$524BProjected 2026 U.S. homeowner remodeling spending — a record high

43 yrsMedian age of an owner-occupied U.S. home in 2024

$12,472Average household spend on home projects in 2025

91%Homeowners who check online reviews before hiring a pro

Home remodeling has quietly become one of the largest and most resilient corners of the U.S. economy. After two years of post-pandemic cooling, annual spending on home improvements and repairs is climbing again toward record territory, the number of remodeling firms has nearly doubled this century, and an aging housing stock all but guarantees decades of work ahead. At the same time, rising costs, a stubborn labor shortage, and persistent contractor fraud are reshaping how — and how carefully — homeowners hire. This report pulls together the most current, verifiable statistics on the U.S. home remodeling industry in 2026, drawn from Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies, the National Association of Home Builders, the Home Improvement Research Institute, Angi, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the Federal Trade Commission.

Key takeaways

Total homeowner remodeling spending is projected to reach roughly $524 billion in early 2026 — a new record high — according to Harvard's Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity.
The U.S. now has about 128,000 remodeling firms, up from 69,000 in 2000, and remodelers make up 56% of all residential building construction companies.
The typical household spent $12,472 on home projects in 2025, completing an average of 10 projects across improvements, maintenance, and emergency repairs.
The median owner-occupied U.S. home is now 43 years old, and 47% of owner-occupied homes are at least 45 years old — a powerful long-term tailwind for remodeling.
U.S. consumers reported losing more than $12.5 billion to fraud in 2024, and home-improvement scams remain a perennial FTC warning category.
91% of homeowners rely on online reviews before choosing a contractor, and being licensed and insured ranks as the single most important factor when they hire.

How big is the U.S. remodeling market?

By any measure, remodeling is a multi-hundred-billion-dollar industry. Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies estimates that spending on improvements and maintenance for owner-occupied homes reached roughly $509 billion in 2025, after the Center revised its market-size estimate upward by $30 billion, or 6.4%. The broader market — which includes spending by rental-property owners — soared above $600 billion in the wake of the pandemic and remains roughly 50% above pre-pandemic levels.

The Home Improvement Research Institute, which tracks products and installed services, pegs the total home-improvement market even higher, at about $593.8 billion in 2025 — 3.4% growth — and forecasts it will exceed $614.6 billion in 2026. Industry analysts at GMInsights project continued mid-single-digit annual growth for the U.S. remodeling market through the early 2030s.

Measure (year)	Estimated spending	Year-over-year change
Owner-occupied remodeling, 2025 (JCHS LIRA)	~$509 billion	+1.2%
Owner-occupied remodeling, early 2026 (JCHS LIRA, projected)	~$524 billion	+2.4%
Total home-improvement market, 2025 (HIRI)	~$593.8 billion	+3.4%
Total home-improvement market, 2026 (HIRI, projected)	~$614.6 billion	+3.5%

The 2026 outlook: record spending, slower growth

After surging 25.3% over 2022 and 2023, remodeling spending cooled but never collapsed. Harvard's LIRA now projects that year-over-year spending on home renovation and repair will rise 2.4% in early 2026 before easing to about 1.9% by the third quarter, with total homeowner remodeling spending reaching a record $524 billion. In other words, the market is expected to keep setting records — just at a more measured pace than the frenzied pandemic years.

Contractor sentiment echoes that cautious optimism. The NAHB/Westlake Royal Remodeling Market Index (RMI) climbed to a reading of 64 in the fourth quarter of 2025, up four points from the prior quarter — any reading above 50 indicates more remodelers view conditions as good than poor. NAHB expects residential remodeling activity to increase about 3% in 2026 and another 2% in 2027 in inflation-adjusted terms.

Who does the remodeling? Inside the remodeler industry

The remodeling trade has scaled up dramatically. According to NAHB, there were about 128,000 remodeling firms at the start of 2025 — up from just 69,000 in 2000 — and remodelers now represent more than half (56%) of all residential building construction companies. Remodeling's share of total residential construction spending has also grown, rising from 33% in 2007 to 44% by the first quarter of 2025.

Most remodeling businesses remain small, owner-operated shops, which is exactly why verification matters so much to consumers: the difference between a licensed, insured professional and a fly-by-night operator is rarely visible at the curb. NAHB also reports that 56% of remodelers now perform aging-in-place modifications, reflecting an older population that increasingly wants to renovate rather than relocate.

What homeowners actually spend

Angi's State of Home Spending report offers the clearest window into the household budget. In 2025, U.S. homeowners spent an average of $12,472 on home projects — a 3.5% increase over 2024 — and completed an average of 10 projects, up from nine the year before. The mix tells the story of a cautious consumer: maintenance and emergency repair budgets grew while discretionary improvement spending dipped slightly.

Spending category	2024 average	2025 average
All home projects (total)	$12,050	$12,472
Home improvements	$9,322	$9,288
Home maintenance	$1,750	$2,041
Emergency repairs	$978	$1,143

The shift toward maintenance and repair is deliberate. Facing higher materials and labor costs, many homeowners are protecting the home they have rather than gambling on a big discretionary remodel — a pattern Angi's research has tracked across multiple survey waves.

