If it seems like it’s getting more expensive to replace a broken door, kitchen fixtures or upgrade a major appliance, you’re not wrong.
The cost of home repair and remodeling projects is up compared to a year ago and running ahead of inflation overall, according to a report from data analytics company Verisk.
The firm’s latest Repair and Remodeling Index jumped 3.4% in the April-June quarter compared to the same period last year. That’s a bigger annual increase than the 2.7% rise in inflation in the same period, as measured by the Consumer Price index.
The index, which tracks costs for more than 10,000 home improvement products, including appliances, doors, plumbing and windows, shows a roughly 0.6% increase from the January-March quarter.
“While costs did continue to rise, they rose at a slower rate than in the first quarter,,” says Greg Pyne, vice president of Pricing at Verisk Property Estimating Solutions.
Much of the increase in home repair and remodeling costs appears to be driven primarily by higher labor costs for repair and remodeling work, Verisk notes.
The second-quarter jump in costs for home improvement products coincided with the Trump administration’s broad rollout of tariffs on imported goods from many of the nation’s major trading partners. But the tariffs didn’t have the expected impact given they were postponed several times and didn’t fully take effect until early August, midway through the third quarter.
