Small businesses feel the pinch from slowing housing market

NEW YORK (AP) — The chill in the housing market is rippling out to the carpenters, landscapers and other small businesses that lose out when fewer homeowners renovate their properties. Inflation was already causing some homeowners to delay big renovation projects as prices for building materials, fixtures and appliances jumped. More recently, higher mortgage rates put a damper on the number of homes being sold. Growth in homeowner spending for improvements and repairs is expected to slow for the rest of 2022 and the first half of 2023, according to the Remodeling Futures Program at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University.