Image courtesy of the Joint Center for Housing Studies

With a stronger economy, among other things, boosting consumer confidence, the outlook for home remodeling activity appears to be improving.

Annual expenditures for improvements and maintenance to owner-occupied homes are expected to grow throughout 2025, according to the Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity (LIRA) released today by the Remodeling Futures Program at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University.

The LIRA projects that year-over-year spending for home renovation and repair will increase by 1.2 percent in 2025. Additionally, the program has increased its projection for the size of the remodeling market for this year by $30 billion to $509 billion

“A solid labor market, rising home values, and continued improvement in existing home sales are supporting greater activity in home remodeling and repair,” Carlos Martín, director of the Remodeling Futures Program, said in a statememnt. “Upward trending retail sales of building materials and steady permitting for remodeling indicate that homeowners are slowly but surely expanding the pace and scope of projects compared to the last couple years.”

Between 2021 and 2022, the homeowner remodeling and repair market expanded 26.6 percent from $407 billion to $515 billion compared with LIRA estimated growth of 15.6 percent.

In a statement, program associate director Abbe Will noted that the growth in spending was 7.5 percent larger than what was projected by LIRA for 2022 and 2023.