, or villas”. The class called Short Term Rental A, for a place that “can accommodate five (5) or more persons”, cost $260.00 a year, and Short Term Rental B, for up to four persons, $195.00. Those are the 2021 fees. The 2026 fees were not re-checked.

The third charge is the gross receipts tax. A tax guide prepared for Airbnb “by an independent third-party law firm” in December 2024 gives it as 5% of all receipts with no deduction for costs, with “generally an exemption for the first $9,000 of gross receipts per month” that is lost once annual gross receipts pass $225,000. The guide says it is a guide and not the statute. No territory-wide short-term rental cap, zoning rule or registration beyond the licence was found for this report, which is an absence of evidence and no more.

Charge	Rate or amount	Applies to	Published by
Hotel room tax	12.5%	Gross room rental on stays of less than 90 days, villas included	V.I. Bureau of Internal Revenue release, December 2015
Gross receipts tax	5%	All receipts; the first $9,000 a month is generally exempt until receipts pass $225,000 a year	Tax guide prepared for Airbnb, December 2024
Short Term Rental A licence	$260.00 a year	Rentals that can accommodate five or more persons	Department of Licensing and Consumer Affairs, 1 July 2021
Short Term Rental B licence	$195.00 a year	Rentals for up to four persons	Department of Licensing and Consumer Affairs, 1 July 2021
Airbnb single fee, host	15.5%	Most hosts; deducted from the host's payout	Airbnb Help Centre, read 11 October 2026
Airbnb split fee, host	3%	Most hosts on the older structure	Airbnb Help Centre, read 11 October 2026
Airbnb split fee, guest	14.1% to 16.5%	Guests, under the older structure	Airbnb Help Centre, read 11 October 2026

Licence fees are those announced in 2021 and were not re-checked for 2026. The tax guide is a guide, not the statute.

Source: V.I. Bureau of Internal Revenue release as reported by VI Consortium, 23 December 2015; DLCA release, 1 July 2021; Airbnb tax guide, December 2024; Airbnb Help Centre

In money: on $1,000 of room rent the hotel room tax is $125. A federal rule governs how it is shown. The Federal Trade Commission's Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees, 16 C.F.R. Part 464, took effect on 12 May 2025 and covers short-term lodging, vacation rentals included. On the agency's staff guidance an advertised total has to include every mandatory charge the business can work out in advance, the cleaning fee among them, while taxes and government charges may be left out of the advertised total but must be shown before payment. The 12.5% can therefore sit outside a headline price. A cleaning fee cannot.

What the platforms take

Most hosts on Airbnb's single fee pay 15.5% of a booking. Airbnb's help page on service fees, read on 11 October 2026, says “Most hosts pay 15.5%” under that structure, that the whole fee comes out of the host's payout, and that the structure is compulsory for most hosts, those who connect through property management software among them, with no way back once a host has switched. Under the older split fee, the page says, most hosts paid 3% and guests paid between 14.1% and 16.5%.

On $1,000 of booking value the host-side fee is $155 under the single structure and $30 under the split one. The two cannot be compared on the host's line alone, because under the split fee the guest was paying a fee on top. The page does not say how hosts have repriced, and which structure any one listing is on is not public.

The national channel figures show what managers weigh against that fee. Key Data's U.S. index for professionally managed rentals, sponsored by the Vacation Rental Management Association, reports for the first quarter of 2026 that Airbnb took 50% of reservations and 37% of revenue, direct bookings 23% and 35%, and Vrbo 20% and 24%. The index gives the earlier shares as 46% and 34% for Airbnb and, for 2025, 26% and 39% for direct. Direct bookings were fewer and larger: 23% of reservations carried 35% of revenue.

Those figures are national. No channel split for the U.S. Virgin Islands was found, and nothing here describes the channel mix of any St. Croix rental.

One villa's published terms

The Cerulean sleeps 12 in five bedrooms and a loft, on its own site's count. Four bedrooms are in the main house. A separate guest cottage has its own kitchen, living room, bedroom and bathroom, and a loft bed up a spiral stair. The site says the cottage is never rented separately, so the property is sold as one unit. There is a pool, an outdoor kitchen and a stretch of shore at the bottom of the property.

