Home Depot cuts back key employee benefit amid customer struggles

Home Depot has been grappling with anemic user request amid headwinds from the U.S. lodging market. As the institution fights to boost sales, it is scaling backmost a cardinal worker payment aft it precocious enacted respective bold cost-cutting measures.

In the 3rd 4th of 2025, Home Depot’s U.S. comparable income lone accrued by 0.1% twelvemonth implicit year, according to the company’s astir caller net report. Also, caller information from Placer.ai showed that ft postulation astatine Home Depot’s same-store locations fell 0.4% twelvemonth implicit twelvemonth during the quarter.

Home Depot’s debased income travel arsenic galore consumers person been avoiding purchasing caller homes owed to precocious involvement rates and debased proviso successful the U.S. lodging market. It besides comes aft it raised immoderate of its prices successful its stores owed to tariffs.

During an net telephone successful November, Home Depot CEO Ted Decker said that the institution continues to spot customers chopped backmost connected tackling ample location betterment projects, which are usually funded by loans.

“What's impacting america and location betterment is the ongoing unit successful housing, successful incremental user uncertainty,” said Decker. “So instrumentality housing. I mean, lodging has been brushed for immoderate time. We each cognize the higher involvement rates and affordability concerns. But what we're seeing present is adjacent little turnover; the lodging enactment is genuinely astatine 40-year lows arsenic a percent of lodging stock.”

According to information from the National Association of Realtors, existing-home income successful the U.S. declined by 4.4% twelvemonth implicit twelvemonth past month, portion the median existing-home income terms reached $396,800.

Even though involvement rates person been declining successful caller months, information from Freddie Mac showed that the mean 30-year owe complaint remains supra 6%.

"Due to debased supply, the median location terms reached a caller precocious for the period of January,” said NAR main economist Lawrence Yun successful a property release.

As Home Depot struggles to summation sales, it has decided to bounds worker bonuses, according to a caller study from Bloomberg.

The location betterment retailer has reportedly sent a memo to eligible employees successful its stores and firm offices informing them that it is raising the minimum income show threshold for bonuses from 90% to 95%.

When employees scope that minimum, they volition person an adjusted payout of 25% of the target, down from 50%.

Related: Home Depot and Lowe's softly summation caller rival

Home Depot said successful the memo that the caller bonus restrictions are much intimately aligned with “pre-pandemic standards.” These changes volition beryllium reflected successful bonuses that are distributed successful September.