US Building Products—Card Insights: Spending Decelerates, but Remains Solid into August

Research evidence excerpt

Vi ewp oint |

05 Aug 2026 12:37:40 ET │ 11 pages

US Building Products—Card Insights

Spending Decelerates, but Remains Solid into August

CITI'S TAKE

In our weekly, we examine a subset of Citi US credit card data for readthroughs to repair & remodel (R&R) activity; we analyze real estate services,

construction materials, forest products, homebuilding, and R&R retail

spending. We consider the categories in aggregate to be a rough

representation of US R&R, albeit weighted toward DIY over Pro. Card

spending in the 4 weeks ended 8/1/26 decelerated 110bp to +3.8% Y/Y on a

tougher comp of +40bp; comps generally get tougher through the summer

as Y/Y spending accelerated over the course of summer ‘25. We stress the

weekly data is volatile, and we see much of the recent spending growth

reflecting producer price hikes, rather than higher consumption volume. We

model R&R spend +2% in 2026 (vs. +2.6% YTD), with elevated home equity,

lower HELOC rates, and favorable comps offsetting macro uncertainty and

consumer confidence challenges

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Anthony Pettinari AC

Bryan Burgmeier

Landry Moore

General Description — Card Insights represent a selected subset of Citi’s credit card

transactions and are not representative of Citi’s overall credit cardholder population.

The data is highly aggregated, anonymized and should be considered in the context

of other economic indicators and publicly available information. All cards included

within Card Insights comprise a panel of more than 10 million US cardholders.

Card Insights Disclaimer and Methodology