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Not every home service business survives a recession the same way.
In this episode of JackQuisitions, Jack Carr ranks the five most recession-resistant home service businesses to own based on one simple question: What do homeowners still pay for when money gets tight?
From plumbing and HVAC to restoration and septic, Jack breaks down which businesses continue generating revenue during economic downturns, why emergency services outperform discretionary work, and what acquisition-minded operators should look for before buying.
If you're thinking about buying a home service company, expanding your portfolio, or simply want to understand which trades are built to weather any economy, this episode is your playbook.
The best businesses aren't just profitable when times are good—they keep printing cash when times get tough.
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In this episode, Jack covers:
→ His ranking of the 5 most recession-resistant home service businesses
→ Why urgent repairs outperform discretionary projects
→ How recurring maintenance creates stable cash flow
→ Why plumbing takes the #1 spot
→ The role insurance plays in restoration businesses
→ Where HVAC, electrical, and septic fit during downturns
→ What buyers should prioritize when evaluating acquisitions
Breaking $5M Workshop
Join John Wilson and Jack Carr in Akron, OH for a hands on workshop built for home service owners ready to scale past $5M. Get the proven playbook, tour Wilson's operation, and connect with other growth minded contractors.
Register here: https://www.ownedandoperated.com/upcoming-events/oao-workshop-breaking-5-million
AI's taking our jobs is what they're all telling us. It's what the headlines read. And I think it's important if you are new to home services, you're thinking about buying a business or starting one up, that it is important to think about hey, what businesses are recession resistant? So here are the top five home service businesses that print cash during a recession. So recessions expose the difference, I think, between what people want and what people actually need. Because when money gets tight and you have to decide where your paycheck's going, homeowners generally delay the big construction projects, the remodels. They cancel the new deck. Maybe they wait an extra week in between landscaping visits. During the 2007 to 2011, so like the great financial crisis, spending on home improvement actually fell 22%, while maintenance and repair increased by 6%. And so that's what we're gonna focus on today is I want to be repairing essential systems, solving urgent problems, and collecting revenue that is not dependent on the homeowner needing to feel wealthy. So here's the five in-order uh home service businesses that I want to own during a recession.
Number five, repair-focused electrical. Electrical, electrical, electrical. If you are a longtime listener, you know I love electrical. Unfortunately, it does sit at number five here because most of electrical work that we make money on is nice to have. It's like, hey, let's move this circuit over here, we want to do this. That being said, if something's burning and there's a burning smell, or the breaker keeps repeatedly tripping, or there's power loss in your house, or there's an unsafe panel. If you're trying to push past five million dollars in your home service business, this is the workshop that I wish I had earlier. September 15th to the 17th of this year, John and I are hosting another breaking five million workshop at his headquarters in Akron, Ohio. We're gonna do a shop tour, we're gonna walk through his business at an extremely high level, and we're gonna give you the playbook on how to break five million dollars. Every single one of these events have sold out, so make sure to click the link below, reserve your spot today, and we'll see you there. You're gonna change it. Like you have to spend money, that's the urgency. It gives the company large tickets still, and uh you still get a chance to replace the things that a lot of electrical home service companies are actually going over, going after anyway. So electrical ranks fifth though, over plumbing, or I'm not gonna tell you the other ones, over the others, because uh a decent portion of the industry is is inevitably tied to new construction or some kind of construction, but mostly just the service uh frequency is a lot less. So that is why that's my number
five. Moving into number four, septic pumping and repair. Um, business model speaks for itself. You're pumping septic systems, you're doing inspections, you're do getting emergency calls, you're doing drain field work, pump replacements. More than one in five households in this country relies on septic or a decentralized water system of some sort, and they need inspections, they need pumping every three to five years. So that gives the business a recurring maintenance cycle, and then the higher ticket comes from when the pumps fail or the lines fail, the tank fails, and so you're back out there again doing those big ticket items. They homeowners may delay pumping longer than they should in a recession, but once the sewage starts to back up or it starts surfacing in the yard, there's no discretion here. Like you can't avoid the poop backing up into your house or not being able to use the toilet. There's no workaround, there's no DIY, like it really is a cash printing business no matter what. Not even in just not even in recessions, just anytime. So that's why Septic is my number four.