The selling chain has three links. The villa's own site takes no payment: its booking buttons go to the manager's page for the house. SP Vacations describes itself there as offering “13 private St. Croix villas and condos” that are “booked direct, no booking fees”. That page's booking box asks for dates and guests and then hands over with the words: “Next: your details and secure payment on Sterling Point's booking portal. Nothing is charged until you confirm there.” The house is also listed on Airbnb, to which the villa's site links for its reviews. One villa is therefore on both sides of the channel figures in the last section.

The site prints no nightly rate, by policy: “Rates vary by season, dates and length of stay, so we don't print a nightly figure here.” This report prints none either. What is public is the shape of the terms. On the manager's booking portal, read on 11 October 2026, the calendar gave a minimum stay of five nights for an October check-in. The cancellation policy shown there is a 100% refund up to 60 days before arrival and a 50% refund up to 30 days before arrival. Check-in is at 4 pm and check-out at 10 am.

Set against the island's figures, those terms place the house at one end of the market. Its minimum stay is a night and a half longer than the 3.5 nights an average St. Croix hotel guest stayed in the first half of 2026. It is the kind of listing AirROI puts at 29.2% of the market, with three or more bedrooms. And its refund steps end 30 days before arrival, well before any storm forecast begins.

The practical limits are stated on the same pages. The manager's page puts the house 30 to 40 minutes from the airport and recommends a car, since nothing is within walking distance of town. The property's accessibility statement says the site is a sloped hillside, the house is on several levels with steps between them, the shore is reached by a stepped path, and the house was not built as wheelchair-accessible. Guests' reviews say the entry to the water is rocky and that water shoes help.

The risk column

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from 1 June to 30 November, and on 11 October it has seven weeks left. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's outlook of 21 May 2026 gave a 55% chance of a below-normal season, with 8 to 14 named storms, 3 to 6 hurricanes and 1 to 3 major hurricanes, citing a developing El Niño. Its update of 6 August raised that chance to 75% and lowered the ranges to 7 to 13 named storms, 2 to 6 hurricanes and 0 to 2 major hurricanes. The agency says the outlook describes the season's overall activity and does not forecast landfalls.

On 2 October Leslie Hudson of the Florida Public Radio Emergency Network wrote, in a report carried by WLRN: “Eight storms have been named, but none has reached hurricane strength”. The report called reaching October without a hurricane “a first in the modern satellite era”. That was the position on 2 October. A week later the pause ended: WLRN reported on 10 October that Hurricane Isaias had made landfall near Destin, on the Florida Panhandle, the night before with sustained winds of 105 mph. That is a Gulf Coast storm. No 2026 storm affecting St. Croix was found in the sources read, which again is an absence of evidence.

The season already has a price in the tables: September 2025's 5,868 air arrivals and AirROI's 30.5% low-season occupancy. For a booked stay the question is who carries the loss. The Cerulean's hurricane guide tells guests to buy travel insurance at the time of booking, because policies exclude storms that have already been named, and its refund steps stop 30 days out. A storm inside the last month therefore falls to the guest's insurance or to the listing's own terms.

For owners the latest primary statement found is three years old. On 12 July 2023 Lieutenant Governor Tregenza Roach, who is also the commissioner of insurance, said the territory “is feeling the pressures of the hard insurance market”, VI Consortium reported. The regulator had approved partial rate increases, some insurers and reinsurers had left, and reinsurers were requiring reduced cover on wood or mixed-frame homes. No premium figure for 2025 or 2026 was found, and none is printed here.

The last risks are concentration and data. Five mainland gateways are flown by three airlines, and Spirit's closure removed one route in a day. The resort reopening is a target date. And the Bureau's sheets, the only official series, contain the contradictions marked above, on the air arrivals total, the cruise total and June's hotel occupancy.

What the figures do and do not tell you

Within their limits the figures say this. St. Croix took about a fifth of the territory's air arrivals in 2025 and grew 1.5% in the first five months of 2026 while its neighbours grew 16.9%. Its hotels filled half their rooms. One weekly flight of 126 seats starts on 31 October, one route was lost in May, and 150 resort rooms are out until a target date in late 2027. A short stay carries a 12.5% room tax, and an Airbnb booking a host fee that is 15.5% for most hosts.

What would change the picture is mostly dated. The Bureau's sheets for June onward will show whether summer followed the spring's rise in arrivals and whether the hotel table's room count drops by 150. The daily flights from Charlotte and Atlanta begin on 17 and 19 December. The hurricane season ends on 30 November. The Club Med is due in the fourth quarter of 2027.

