Susan Lambert is shown inside her home which is currently being renovated. Susan Lambertis is in the process of renovating her entire home and hopes to have it finished early next year. “We’re knee deep in a reno,” he said. After finalizing plans with an architect last year, getting the necessary approvals and some pandemic-related delays, the project officially began last spring. Lambert said she and her husband were motivated to upgrade their home after realizing it needed a lot of smaller fixes. “We needed new windows, we needed a new roof. Our kitchen was falling apart — the cabinets were all broken, our refrigerator was broken, our stove. So we needed to do a lot of things,” she said. The renovation industry boomed in the first two years of the pandemic as people spent more time in their homes, and that momentum has continued despite higher costs and increased interest rates. Dave Kenney, who runs BroLaws Construction with his brother-in-law, said a kitchen remodel can cost between $15,000 and $20,000 more than it did a few years ago. “A job two years ago and a job now are not comparable, which is a bit difficult as a business owner when you get callbacks for other jobs that people have used you for in the past,” he said. Jordy Fagan, co-founder of Toronto-based interior design firm Collective Studio, said projects are more expensive overall right now, which is largely attributed to labor costs. He said prices for materials such as lumber have stabilized somewhat compared to wide swings over the past two years, but still remain higher than pre-pandemic levels. “It’s easier to make an offer now, and not say, ‘OK, this offer is only for five days, because anything can happen in five days.’ At least now it’s a little more stable and you feel a little more comfortable diving into a renovation,” he said. Coming out of the first lockdown, Collective Studio saw demand skyrocket in the summer of 2020. “That summer felt a little more normal, even though we were pre-vaccination. I feel like that sparked interest in preparing for the next fall wave of creating work-from-home situations and understanding that kids weren’t necessarily coming back to school in September,” Fagan said. “The volume started to get crazy big, which was amazing.” Fast forward to 2022 and declining consumer confidence has affected some of that volume, but demand is still very much there, Fagan said. “I think people have saved some money now,” he said. Meanwhile, BroLaws’ Kenney said one of the challenges over the past two years has been quality work, especially as demand remains high and workers are under pressure. He said his company works to encourage interest in the professions and give young people the right training and experience. “I think we need more advocates or people who can demonstrate that the professions can be a good place to work and that you can be just as successful as any other job,” he said. Kenney added that he has raised his employees’ wages as the cost of living rises, and consequently raised prices to keep up. In September, the average hourly wage for construction workers rose 7.5 per cent year over year, up $2.36 to $33.79, according to Statistics Canada. While Kenney has been able to keep up with demand, he said getting projects to 100 percent is still a problem at times because of ongoing delays. “Well, we finished a kitchen, for example, but they didn’t have their stove for another two months because the stove was back-ordered and delayed in being shipped,” he said. “Or we’ve finished other projects and waited at a counter that it’s now back-ordered just because of the demand to pick it up from overseas.” Homeowners spent an average of about $13,000 between March 2021 and February 2022 on interior home renovations, while an average of $6,600 was spent on outdoor projects, according to data from home improvement company HomeStars. HomeStars also found that homeowners expect to spend an average of more than $25,000 on home renovations from March 2022 to February 2023. So what are people asking for this year? Special areas for children to do work, home offices and entertainment areas, Fagan said. Kenney said there are also many requests for kitchen renovations, outdoor projects and indoor air quality improvements. Looking ahead to 2023, some industry experts say there could be some slack on the way. Kevin Lee, CEO of the Canadian Home Builders’ Association, has already seen a slight slowdown in demand in the second half of 2022. “A lot of people, when they do particularly big renovations, they finance it through things like their lines of credit. So with the cost of borrowing money going up as fast as it has, a lot of people are now putting off some of the renovations,” he said. However, RenoAssistance, a general contracting business owned by Desjardins, sees the renovation market remaining strong next year. That’s because more homeowners are choosing to stay in their current property and improve it rather than trying to find a new property in a cooling housing market, he said. Lambert said the renovation process has been stressful as she and her husband balance mortgage payments, rent and financing the renovation itself, but noted that having a good contractor and architect has made a big difference. “I went in expecting this, of course, to be the most stressful thing we’ve done. That’s what everyone says. I feel like we did really well.”
