Home Repair Costs Up 76% in a Decade as Power and Heating Bills Climb

Repair bills have risen faster than the rest of the household budget

Owning a home costs a lot more than it did ten years ago, and the mortgage payment is only part of the increase. A LendingTree analysis released this month puts the median home improvement project at $2,113 in 2025, in inflation-adjusted terms. That is 76.1% more than the $1,200 median in 2015.7 The research is based on the U.S. Census Bureau's American Housing Survey. The steepest increase came between 2021 and 2023, when the median project cost rose 22.2%.7

Coverage of the study has been consistent. USA TODAY, IBTimes and several syndication outlets all repeated the same headline figures, and all quoted LendingTree chief consumer finance analyst Matt Schulz blaming higher labor and building costs.124 Most of that coverage left out a caveat from LendingTree's own write-up. Schulz said the higher figure could also mean homeowners are taking on bigger and more complicated projects, because many are staying put rather than moving at today's mortgage rates.7

That caveat changes how the 76% should be read. Part of it is probably about what people are buying, not only what the same job costs. The methodology section adds to the uncertainty. It says 2023 survey estimates were converted to 2025 dollars using the Consumer Price Index, but it does not clearly explain how the 2015 baseline was handled.7 An outside measure helps here. The Verisk Remodel Index, which tracks repair costs, is up more than 61% since early 2015, and it rose 3.97% year over year in Q1 2025, well ahead of 2.4% CPI inflation at the time.10 My reading is that the true like-for-like increase in repair costs falls somewhere between those two figures. Either way, it is far above general inflation.

Where the money goes

The study's details show the pressure comes mostly from frequent small jobs, not big renovations. Water heaters, dishwashers and garbage disposals were the most common project category, at 11.7% of all projects tracked, with a median cost of $845.7 HVAC installation or replacement came second at 9.1%, followed by flooring, plumbing fixtures and roofing.7 About 51.6 million of the country's 86.9 million owner-occupied homes had some kind of work done during the survey's two-year window. That added up to 139.9 million projects, or 2.7 per improved home.3

Who does the work makes a big difference. Professionals handled 64.1% of projects, at a median cost of $4,103, while DIY projects had a median of $845.7 LendingTree points out that the most expensive jobs, such as roof replacements, usually need a professional, which pushes the professional median up.7 So the roughly fivefold gap reflects the kind of work involved, not just labor markups.

The age of the house matters too. LendingTree estimates routine maintenance at $1,433 a year on average. That rises to $1,706 for homes built before 1940 and drops to $173 for homes built in 2022 and 2023.2 Other estimates are higher. Angi's spending report found households spent $2,041 on maintenance and another $1,143 on emergency repairs in 2025.10 A 2023 Thumbtack estimate put yearly maintenance at $6,548 for single-family homes.8 The differences come largely from what each survey counts, such as lawn care, cleaning or emergency work. Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies suggests budgeting 1% to 2% of a home's value each year for maintenance.6 On that basis, LendingTree's figure looks like a minimum.

Most homeowners are paying out of savings. Cash covered 75.7% of projects, credit cards 6.3%, and insurance settlements 3.9%.7 Larger jobs were more likely to be financed. The median home-equity-funded project cost $7,924, and the median insurance-funded project cost $9,963.3

Higher electricity rates add to the cost

Repair costs are only one part of the problem. Several of the most common projects, including HVAC systems, water heaters and electrical panels, are tied to how a home uses energy. Energy prices are rising too.

U.S. residential electricity averaged 17.30 cents per kilowatt-hour in 2025, compared with 12.55 cents in 2016, according to Energy Information Administration data.23 By my calculation, that is a 38% increase in about a decade. EIA's October 2026 Short-Term Energy Outlook expects prices to reach 18.2 cents in 2026 and 18.7 cents in 2027.26 One analysis of the same data cites 18.6 cents for 202730. That small gap does not change the overall picture: prices are still rising, just more slowly.

The monthly bill shows the effect more clearly than the per-kilowatt-hour rate. One analysis of EIA retail data puts the average residential electric bill at $159.89 a month for January through July 2026. That is $44.59 more than in 2020, or about $535 a year.30 The same analysis found prices up 39.5% since 2020, about 8.6% more than inflation.30 As of July 2026, the national average was 18.31 cents, up 4.9% from a year earlier. Hawaii, New Hampshire and Maine had the steepest 12-month increases.22 Prices are not rising everywhere. Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts saw declines over the first seven months of 2026.23

The causes are largely structural, which suggests the increases will last. EIA expects wholesale power prices to average about 11% higher in 2026 than in 2025.26 Utilities are also spending more on transmission and distribution as demand grows.23 Industry observers interviewed by Utility Dive said electricity prices have risen much faster than wages, and that middle-income households, not only low-income ones, are now feeling the squeeze.25

Heating costs depend on the fuel

This winter, what a household pays for heat depends mostly on its fuel. EIA's Winter Fuels Outlook, published October 6, expects homes heated with natural gas to spend about $640 from November through March, down 9%. Propane households are expected to spend $1,246, down 3%. Electric-heated homes are expected to spend $1,196, up 4%.20

Heating oil is the exception. EIA expects oil-heated households to spend $2,115, 21% more than last winter, with the average price per gallon up 34% to $5.26.20 Bills should rise less than prices because EIA assumes the Northeast, where most heating oil is used, will be 12% warmer than last winter.11 Disruptions to oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz have pushed crude prices up, and EIA now expects Brent to average $105 a barrel in the fourth quarter.20 About 4.1 million U.S. homes, mostly in the Northeast, heat mainly with oil.13

Not every forecast agrees. One outlet reported that a group representing state energy-assistance offices expects higher heating bills across all fuels, not EIA's mixed outcome.14 EIA's own outlook relies on a weather assumption. If the Northeast winter turns out colder than forecast, oil-heating households will lose the cushion that keeps their bills from rising as fast as prices.

What it means for homeowners

Put together, the reports point to a household budget under pressure from several directions at once. Schulz describes many owners as stuck: their homes no longer fit their needs, but they won't trade a roughly 3% mortgage for one near 7%.2 Staying put avoids a costlier loan. It also means living with an aging house, where routine repairs keep coming at higher prices while power and, for some, heating bills rise as well.

The overlap matters most for older homes. Owners of pre-1940 houses face the highest maintenance costs.2 Those houses are also the most likely to have outdated heating systems and poor insulation, and EIA's own numbers note that a large, poorly insulated home can use far more fuel than average.11 For those households, a repair and an energy upgrade are often the same job. A new heat pump or water heater costs money now, but it can lower energy bills that are expected to keep rising.

The LendingTree figure is a rough measure, and it probably mixes higher prices with bigger projects. Still, the Verisk index, EIA's rate data and the heating outlook all point the same way. The fixed costs of keeping a home running are growing faster than inflation, and none of the reporting points to a near-term reversal. Homeowners who budget only for the mortgage are likely to come up short.