World Cup Countdown: There's still enough room for pool play

This Orakei house is available to rent during the Rugby World Cup for $15,000 a week. Photo / Doug Sherring

Vacancies abound - with the possible exception of knock-out weekends - as accommodation bookings arrive in patches for the Rugby World Cup.

Hotels and other accommodation providers are seeing "hotspots" of strong trade scattered with popular matches around the country, but they say they are open for business-as-usual the rest of the time.

"Auckland isn't going to be full," said Stamford Plaza general manager Peter Gee. "There will still be plenty of room for day-to-day business."

During the six weeks of the tournament, the city would be crowded for 18 days due to matches and build-ups - leaving 26 days for "business-as-usual", Mr Gee said.

"This was a big problem in Sydney during the Olympics. People said, 'We can't go to Sydney now; everything's full and too expensive'.

"They stayed away in droves and the city went very quiet. But there's plenty of room to duck and dive in-between."

YHA marketing manager Daniel Shields said that hotspots of bookings followed popular matches around the country, but beds were far from sold out.

"Everyone is realising that the early excitement about the whole of New Zealand being jam-packed was optimistic," Mr Shields said.

"There's some realism creeping back into the accommodation sector that there might not be the massive demand for beds that everyone though they were going to get rich on."

Tour operators who work closely with hotels echoed the observation, saying there was little business outside the last two weeks - which agents had secured in blocks, hoping to sell packages to visitors.

Hospitality Association chief executive Bruce Robertson said accommodation providers would be foolish to raise their rates outside the final two weekends.

"Rates will pretty much be normal - or they should be," Mr Robertson said. "If [accommodation providers] are charging rates that are too high they're going to have empty beds. Our advice is you have to take a very practical approach because, aside from peak periods, there will be plenty around."

Hotels say they are letting the market determine rates through "dynamic pricing", which means they will have "event rates" during the finals period.

These are more expensive than "corporate rates" and bargain rates - but are "not a mark-up", they say.

Mr Shields said budget travellers were descending on Wellington for the city's two quarter-finals, which was turning into the "people's finals".

"Wellington has been far and away the most heavily booked city for us. Those quarter-finals will be the people's finals - it's the highest level of game where the tickets are reasonably affordable, and the average Kiwi or traveller can get there."

Another bargain option is to sleep on mattresses at enterprising marae for a full cultural experience from $80 a night.

Te Mahurehure Marae in Auckland was expected to have launched its accommodation programme this month after recently gaining Qualmark accreditation.

Organiser Tracey Panapa said there would be powhiri, waiata, history and food - without being too dear.

Top secret VIPs - "so top secret I don't even know who they are" - were planning to book out the whole complex during part of the tournament, Ms Panapa said.

Luxury Rentals 2011, which books out Auckland homes to corporate guests, said most of the interest was concentrated in the 10 days before the finals.

Director Kerrin Parton said there were still of plenty of houses available, but bookings had not slowed down as the tournament approached. An average house rental was four bedrooms able to host up to eight people at about $1500 a night.

Average luxury home rental:

* $1500/day
* 4 bedrooms
* 10-day stay (up until finals)
* 8 guests maximum