Who Hires Pros and How Much Are They Spending to Complete Those DIFM Projects in 2024?

Home main­te­nance and ser­vices are a cru­cial part of home­own­er­ship across the coun­try. Some home­own­ers han­dle their own home improve­ments and main­te­nance, com­plet­ing DIY projects on a reg­u­lar basis. Oth­ers rely on the ser­vices of pro­fes­sion­al con­trac­tors and oth­er home improve­ment spe­cial­ists, par­tic­u­lar­ly if they don’t have the time, skills, or tools to do the work themselves. 

Those types of projects fall into the DIFM (do it for me) jobs cat­e­go­ry, and they encom­pass ongo­ing, pre­ven­ta­tive main­te­nance and ser­vice activ­i­ties that help indi­vid­u­als pre­serve the con­di­tion and func­tion­al­i­ty of their home and sur­round­ing prop­er­ty for the dura­tion of their ownership.

What are Remodeling Trends for DIFM Projects in 2024?

44% of home­own­ers tack­led a home main­te­nance project over the past year, with land/​landscaping and home clean­ing being the most preva­lent types of main­te­nance, accord­ing to home remod­el­ing sta­tis­tics in our recent­ly pub­lished Home Ser­vices Study. Fur­ther, four out of five of those indi­vid­u­als who com­plet­ed main­te­nance projects paid a pro­fes­sion­al to com­plete at least one home ser­vice. This demon­strates the ongo­ing val­ue of pro­fes­sion­al con­trac­tors and ser­vice providers.

Pro­fes­sion­als are typ­i­cal­ly hired for more tech­ni­cal home ser­vices, or those tasks requir­ing spe­cial skills, tools, or materials.

View more in the full info­graph­ic on this topic.

This per­tains to activ­i­ties such as HVAC, pest con­trol, plumb­ing, and elec­tri­cal jobs, which require spe­cif­ic licens­es and skills to ensure the work is done prop­er­ly and safe­ly. Any­where from two-thirds to three-fourths of jobs in these cat­e­gories are com­plet­ed using a pro. Mean­while, jobs requir­ing spe­cial tools, mate­ri­als, and skills — includ­ing garage door, exte­ri­or, roof, and gut­ter main­te­nance — also typ­i­cal­ly become DIFM. 

Along the same vein, our Home Ser­vices Study shows that a home­own­er’s lack of skills and lack of tools/​supplies are the two high­est moti­vat­ing fac­tors in the deci­sion to hire a licensed ser­vice provider. Phys­i­cal abil­i­ty and safe­ty con­cerns, along with con­cern for work qual­i­ty, are also strong moti­va­tors for DIFM decisions.

Despite near­ly two-thirds of home­own­ers not hir­ing a home ser­vices pro in the past 12 months, 84% of those home­own­ers have used one pre­vi­ous­ly. Look­ing ahead at 2025 home improve­ment trends, home­own­ers show the most intent for com­plet­ing cos­met­ic main­te­nance — such as lawn/​landscaping care, pest con­trol, and home clean­ing. These tend to be top of mind for home­own­ers, where­as less-visu­al home main­te­nance activ­i­ties — par­tic­u­lar­ly elec­tri­cal and plumb­ing — have less inten­tion behind them but become pri­or­i­ties when the need does arise.

What Demographics Rely on Home Improvement Pros?

There are four seg­ments of home­own­ers who reg­u­lar­ly hire home ser­vices providers: afflu­ent young home­own­ers; afflu­ent mid­dle-aged home­own­ers; mid­dle-income seniors; and low-income seniors. Under­stand­ing these mar­ket seg­ments can help indus­try pro­fes­sion­als — as well as prod­uct man­u­fac­tur­ers and sup­pli­ers — tai­lor their ser­vice offer­ings and mar­ket­ing strate­gies to cap­ture a greater mar­ket share.Here is a clos­er look at each segment:

Affluent Young Homeowners

Afflu­ent young home­own­ers — Mil­lenials who pri­mar­i­ly make upwards of $159k per year — have the high­est home improve­ment bud­get. More than any seg­ment, they pri­or­i­tize hir­ing licensed, high-qual­i­ty pro­fes­sion­als. Some of their top main­te­nance activ­i­ties include clean­ing, lawn car, win­dow upkeep, and plumb­ing work. Com­pa­nies want­i­ng to engage with this demo­graph­ic should pri­or­i­tize offer­ing pre­mi­um ser­vices and prod­ucts that appeal to young home­own­ers’ pref­er­ence for qual­i­ty; this includes advanced smart home prod­ucts, high-effi­cien­cy appli­ances, and lux­u­ry main­te­nance supplies.

Middle-Income Seniors

Com­posed pri­mar­i­ly of Baby Boomers, about half of the home­own­ers in this seg­ment are mak­ing $80K to $159K per year. They are the sec­ond-high­est spend­ing seg­ment, invest­ing about $6,500 per year in pro­fes­sion­al home ser­vices, and they’re like­ly to hire out for dan­ger­ous or phys­i­cal­ly demand­ing tasks. They are the sec­ond-high­est spend­ing seg­ment. Man­u­fac­tur­ers who want to con­nect with this seg­ment should focus on prod­ucts and ser­vices that reduce phys­i­cal strain or enhance acces­si­bil­i­ty, while offer­ing con­trac­tor part­ner­ships for nec­es­sary home services.

