Wellness has moved from the basement of the hotel to the centre of the business plan. The Global Wellness Institute put the global wellness economy at 6.8 trillion dollars in 2024, twice its 2013 size, and found that wellness real estate grew faster than any other wellness sector between 2019 and 2024, at 19.5 per cent a year. In Morocco the luxury pipeline is moving the same way: Hilton plans to more than double its presence in the country to 25 hotels, and the Nikki Beach resort announced for Marrakech in 2028 lists hammams, saunas, therapy rooms, a gym and yoga studios among its features.

That does not mean every project should carry a large spa. A wellness component that nobody uses is one of the most expensive mistakes in hospitality: it takes floor area, staff and maintenance, and gives little back. Before it goes into the plan, seven questions are worth asking.

1. Who will actually pay for it, and in which season?

Hotel guests, residents, local members and visiting groups do not buy the same thing. A Marrakech palace fills its spa with guests in spring and autumn; a residence lives on its members all year; a desert or mountain property depends on groups who come for a programme. Name the buyer before you draw the room.

2. Is it sized for the use, or for the brochure?

The most common error is a treatment floor sized for the photographs. Count the realistic number of treatments per day, the peak hours and the share of guests who will use the facilities, then size the rooms, the changing areas and the team. A smaller spa that is full every afternoon is worth more than a large one that is empty every morning.

3. Can it be staffed in Morocco?

Therapists, coaches and a spa manager working to international standards are the real constraint, more than the equipment. Ask where the team will come from, how it will be trained, where it will live if the site is remote, and who replaces a lead therapist in high season.

4. Who will run it?

A hotel can run its own spa, hand it to a specialist operator under a management agreement, or lease it. Each choice changes the brand, the standard, the margin and the risk. The decision should come before the design, because operators bring their own requirements for the plans.

5. Which brands will be in the treatment rooms and the shop?

Guests now pay for what is specific and proven. Specialist and origin brands, from argan and rose to ghassoul and saffron, can give a Moroccan property something a global brand cannot: a story that belongs to the place. Choose them for their proof and their reliability of supply, not only for their packaging.

6. Does the programme bring people in?

A treatment menu is not a programme. The properties that make wellness pay add retreats, events, practitioners in residence and partnerships with the brands and studios that bring their own communities. Ask what the calendar of the first year looks like.

7. Has the wellness side been read independently?

For an acquisition or a project under study, an independent review of the wellness component, its size, its team, its operator and its programme, costs little compared with the floor area it occupies. It is not financial advice and says nothing about the value of the asset; it tells you whether this part of the project can work.

Where to start

Start with the buyer and the season, then the operator, then the size; the architecture follows. If you are building, buying or renovating a hotel, a resort, a residence or a clinic in Morocco, our wellness investment advisory reads the wellness side of the project before it is built.

Wellness in Moroccan Hotels and Residences: What an Investor Should Check