Home Depot on Tuesday reported sales of $40.2 billion and net earnings of $3.8 billion for the third fiscal quarter, results that were better than expected, company officials said.
Although most homeowners are financially healthy and the nation’s aging housing stock requires evermore repairs, high interest rates have been forcing delays in some larger projects, the company said.
“While macroeconomic uncertainty remains, our third-quarter performance exceeded our expectations,” Ted Decker, the company’s chair, president and chief executive, said during a conference call with analysts and reporters.
Sales were up 6.6% from the same period last year, while net earnings were down less than 1%.
Home Depot said it expects to finish its fiscal year with overall sales up about 4% from the previous year, partly because leap year added a week to the business but also because it believes the overall fundamentals are strong and the company is snaring a larger share of the nearly $1 trillion-a-year market.
That is despite the struggle of the housing market to overcome the burden of high interest rates. Turnover in homes is at or near a record low, with many homeowners staying put when they might like to move.
That can mean a huge, pent-up demand for renovations as families grow or other household needs change. And with unemployment low and wage gains outpacing inflation, Home Depot’s do-it-yourself customers — who are typically homeowners — are generally on a good financial footing.
But they still may have trouble if they need to borrow money.
While the Federal Reserve has begun to slowly trim its benchmark borrowing rate, the interest rates paid by businesses and consumers — including homebuyers — are still higher than they have been since just before the Great Recession in 2007.
And while more than half Home Depot’s business is with contractors, they are in often doing work for homeowners.
Big-ticket orders at Home Depot — that is, more than $1,000 — were 6.8% lower in the past quarter than during the same period a year earlier. The need is there, since American housing stock is, on average, older than ever, but many homeowners are waiting to do costly renovations, like kitchen and bathroom remodeling, according to Decker.
“The larger, more discretionary projects, those are the ones that are being deferred,” he said.
In times past, customers who hesitated to borrow from a bank or put purchases on credit cards — whose rates are historically high — might have taken out a home-equity loan to pay for a project. But mortgage rates have been stubbornly high, chilling that inclination.
The amount of home equity loans is down more than 40% from a decade ago, according to the Federal Reserve.
“One could argue that the rate environment is settling down … but we just don’t know,” Decker said. “If you get stability at any rate, that might be more important. I don’t think we need a dramatic drop.”
While not mentioning the name of President-elect Donald Trump, Home Depot officials said that they do not think they will be disproportionately hurt if he follows through on his promise of higher tariffs.
Economists have warned that tariffs will raise the price of imports, especially from China.
Home Depot is aware of the possible price pressure but believes it is somewhat insulated since it buys more than half its materials and tools in North America, primarily in the United States, Decker said.
Moreover, if Home Depot must pay higher prices for other imports, so will everyone else, Decker said. “Whatever happens in tariffs will be an industrywide impact.”
Home Depot stock was trading at $405.56 a share midday on Tuesday, down $3 a share from the opening. A year ago, Home Depot’s sales were dipping and shares of its stock had sunk to a low of $288 a share. But last month, the company hit a 52-week high of nearly $419 a share.
Ana Garcia, a stock analyst with CFRA Research, said Tuesday after the company’s teleconference that she has raised her expectations and believes shares of Home Depot could hit $433 within the next 12 months.
With more revenues than any other company based in Georgia, Home Depot has 2,345 stores in the United States, its territories, Mexico and Canada. A dozen more are to be added in the coming year, the company said.
The 46-year-old company has about 465,000 employees.
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