Millennials are now the spending engine

For the first time, Angi's data shows that Millennials generate the highest total home spending of any generation, averaging $14,199 per household — including the highest maintenance ($2,601) and emergency ($1,519) spending. Although Millennials are not yet the largest group of homeowners, they outspend every other generation on a per-household basis, a signal of where the industry's growth will come from over the next decade.

America's aging housing stock is fueling demand

The single most durable driver of remodeling is simple: American homes are getting old. The median age of an owner-occupied home climbed to roughly 43 years in 2024, up from about 31 years two decades earlier. The share of homes at least 45 years old rose from 39% in 2014 to 47% in 2024, while the share of relatively new homes (built within the past 14 years) fell from 18% to just 13%.

Older homes need more work: outdated systems, worn finishes, and energy-efficiency upgrades all translate into projects. Redfin has documented how chronic underbuilding since the Great Recession has left buyers purchasing older homes than ever — homes that arrive with a built-in remodeling to-do list. For the verification-minded homeowner, that means more first-time renovation projects handled by contractors they've never worked with before.

The projects homeowners take on

According to NAHB, the most common remodeling projects in 2025 were bathroom remodels, kitchen remodels, and whole-house remodels. Kitchens and baths remain the perennial heavyweights — they are both the most desired upgrades and the most expensive, which is exactly why hiring the right professional carries the highest stakes. Surveys of homeowner "wish lists" consistently show kitchens and bathrooms at the top, with roughly 31% dreaming of a kitchen remodel and 22% a bathroom update.

Remodeling ROI: which projects pay back

Not every dollar comes back at resale, and the gap between project tiers is wide. National Cost vs. Value data shows that midrange and exterior projects consistently recoup more of their cost than high-end overhauls. A midrange bathroom remodel recoups roughly 74% of its cost nationally, while an upscale bathroom remodel returns closer to 45%. Lower-cost, high-impact work — such as kitchen cabinet refacing rather than a full gut renovation — tends to top the ROI charts. The lesson for homeowners is counterintuitive: the most expensive remodel is rarely the smartest financial move.

How homeowners pay for it

With remodeling costs elevated, financing has become central. Home equity is the workhorse: Bankrate reports that more than half of HELOC and home-equity-loan borrowers use the funds to invest in their current property, with average HELOC rates easing to roughly 8.1%–8.3% in 2025 after peaking earlier. As savings buffers thin, more homeowners are tapping equity rather than cash — a sign that demand to renovate is outrunning the ability to pay out of pocket, and one more reason cost transparency from contractors matters.

The labor crunch behind the boom

The biggest constraint on the industry isn't demand — it's people. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that construction and extraction occupations will grow faster than average through 2034, with about 649,300 openings per year on average, largely to replace retiring workers. The skilled-trades shortfall is acute: industry estimates compiled in the U.S. construction workforce report put the net need at roughly 349,000 additional workers in 2026, rising to 456,000 in 2027, with the large majority of firms reporting difficulty filling craft positions. A tight labor market means longer lead times, higher prices, and — critically — more opportunity for unqualified or unlicensed operators to fill the gap.

The dark side: contractor fraud and scams

Where money and urgency meet, fraud follows. U.S. consumers reported losing more than $12.5 billion to fraud in 2024 — a 25% jump over the prior year — across 2.6 million reports. Home-improvement and home-repair scams are a perennial fixture on the FTC's consumer-warning list, with classic red flags including door-to-door solicitations, large upfront cash deposits, high-pressure timelines, and no written contract. The Better Business Bureau, cited in guidance from Synovus, estimates the typical contractor scam costs a homeowner roughly $1,800 — and that figure excludes the far larger losses from shoddy or unfinished work that has to be torn out and redone.

How homeowners vet contractors

The good news: homeowners are doing their homework. A survey on what matters when choosing a pro found that being licensed and insured is the single most important factor, and that 84% consider membership in a professional organization such as the BBB or a chamber of commerce important. Online reputation is now nearly universal as a screening tool — 91% of homeowners rely on online reviews before choosing a contractor. And reputation translates directly into revenue: more than 70% of homeowners say they would pay more to hire a pro with a stronger service reputation.

Rely on online reviews before hiring91%

Value pro-org / BBB membership84%

Would pay more for a better-reputation pro70%

Why verification matters more than ever

Put the numbers together and a clear picture emerges. A half-trillion-dollar market, an aging housing stock guaranteeing decades of projects, a labor shortage drawing in newcomers of uneven quality, billions lost to fraud, and homeowners who overwhelmingly want proof that a contractor is licensed, insured, and well-reviewed before they sign. The demand for trust is structural, not cyclical.

That gap between what homeowners want to verify and what they can easily check is exactly the problem HomeProBadge was built to close. By giving contractors a verifiable, shareable badge that confirms license status, insurance, and background screening, HomeProBadge turns the homeowner's most important hiring criteria — "is this pro legitimate?" — into something that can be confirmed in seconds rather than discovered the hard way. In an industry this large and this fragmented, verification isn't a nice-to-have; it's the foundation of every successful project.

Home Remodeling Industry Statistics (2026)