Number three is HVAC. Again, I own an HVAC company. The business is maintenance agreements, diagnostic and repair and service calls, indoor air quality and replacements when equipment can no longer be managed or it's too old to be serviced. Again, what ends up what you end up seeing happening in this industry is that installation and installation work tends to shift more to repair and service work, which is okay because you're still making great money and margins on the repair and service work. So instead of getting a $15,000 brand new system installed, somebody might elect to do a three or four thousand dollar compressor. Lower average ticket, but it doesn't eliminate demand. And then if you're still doing a good service for that customer in another three or four years, guess what? They still need the system replacement once the economy starts taking off again. So it doesn't disappear completely. What I will say though is it's not my number one because there's a lot of workarounds we see in the HVAC industry, right? You can buy window units, you can buy $200 whole room units. It's ugly, it looks gross, but people can get by with little workarounds. They can get in-house heaters, electric heaters in every single room. It doesn't work when it starts getting super low or super high in temperature, but it can push back their repairs into the future. So that's why it's my number three and not my number
one. Number two is going to be a surprise for some of you, I think. It's gonna be water, fire, and mold remediation. This business model is 24-hour emergency response, water extraction, um, drying, demolition, smoke remediation, mold work, uh, you know, the normal stuff. It's mold and fire and water remediation. But restoration on the whole has three huge advantages. The loss is urgent, the tickets are huge, they can be giant, and insurance pays most of the bill most of the time. About one in 60 homes has property damage claim caused by water damage or freezing every single year. In Tennessee, this year we had a giant ice storm which took down tons of homes, and so there's claims all throughout Middle Tennessee, uh, this year alone. And these events don't stop because unemployment rises. The pipes are still gonna burst in somebody's house uh if there's no power and it's freezing. Like it's what happens. Water heaters are still gonna leak, and storms are still gonna be here, and fires are still gonna happen. But this is not effortless money. You still need referral relationships, immediate response, excellent documentation, you know, expertise, working capital, like the whole thing still apply, that it's still a viable business, but a restoration company can show enormous revenue and have amazing cash flows in the right type of season. And in a recession, they still have a buffer that they get paid out by the insurance company and not the homeowner itself. I think that's a really important part is it's urgent work. Some of the money comes from the homeowner, but some of it also comes from the insurance company, and it can deliver huge margins, huge revenue, and can provide decent cash
flow. The number one business that I would like to own in a recession is going to be plumbing, drains, and sewers. The business model combines emergency plumbing, service work, drain cleaning, sewer inspections, replacement, water heaters, leak detection, repiping. It's a plumbing company, right? And plumbing is the number one because the market is so broad, the volume is so frequent, and most problems for plumbing is urgent, right? Your water heater doesn't work, you're not having hot water in the house. And guess what? There's no workaround like an HVAC. You can't buy a mini hot, I guess you could boil water on the stove, but I don't know who's doing that, right? There, you just don't have options. And your sewer backs up, you can't DIY sewer repair. You could maybe buy a snake from Home Depot and try yourself, but most of the snakes and equipment that you're utilizing to break up those clogs and get rid of roots in the line, or get little Jimmy's toy that he flushed down the drain, like it's expensive equipment that it's specialized and it's just gonna be not DIYable for the homeowner. And so there's no other option. It's urgent, high ticket. A company can run a small repair today, replace a water heater tomorrow, and sell sewer replacement the next day, and then a whole home repipe the next month. So that is why plumbing is my number one recession-resistant business that I would want to own in a recession. Recessions don't eliminate household spending, they just force homeowners to separate optional projects from projects that need to be solved. And that's why this is my list of the top five businesses to own in a recession. If you like what you heard, like, sub, tell me why I'm right or wrong in the comments below. Always love that. Uh, and then I'll catch you next time.
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