HI Retail Sales Flat MoM, +5.6% YoY

Research evidence excerpt

HI Retail Sales Flat MoM, +5.6% YoY

Homebuilders & Building Products

June 17, 2026

HI Retail Sales Flat MoM, +5.6% YoY Exhibit 1 - Retail Sales

Statistics

The Wolfe Byte Home Improvement

May Home Improvement Retail Sales slightly underperformed seasonality, May 2026 Spend $ 41,908

although YoY performance remains positive, partially driven by pricing. April% MoM2026 $ 41,900+0.0%

% YoY +5.6%

% vs May 2024 +4.3%

May Home Improvement Retail Sales were effectively flat sequentially and Source: Wolfe Research, Census

increased +5.6% YoY. Sales typically improve +0.2% on average historically. May

Exhibit 2 - HI Sales Sincemarks the sixth straight month of YoY increases on easy comps while recent Feb 2021

figures are likely benefitting from tariff-related pricing. May was a particularly 44000 35%

42000 25%easy comp as May 2025 declined -2.5% sequentially. That said, our sense is R&R 43000 30%

20%

40000 15%is underperforming the numbers reported by the Census as our contacts have 39000

5%consistently indicated demand remains challenged while the Census data is up +4.1% 3800037000 10%

36000 0%

35000 -5%YTD, which is also notably better than HD and LOW recent comp performance. 2- 34000 -10%

year stacked growth improved to 4.4% from 3.3% on average over the past six Apr-21 Sep-21 Feb-22 Jul-22 Dec-22 May-23 Oct-23 Mar-24 Aug-24 Jan-25 Jun-25 Nov-25 Apr-26

HI Spend YoY % Change

months, and was the second strongest since August 2023, after April's 4.9%.

Appreciating the acceleration may be driven by pricing related to cost headwinds, Source: Wolfe Research, Census

demand appears to at least be holding steady. The HI Retail Sales data is clearly in Exhibit 3 - Retail Sales

nominal terms, which could further support figures moving forward if incremental MoM % Change Trends