Global hotel transactions plummeted by half over the first five months of the year compared to 2019 and by 87% in the second quarter, according to Real Capital Analytics Inc. Prospects for recovery in the near future are not bright given the coronavirus resurgence and curtailed travel, Tom Leahy of the analytics firm warns.

Two Disneyland hotels will accept reservations beginning Aug. 1 while the company's theme parks in Anaheim, Calif., remain closed after July reopening plans were set aside indefinitely. Three other Disney hotels in the state are staying closed due to an upsurge in coronavirus cases.

The owner of the Dallas Stars professional hockey team has presented plans for a six-story luxury hotel to Irving, Texas, city leaders. Tom Gaglardi's Sandman Signature Hotel would be part of a mixed-use development by Blue Star Land, headed by Dallas Cowboys football team owner Jerry Jones.

Traveling during the pandemic looks much different, writes Michelle Gross, who recently stayed at a Hyatt, InterContinental Hotel Group and Marriott. Along her trip, Gross found different protocols at each hotel including different valet options, lack of decorative pillows and blankets, contactless check-ins and amenity masks and wipes.

A nonprofit hotel in Tulsa, Okla., has been providing both shelter and future hope to homeless people who are deemed vulnerable to coronavirus infection. Of the 65 guests taken in over the past two months by City Lights Hotel, 15 have made the transition to permanent housing.

Mayors in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas are scouting out hotels that might provide relief to hospitals stressed by coronavirus cases. "People that are recovering in hospital beds, where people that are coming down with worse symptoms, there ought to be some sort of accommodation if we have space already," McAllen Mayor Jim Darling said.