The electrician wiring your kitchen and the one wiring a data center are the same person, and this fall, the data center is winning. Crews under contract for data center work averaged 11.3 months of signed backlog in September, a full three months more than those without it [1]. Over that same stretch, home improvement spending fell 7.4% from a year earlier [4]. Your remodel loses to 149% growth in data center construction [2]. What it loses is not the price. It is the calendar.

The big picture:

My read starts with two gauges of a single trade, pulled from opposite ends. One measures signed work. The other tracks how builders view their own market.

Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) asks its members each month how much work they hold. The baseline answer was 8.7 months in September [1]. But the 15% of members handling data center projects averaged 11.3 months, a full three months more than the rest of the pack [1].

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) asks remodelers a different question. Its market index scored 62 in the third quarter, up a point [3]. Any reading over 50 means more remodelers call conditions good than poor [3].

Both surveys signal a busy market, but the dollars tell a thinner story. Home improvement spending rose 2.5% in August yet remains down 7.4% for the year [4]. Data center construction spending rose 7.5% that same month. It sits more than 73% above a year ago and has run at a 149% annualized pace since March [2].

NAHB’s chief economist draws a direct line between the two. Labor shortages, he notes, “exacerbated by immigration enforcement and competition from data center construction, are extending the time it takes to complete projects” [3]. That clause is the only place either report admits these two markets collide.

The split is lopsided. Among contractors with more than $100 million in annual revenue, 39% hold data center work now [1]. Below that line, only about 1 in 10 do [1]. A small remodeler does not just bid against another small shop for wire pullers. He bids against a big jobsite booking year-long schedules.

By the numbers

  • 11.3 months — Data center backlog: crews under contract for data center work averaged 11.3 months of signed jobs in September, three months more than members without it [1].
  • 149% — Boom pace: data center building rose 7.5% in August, sits more than 73% above a year ago, and has grown at a 149% annualized pace since March [2].
  • 7.4% — Remodel dollars: home improvement spending rose 2.5% in August but is down 7.4% on the year, in a Census series unadjusted for prices [4].
  • 62 — Remodeler mood: the market index rose a point, and the backlog of remodeling jobs climbed two points to 56 [3].

What I’d watch:

Where this bites is the schedule page of the contract, typically the shortest part of the bid. A price is just a number. A finish date is a claim about a crew’s availability.

  • The crew named in the bid: the question I would want answered is whether the people priced into week one actually arrive in week six. On an 11.3-month backlog, crews get moved.
  • The size split: large remodeling jobs rose two points to 66, while mid-size fell to 71 and small fell to 73 [3]. The biggest jobs hold their ground. That points to a labor squeeze, not a demand drop.
  • The margin line: more than 1 in 4 contractors expect profit margins to shrink over the next six months, the highest share since November 2025 [1]. Cost pain cuts both ways.
  • The next print: October’s backlog figure lands in November, followed by the fourth-quarter mood index. If data center backlogs climb again while remodel backlogs stall, the split looks structural rather than seasonal.

The catch

Between the lines, both headline numbers are opinions gathered by trade groups.

ABC polls its own members, and NAHB polls remodeler members. Neither is a count of the work for sale in your town. An 11.3-month average says nothing about the single builder quoting your kitchen.

The mechanism is time, not money. NAHB says competition from data center work stretches out finish dates [3]. Nothing in these reports says data centers make a remodel cost more. ABC names materials, labor and borrowing costs as the squeeze on contractors, and it names them for big commercial jobs [2].

What I keep circling is that falling dollars and rising confidence can coexist for mundane reasons. NAHB’s own remodeling chair points to high material costs and hesitant customers [3]. Part of that 7.4% drop is nerves, not capacity. The two stories are not exclusive, and this data cannot split them.

The schedule is the one variable a homeowner can actually see. A builder’s calendar stays hidden until you sign. It shows up as one line in the contract. That line is where the next year of this market will land.

At a glance

  • The Big Shift: Crews handling data center work carried 11.3 months of signed backlog in September, three months more than crews without it. Home improvement spending dropped 7.4% on the year, even as remodeler mood ticked up to 62.
  • Why It Matters: The scarcest thing in a 2026 remodel is not the quote. It is the crew’s calendar, and top crews get booked on longer projects with bigger budgets.
  • What I’d Watch: Whether the gap between data center work and residential remodels widens in the next two surveys.
  • Backlog gauge: a monthly poll of how many months of signed work crews hold, split by data center work.
  • Mood index: a quarterly survey of remodeler opinion, where 50 is the break-even mark.
  • Remodel spending: the Census dollar series of work actually put in place.
  • The Catch: Both headline surveys poll trade group members, and the clash they describe is about time, not price.

Related reading

Sources

[1] Associated Builders and Contractors, “ABC’s Construction Backlog Indicator Rises Again in September on Data Center Strength”, 2026-10-13 — https://www.abc.org/News-Media/News-Releases/abcs-construction-backlog-indicator-rises-again-in-september-on-data-center-strength [2] Associated Builders and Contractors, “ABC: Data Center Construction Spending Growing at 149% Annualized Pace Since March”, 2026-10-01 — https://www.abc.org/News-Media/News-Releases/abc-data-center-construction-spending-growing-at-149-annualized-pace-since-march [3] National Association of Home Builders, “Remodeling Market Sentiment Remains Stable in Third Quarter Despite Headwinds”, 2026-10-08 — https://www.nahb.org/news-and-economics/press-releases/2026/10/remodeling-market-sentiment-remains-stable-in-third-quarter-despite-headwinds [4] Eye On Housing (NAHB), “Private Residential Construction Spending Posts Broad-Based Gains in August”, 2026-10-01 — https://eyeonhousing.org/2026/10/private-residential-construction-spending-posts-broad-based-gains-in-august