Affluent Middle-Aged Homeowners

Afflu­ent mid­dle-aged home­own­ers are anoth­er key demo­graph­ic in the home ser­vices indus­try. Almost two-thirds make between $80k and $159k annu­al­ly. Although they spend 56% less on main­te­nance, they rely on pro­fes­sion­al providers for time-con­sum­ing tasks that require spe­cial­ized skills and tools. When tar­get­ing this seg­ment, keep in mind that they are bud­get con­scious but also val­ue their time, so effi­cien­cy, dura­bil­i­ty, and qual­i­ty are essential.

Low-Income Seniors

This home­own­er seg­ment spends the least on ser­vices, with a major­i­ty mak­ing less than $40k per year. On aver­age, they spend almost $2,600 per year on pro­fes­sion­al ser­vices. How­ev­er, like oth­er seniors, they are moti­vat­ed to hire pro­fes­sion­als for phys­i­cal­ly chal­leng­ing tasks. You can tar­get this home­own­er seg­ment by pro­vid­ing afford­able options and financ­ing solu­tions for essen­tial main­te­nance tasks.

What is the Average Spend for DIFM Projects?

Home­own­ers spend sig­nif­i­cant­ly more on pro­fes­sion­al ser­vices than on DIY tasks, and they spend about three times more for pro­fes­sion­al ser­vices than they do for main­te­nance mate­ri­als and supplies.

For exam­ple, roof and gut­ter projects have the high­est aver­age spend­ing per year, or about $1,390. Of that, home­own­ers allo­cate approx­i­mate­ly $200 for mate­ri­als and close to $1,200 for a con­trac­tor. Plumb­ing is anoth­er DIFM cat­e­go­ry where home­own­ers spend more than $1,000 — on aver­age — for year­ly main­te­nance, includ­ing sup­plies and con­trac­tor costs. Pest con­trol, win­dow clean­ing, and snow removal are on the low­er end of the spectrum.

A major­i­ty of home­own­ers feel the costs for var­i­ous types of home main­te­nance remained the same over the past year, com­pared to the 12 months pri­or. The one excep­tion is plumb­ing, where more than half of home­own­ers report­ed cost increas­es in the past 12 months.Even still, home­own­ers cite cost trans­paren­cy as one of the top chal­lenges when sched­ul­ing providers, with more than a quar­ter of home­own­ers say­ing they expe­ri­enced this issue in the past 12 months. Addi­tion­al­ly, when look­ing ahead to the next 12 months, rough­ly 41% of home­own­ers list­ed bud­get con­straints as a fac­tor that will pre­vent them from com­plet­ing home main­te­nance. The impact was twice as severe for home­own­ers mak­ing less than $40K per year.

In areas where home­own­ers are mak­ing sub­stan­tial invest­ments into main­te­nance, pro­fes­sion­al retail­ers and man­u­fac­tur­ers can appeal to cus­tomers through ser­vice plan offers. Take, for instance, that about one-quar­ter of home­own­ers pur­chase war­ranties for crit­i­cal home sys­tems and appli­ances to help man­age costs. Offer­ing extend­ed war­ran­ty options or main­te­nance ser­vice plans gives home­own­ers greater con­fi­dence in their invest­ment. Addi­tion­al­ly, retail­ers and man­u­fac­tur­ers can bun­dle war­ranties or ser­vice pack­ages with high-main­te­nance prod­ucts like HVAC sys­tems, plumb­ing fix­tures, and elec­tri­cal systems.

How Do Homeowners Research and Select Pros?

Ulti­mate­ly, home­own­ers are con­cerned about, but they take a lot more into con­sid­er­a­tion when decid­ing to hire a home ser­vices pro, as well as select­ing who they want for their project. In fact, our study shows that work qual­i­ty, rep­u­ta­tion, and being licensed and insured all trump price as the top fac­tors in select­ing a pro, with qual­i­ty of work being cit­ed as ​“impor­tant” for approx­i­mate­ly 96% of homeowners.

Despite the dig­i­tal age, per­son­al refer­rals remain the top resource for iden­ti­fy­ing and select­ing home ser­vices providers. Home­own­ers are about twice as like­ly to find a ser­vice provider from a per­son­al refer­ral than via an online search. Mean­while, social media was a use­ful resource for only 16% of home­own­ers. Addi­tion­al­ly, near­ly two-thirds of home­own­ers pre­fer to book over the phone or by an in-per­son vis­it as opposed to book­ing on a web­site, text mes­sag­ing, or using a mobile app.

As home­own­ers con­tin­ue to rely heav­i­ly on per­son­al refer­rals when choos­ing ser­vice providers, con­sid­er what that means for your com­pa­ny in 2025. It’s impor­tant to encour­age pos­i­tive word-of-mouth in your com­mu­ni­ty by offer­ing refer­ral pro­grams, loy­al­ty rewards, and excel­lent cus­tomer ser­vice. Also, your team may want to incor­po­rate tes­ti­mo­ni­als and peer reviews into mar­ket­ing mate­ri­als and in-store dis­plays as a way of rein­forc­ing trust and reputation.

Digging Deeper into Home Services Data and Insights

Our 2024 Home Ser­vices Study pro­vides fur­ther insights into the how, why, and when of home­own­ers opt­ing for pro­fes­sion­al help with home main­te­nance instead of going the DIY route. Along with sta­tis­tics and data, it also offers prac­ti­cal rec­om­men­da­tions for imple­ment­ing strate­gies that opti­mize home improve­ment trends relat­ed to pro­fes­sion­al ser­vice providers.