The Associated Press

May 23, 2025, 7:00 AM

LOS ANGELES (AP) — U.S. homeowners are spending more on home renovation projects, bucking a broader pullback by consumers amid diminished confidence in the economy.

Sales at building materials and garden supply retailers rose 0.8% last month from March, the biggest gain since 2022, and were up 3.2% from April last year. At the same time, U.S. retail sales overall rose 0.1%, a sharp slowdown from March.

The trend comes even as prices for home improvement products have been rising.

The cost of home repairs and remodeling climbed by nearly 4% in the first quarter from a year earlier, according to Verisk’s Remodel Index. The strategic data analytics firm tracks costs for more than 10,000 home repair items, from appliances to windows.

Recent price increases appear to be driven primarily by labor costs and don’t appear to reflect the ongoing trade war that the Trump administration is engaged in with major U.S. trading partners like Mexico, China and Canada.

“We haven’t seen panic buying from contractors or investors concerned about the impact tariffs might have on future costs, or labor rates being driven up by stricter enforcement of immigration policies,” Greg Pyne, vice president of pricing for Verisk Property Estimating Solutions, said in a report earlier this month.

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