Overseas visitors flocked to stay in pricey North Island accommodation and Kiwis stayed at home during the Rugby World Cup, statistics show.
Statistics New Zealand figures released this morning show guest nights for international visitors rose 7.1 per cent during October, the second month of the Rugby World Cup tournament.
The increase in foreign visitors was offset by a 6.5 per cent fall in domestic guest nights.
The overall guest nights figures for the month fell by a total of 1.5 per cent, which sorely showed in regions across the country, said industry and labour statistics manager Lousie Holmes-Oliver.
"The Rugby World Cup lifted international guest nights in October, particularly in the North Island.
"However, domestic guest nights were down in nearly every region. This continues what was seen in September 2011, with increasing international and decreasing domestic guest nights.''
The figures record guests staying in hotels, motels, backpacker accommodation and holiday parks across the country each month. They do not include cruise ship, private dwelling guests or temporary campervan parks.
Numerous accommodation and campervan providers came under the spotlight before the tournament as they lifted their rates to capitalise on the influx of visitors.
Experts cautioned that price gouging would result in less demand, whereas accommodation providers argued that lifted prices were common across the world during tournament periods.
A total of 133,200 visitors flocked to our shores for the tournament, with 53,000 arriving in October.
Most of the visitors chose to stay in Auckland, Wellington and Waikato, and international guests were higher in nine of the 12 regions for the month.
As 13 of the 15 World Cup games for the month were held in the North Island, there was a rise of 24 per cent in international guest nights for the top half of the country.
Canterbury suffered the most of all the regions, reporting the largest regional fall in guest nights, but Nelson, Marlborough, Tasman and Otago bucked the regional trend.
Christchurch, in particular, lost much of the accommodation capacity because of the Canterbury earthquakes, as stadium damage stopped any games from being held in the city.