The Cerulean publishes its own pages, with its rooms, its terms and its guides to the island, at theceruleanstcroix.com. Nothing on them is a market statistic, and nothing in this report is a statement about that villa's bookings, prices or income. Its place here is as a unit of scale: twelve guests and a five-night minimum, on an island that the Bureau of Economic Research says received 185,349 air visitors in 2025.

Common questions

Sources

1. USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Air Visitor Arrivals, January 2025 to May 2026 (13 July 2026).
2. USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Cruise Passenger Arrivals, January 2025 to June 2026 (17 July 2026).
3. USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Monthly Hotel Occupancy Report, Tables 1 to 4, June 2026 (30 July 2026).
4. USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Hotel Occupancy Rates, January 2025 to June 2026 (July 2026).
5. USVI Bureau of Economic Research, Hotel Occupancy Rates, January 2024 to November 2025 (2024 annual figure) (February 2026).
6. USVI Department of Tourism, U.S. Virgin Islands reports record-breaking first quarter 2026 visitor arrivals (8 April 2026).
7. USVI Department of Tourism, United Airlines announces new nonstop service linking St. Croix to Newark/New York (1 June 2026).
8. VI Consortium, United to resume Newark-St. Croix flights after 32-year absence (29 May 2026).
9. Google Flights, Schedule checks for nonstops to St. Croix (STX) from Miami, Charlotte, Atlanta, Chicago, Newark and Fort Lauderdale (read 8 October 2026).
10. The Buccaneer, Flight schedule, 2026-27 (hotel page, secondary) (read 8 October 2026).
11. Virgin Islands Port Authority, Henry E. Rohlsen Airport (read 8 October 2026).
12. OPB / NPR, Spirit Airlines ceases operations after escalating financial struggles (2 May 2026).
13. VI Consortium, Carambola Beach Resort set to close to guests as $50M redevelopment drives St. Croix hotel incentive bill (2 March 2026).
14. St. Croix Times, Carambola Resort to close end of May for renovations (13 May 2026).
15. GoToStCroix, Hotel update: Carambola Beach Resort (local guide) (updated June 2026).
16. Hotel Executive, VICI Properties and Club Med announce acquisition and redevelopment of Carambola Beach Resort in St. Croix (company announcement) (read 11 October 2026).
17. PAX News, Work gets underway on new Club Med in St. Croix (17 July 2026).
18. AirROI, Christiansted, St. Croix: short-term rental market data (updated 12 September 2026).
19. Airbnb Newsroom, U.S. Virgin Islands kick off Airbnb's first tax collection agreement in the Caribbean (24 May 2017).
20. VI Consortium, St. Croix and Crown Bay Cruise Schedules Highlight Heavy Winter Calls, Summer Continuity (16 September 2025).
21. VI Consortium, Bureau Of Internal Revenue Reminds Tax Payers Of Hotel Room Tax Increase (23 December 2015).
22. USVI Department of Licensing and Consumer Affairs, Short-term rental business licence (release by Commissioner Richard T. Evangelista) (1 July 2021).
23. Airbnb (prepared by an independent third-party law firm), The United States Virgin Islands: Tax Considerations on Short-Term Accommodations (December 2024).
24. Federal Trade Commission, The Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees: Frequently Asked Questions (read 11 October 2026).
25. Airbnb Help Centre, Airbnb service fees (read 11 October 2026).
26. Key Data, U.S. Key Data Index, Q2 2026: Industry Performance Analysis (sponsored by VRMA) (2026).
27. SP Vacations (Sterling Point Real Estate), The Cerulean: villa page and booking portal listing (read 11 October 2026).
28. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA predicts below-normal 2026 Atlantic hurricane season (21 May 2026).
29. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA maintains prediction for below-normal Atlantic hurricane season (6 August 2026).
30. WLRN / Florida Public Radio Emergency Network, Will October end the Atlantic's historic hurricane pause? (2 October 2026).
31. WLRN, 2 deaths reported in Florida after Hurricane Isaias moves through Panhandle (10 October 2026).
32. VI Consortium, Windstorm insurance remains available in USVI despite global insurance market pressures, Lt. Governor assures (12 July 2023).