60 Percent of Homeowners Plan Summer Home Improvement Projects

SEATTLE, June 21, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- More homeowners are choosing to stay in their homes and invest in home improvements due to tight inventory and the fact that more than 25 percent of homeowners nationwide are underwater on their mortgages[i]. To make the most of their current surroundings, 60 percent of homeowners plan to make a home improvement or addition this summer, according to the Zillow® Digs™ Summer Home Improvement Trend and Spending Survey[ii].

"Zillow Digs is a leading resource for discovering up-and-coming design trends as actual consumers and professionals are sharing and discussing what they like," said Cynthia Nowak, Zillow Digs trend expert. "As we head into the long days of summer, we are seeing increased interest in outdoor spaces with very natural elements such as stone fireplaces, as well as bringing more light into bathrooms with clear glass on the walls and shower enclosures."

Home improvement projects and spending varies by age and life stage

Younger homeowners and homes with children are significantly more likely to be planning a home improvement or addition this summer.

• 18-to-34-year-olds: 71 percent
• 35-to-54-year-olds: 61 percent
• 55 and older: 51 percent
• Homes with children: 65 percent
• Homes without children: 57 percent

Homeowners plan to spend a median of $1,200 on summer home improvement projects. Sub-groups of homes with children as well as homeowners 54 years of age and younger plan to spend one-third more ($1,500) compared to homes without children and those 55 and older ($1,000).

Summer home improvement trends: Back to nature and classy glass

The survey found that some of the most popular summer home improvement projects are outdoor spaces (40 percent) and bathrooms (17 percent). Younger respondents and homes with children are significantly more likely to be planning three or more home improvements this summer.

Since more than 80 percent of Zillow Digs users are actively working on or planning a home improvement project and nearly 70 percent are using Zillow Digs to collect ideas or get inspired[iii], Zillow's trend analysts looked at what is hot on Zillow Digs for outdoor spaces and bathrooms to spot trends for summer home design:

• Back to nature: Zillow Digs users like a very natural look for their outdoor spaces. Instead of infinity pools and sleek modern decks with well-appointed outdoor kitchens, summer home remodelers prefer camp-like settings that use a lot of stone, particularly stone fireplaces. People want to be comfortable but remember that they're outdoors and feel like they are in a very natural setting.
• Classy glass: From glass shower enclosures to glass tiles, Zillow Digs users want open and light bathrooms. Get out the squeegee and glass cleaner – frosted glass is out. Without shower curtains, many homeowners and designers take advantage of the free wall space to showcase beautiful glass tiles.  

More than half of young homeowners find inspiration online

The survey also looked at the top sources of ideas and inspiration for home improvement and found online sources are the most popular at 37 percent overall, with more than half (53 percent) of younger homeowners and 50 percent of homes with children finding inspiration online. Zillow/Zillow Digs was the third most common source for online inspiration (6 percent), following HGTV.com (25 percent) and Pinterest (15 percent).

Zillow Digs users can browse more than 44,000 photos from Zillow's database of more than 110 million U.S. homes, or those provided by home improvement professionals and homeowners, and see Zillow's proprietary Digs Estimates for the estimated cost of the actual bathrooms and kitchens they are viewing. They can create, save and share boards of ideas and decor they love, and browse more than 105,000 boards created by others, comment on photos and follow people with similar interests. And, they can connect with local home improvement professionals for help – for free, on iPad® and the Web.

About Zillow, Inc.

Zillow, Inc. (NASDAQ: Z) operates the leading real estate and home-related marketplaces on mobile and the Web, with a complementary portfolio of brands and products that help people find vital information about homes, and connect with the best local professionals. Zillow's brands serve the full life cycle of owning and living in a home: buying, selling, renting, financing, remodeling and more. In addition, Zillow offers a suite of tools and services to help local real estate, mortgage, rental and home improvement professionals manage and market their businesses. Welcoming 55 million monthly unique users, the Zillow, Inc. portfolio includes Zillow.com®, Zillow Mobile, Zillow Mortgage Marketplace, Zillow Rentals, Zillow Digs™, Postlets®, Diverse Solutions®, Mortech™, HotPads™ and Agentfolio™. The company is headquartered in Seattle.

The Zillow logo is available at http://zillow.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=191

Zillow.com, Zillow, Postlets and Diverse Solutions are registered trademarks of Zillow, Inc.
Mortech, HotPads, Digs and Agentfolio are trademarks of Zillow, Inc.

iPad is a registered trademark of Apple Inc.

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[i] Zillow Negative Equity Report, May 2013

[ii] These are some of the findings of an Ipsos poll conducted May 30-31, 2013. For the survey, a nationally representative sample of 2,078 randomly-selected adults aged 18 and over residing in the U.S. was interviewed via Ipsos' U.S. online omnibus. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate within +/-2.1 percentage points 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire population of adults in the U.S. been polled. The margin of error will be larger within sub-groupings of the survey population. The sub-group of homeowners in the sample is 1,411, which has a margin of error of +/-2.6. These data were weighted to ensure the sample's regional and age/gender composition reflects that of the actual U.S. population according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. All sample surveys and polls may be subject to other sources of error, including, but not limited to coverage error, and measurement error.

[iii] The survey was sent to all registered Zillow Digs' users and conducted via Survey Monkey in April 2013, resulting in 306 completed surveys.

SOURCE Zillow, Inc.