The 19th annual Cost vs. Value Report shows that prices continue to climb for most remodeling projects at the same time the value of improvements at resale returns to 2002 levels. None of this should come as much of a surprise to industry professionals, who have been riding the crest of the remodeling boom for several years, and this year's data confirm the housing slowdown many parts of the country are experiencing.
A number of improvements designed to make the report more reliable and more useful has also affected both cost and value data. For starters, they took a fresh look at the specs for all 25 projects. The result is cost-to-construct figures (which include labor, material, subtrades, and gross profit) that are not only higher than in previous years but also considerably more accurate. Estimates of resale value are also more accurate than ever before, thanks to a record 2,188 members of the National Association of Realtors who completed the e-mail survey. Finally, they have introduced nine regional averages following the divisions established by the U.S. Census Bureau. They believe this data provides more useful points of comparison than the four larger regions used in previous years.
Downloadable City Reports: PDF files for each of the 60 cities surveyed in the 2006 Cost vs. Value Report are available for purchase and immediate download from costvalue.remodelingmagazine.com.
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