National spending on home remodeling and repairs over the last few years has been a bit overstated, according to the latest Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity report from the Harvard Joint Center.
Released today, the updated LIRA revised historical spending levels and now indicates lower and less cyclical growth in home improvement spending in 2014 and 2015. For instance, spending was found to have increased 11.3 percent, from $250 billion in 2013 to $278 billion in 2015, which is lower than the previous LIRA estimate of 14.3 percent.
Previously, the LIRA estimated a homeowner improvement and repair market size of $305 billion in 2016 and projected spending growing to $326 billion by the third quarter of this year. Now with the replacement of AHS-based benchmark data for previously modeled benchmark estimates, the LIRA model indicates remodeling activity reached $297 billion in 2016 and projects spending will reach $317 billion this year.
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