Tourism drives Asheville's economy, supports a large share of local jobs and is central to the city's recovery from Hurricane Helene. This explainer pulls together what is known about the visitor economy, with each figure attributed and treated with appropriate caution where the source is an interested party.

The scale of it

Visitor spending in Buncombe County had run near $3 billion a year before the storm, reaching $2.97 billion in 2023. After Helene hit in late September 2024, spending slipped to $2.65 billion in 2024, according to a study commissioned by Explore Asheville, the area's tourism authority. The visitor economy accounts for roughly a fifth of the county's total economy and generated about $265 million in state and local tax revenue. We treat tourism-authority figures as interested-party data, not neutral fact, because the body that publishes them has a stake in the numbers.

Recovery and the "Asheville is open" message

After the storm, local tourism bodies pushed an "Asheville is open" message to bring visitors back, supported by a recovery allocation from lodging-tax revenue. Lodging-tax collections were projected to fall sharply in the 2025 fiscal year before a rebound in 2026. The tension here is real and worth stating plainly: the city needs visitors for revenue while many residents are still rebuilding.

The housing squeeze

A strong tourism economy and a tight housing market pull against each other. Hospitality workers need somewhere affordable to live, and the region faces a documented housing shortage, a pressure tied directly to the city's wider budget strain. We report the housing-and-tourism tension as one connected story rather than two separate ones.

What we will track

We will follow visitor-spending trends, the major hospitality investments reported for the area, and the knock-on effects on jobs and housing, attributing figures and flagging uncertainty as we go. For the wider recovery context, see our Helene recovery tracker.

Sources