Exclusive Research: Window and Door Preferences

Of course, money matters to the new-home buyer. So when customers evaluate the trade-off between paying more up front for a better or best window against the potential for lower utility bills in the future, most clients opt for the standard energy-efficient selection, according to builders and architects who participated in Professional Builder’s Window and Door survey. Almost 40 percent of respondents offer window upgrades, but just 17.4 percent said that the majority of their clients buy them, which is down from a quarter of builders who indicated—in both last year’s and the 2015 survey—that they were able to sell better and best options to most of their buyers.

Almost two-thirds of builders and architects noted that they are specifying the same number of windows per home as they did three years ago. That figure ranged between 10 to 15 windows for a third of respondents and 16 to 20 for another third. Also, 34 percent of survey participants said that the average size of window units is larger compared with what they designed or installed three years ago. Picture/fixed windows have been the first or second most popular window type since moving up from the No. 3 slot in the 2013 survey.

In the door category, innovation has gone beyond the typical swing door, with pivot doors, barn doors, and multi-slide stacking doors now being available, as well as a wide variety of styles and colors. However, price is the main consideration for doors, with 71 percent of respondents picking price as the leading factor influencing door selection. More findings about window and door decision-making are in the charts that follow (click to enlarge).