Posted on November 12th, 2022.

Americans are not only paying some of the highest prices ever for houses, they’re also spending more money to maintain them.

The cost of maintaining a home is estimated to rise by 9.3% this year, according to a new index from Thumbtack, a home services website. Owners should budget $4,886 for a single-family home -- up about $450 from last year, in part due to labor and material shortages, according to a statement Thursday.

The expenses are increasing particularly in cities like Portland, Oregon, and Las Vegas, where home prices have also skyrocketed. Meanwhile, they dropped about 2% in Baltimore, where the housing market is softer. 

Americans are choosing to invest more in their homes to outfit spaces for work and school. Almost a third of owners surveyed say they plan to spend more than $10,000 on projects in the next 12 months, which could add further upward pressure on housing prices.

Other projects are being done more out of necessity, like repairs to air conditioners in warm climates or hot water tanks that have a limited life cycle. Americans are also pro-actively spending on routine maintenance to avoid costlier repairs down the road, the study showed.

Thumbtack’s data is based on more than one million projects that are deemed essential annual tasks for home maintenance, such as fixing a roof and tree removal. It tracked requests on its platform from Jan. 1, 2020 to Nov. 18, 2021.

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While some projects can be done by handy owners or deferred, many others must be tackled each year and require a skilled technician. Appliance maintenance costs rose 19.7% from a year earlier, the data show.

The costs of home care in townhouses and apartments have risen 8.6% and 10%, respectively, in the last 12 months, Thumbtack said. It now costs an average $1,922 for townhome upkeep annually and $682 for apartments. 

The increases parallel a rise in the monthly median fees set by condominium homeowners’ associations, according to data compiled by Zillow Group Inc. And rising home valuations likely translate to higher property tax costs, which were up the most in 15 years in 2020, according to Labor Department data.

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