Our Renovations Era: How the Market Looks

Without a doubt, we live in a renovations heyday. And the times only promise to become more friendly to this part of the industry.

It’s not just a matter of homeowners choosing to invest in their backyards, or opting away from new-pool purchases, says Michael Todd, president of Rainbow Pools in Fishkill, N.Y. It was bound to happen, especially as projects built during the new-pool glut of the 1990s/early 2000s are reaching the quarter-century mark.

“Certainly it’s rising, but I think it’s going to keep rising in an incremental fashion because it’s time to fix all these pools,” he says.

Here, professionals assess the current landscape of pool/spa renovations and what it’s meant for their companies as they look for this market to continue thriving.

Healthy activity
Many companies are reporting moderate increases in renovation sales.

The Amenity Construction Group (ACG), based in Raleigh, N.C., sees increases ranging from 10% to 35% among its locations that serve the Eastern Seaboard, Texas and Arizona.

“The numbers vary a bit region to region, but across the board, the trend is up,” says Mitch Larriva, president of ACG’s Remodel Division.

While builders agree that renovation business is growing more than new construction, some don’t see it reaching its full potential quite yet.

“We’re up in renovation [revenue] 5% to 7% year-over-year,” says Bruce Mungiguerra, CEO of Riverbend Sandler Pools in Plano, Texas. “We have seen some growth but, candidly, we had expected to see greater growth.”

Units are up for the company — with renovation volume increasing 10% to 12%, but average ticket price has dropped about 15%.

For Riverbend and others, more clients seem to be limiting the scope of renovations to a simple refresh with a replaster/retile job, rather than a total transformation. “I think customers are saying ‘This is a $50,000 remodel project. Let’s do tile and coping for now and do the rest later,’” Mungiguerra explains.

He sees renovation sales tempered by the same factors that slow new-pool activity. It’s true that some homeowners decide to renovate as part of their decision to stay where they are. But, Mungiguerra believes, others would move if economic conditions were friendlier. So they see their homes as temporary and bristle at the idea of investing too much.

For ACG, the scope of renovations have varied by region. “During the COVID pool boom, pebble interiors became the go-to everywhere,” says Larriva. “That’s regressed in some markets, with customers looking for more cost-effective options. Pebble is still king in Florida and Arizona, but in other areas, quartz-based plaster and even marcite have come back into play.”

For Rainbow Pools, other realities have led to a quite different trend. As working remotely gives home buyers more options for where to relocate, wealthier consumers are migrating into certain neighborhoods that used to be more working- or middle-class. For these customers, a “renovation” may equate to tearing a pool out and replacing it altogether.

“They are buying houses that were originally purchased by people of more modest means, who may have put in a simple vinyl-liner pool,” Todd explains. “Now you have people from the city coming out and gutting the house and backyard. They want a pool with all the bells and whistles. They don’t want to slap on a coat of paint or put a new liner in.”

Lingering Pandemic Effects
Some are beginning to see a phenomenon that many had expected since the pandemic boom.
During this time, when demand exceeded supply and contractors were stretched impossibly thin, companies and individuals from outside fields saw the supply gap as an opportunity and tried building pools. Many in the industry predicted that, within a few years, homeowners would be looking for help repairing shoddy work by some of these dabblers.

For Riverbend Sandler, that has materialized. “We’re actually doing some remodels on pools that are three and four years old,” Mungiguerra says.

Among the company’s six operations in Central Texas, most issues revolve around tile and decking. They often find decking that is too thin or lacks steel reinforcement or a proper base. Tile may not have been adhered correctly so it’s falling out. “And it’s not onesies-twosies,” Mungiguerra says. “It’s where 20% of the tile has fallen off.”

Homeowners in his area seem to have skirted workmanship issues with the shells, which Mungiguerra credits to the area having a very skilled shotcrete trade.

ACG is also seeing a number of pools in premature need of renovations. “We’re seeing plenty of those,” Larriva says.

His company comes across both structural and surface problems. “Common issues include bad gunite/shotcrete methods and improper subgrade prep or testing,” Larriva says.

With these projects, builders have to deal with the same uncertainty and concerns of any renovation — namely, not knowing exactly what will become unearthed and protecting themselves from inheriting another contractor’s liability. But, on top of that, they have to deal with devastated clients, Mungiguerra says.

“There is some sticker shock, some frustration,” he says. “So we’re spending more time educating them on why the pool or feature failed or why their tile’s falling off.”

When interacting with these customers, his team keeps their own emotions out of it and focuses on the job at hand to avoid adding to the aggravation.

Gearing up for opportunity
While the renovation market is self-generating to a certain extent due to the inevitability of pools aging, these builders see investment and focus as being necessary to maximize this business.

“I think the opportunity is there for whoever’s willing to seize it,” says Josh Sandler, CEO of Gold Medal Pools in Lewisville, Texas. “It’s just a matter of bandwidth.”

With his new-construction operation perfected, he now plans to focus on fine-tuning his renovations operation. “The opportunity’s huge,” he says.

On the business side, several of these builders have established separate divisions for their renovation work, if for no other reason than to keep the bookkeeping clean.

“There have been times where [new construction] is extremely profitable and renovations isn’t, then others where renovation is a profit leader but new construction isn’t as strong,” says Mike Panella, CEO of Swimming Pool Services in Waukesha, Wis. “Because we have those numbers broken out, we can watch for where there could be improvements.”

Some will share design, sales and construction staff between new construction and renovation. However, others take it another step, assigning renovation work only to those with more experience, so they can more easily respond to situations as they arise.

For Swimming Pool Services, that staff is on the rise.

“We just took one of our [new-construction] members and moved him to the renovation team,” Panella says. “He wanted to try something new, and we could use somebody with all his knowledge on the renovation side when we’re tearing apart these existing pools. So now we’ll have three renovations teams. If I rewind to four years ago, we had one. We’re seeing a lot of growth, so we’re already anticipating adding a fourth in 2027 — maybe even next year.”

Mike Church, CEO of Cody Pools in Austin, Texas, has found something of a middle ground. His company, with locations in Texas, Florida and Arizona, doesn’t have dedicated renovation crews. However, it only allows certain crews and project managers on its renovation sites. “It’s a selective group,” Church says. Less-experienced employees stick to new pools.

For some of these companies, investing in renovation also means targeting marketing efforts specifically to customers whose pools may need a revitalization. This often consists of emails and other communications with homeowners whose pools they built. Those with service divisions have another built-in audience for these efforts.

“… It’s becoming more proactive than reactive,” says Sandler from Gold Medal Pools. “So we’re taking our current base of thousands of clients and helping them understand what needs updating and what the opportunities are. That in itself could keep us busy for years.”

If economic trends continue as is, Church expects the renovation upswing to continue. “I think it’s only going to increase because of the uncertainty of people financing new pools,” he says.

But builders don’t expect the growth to hinge only on conditions that dampen new construction.
“We’re extremely optimistic,” Panella says. “We’re adding people. We’re not saying, ‘Oh it’s going to level out.’ We’re keeping our foot on the gas. We see the opportunity in our area and want to grab what’s available.”