PartSelect.com Names the Top 10 Cities Most Likely to DIY

PartSelect.com reveals the cities in America in which people are the most likely to tackle their own appliance repair jobs.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

HALIFAX, Nova Scotia- PartSelect.com, the complete online resource for the do-it-yourself (DIY) repair market and official home of the Instant Repairman, today revealed the cities in America in which people are most likely to tackle their own appliance repair jobs.

Using data collected from millions of customer orders throughout the company’s history, PartSelect.com determined that the top 10 cities most likely to DIY, grouped by Combined Statistical Area, are:

1. 1. Santa Fe-Espanola, N.M.
2. 2. Wausau-Merrill, Wis.
3. 3. Bend-Prineville, Ore.
4. 4. Port St. Lucie-Sebastian-Vero Beach, Fla.
5. 5. Claremont-Lebanon, N.H.-Vt.
6. 6. Sarasota-Bradenton-Punta Gorda, Fla.
7. 7. Hartford-West Hartford-Willimantic, Conn.
8. 8. Washington-Baltimore-Northern Virginia, DC-Md.-Va.-W.Va.
9. 9. Boston-Worcester-Manchester, Maine-R.I.-N.H.
10. 10. Raleigh-Durham-Cary, N.C.

“The Sante Fe-Espanola, N.M. statistical area tops the chart, with people 71 percent more likely to fix their own appliances than the average American,” says Ben Graham, Director of Ecommerce for PartSelect.com. “And yet, people in cities far from there, such as up north to Wausau, Wis., and as southern as Sarasota, Fla., are not far behind that. When we first decided to develop these rankings we thought some interesting geographic patterns might emerge. But now we see that the popularity of DIY is not confined to a specific region. As this top 10 list demonstrates, people all over the United States have the same drive to save money by repairing their own appliances and buying their parts online with a site like PartSelect.com.”

To calculate the rankings, PartSelect.com examined data from the 120 largest statistical areas in the United States and graded them based on the number of appliance repair parts ordered in that area. The company factored in population, number of households, homeownership rates, and number of people per household in each region to rate the relative likelihood of appliance repair and determine the region’s Appliance DIY Score.

“By taking all of these factors into account, we can accurately say, for example, that a Bostonian is 19 percent more likely than the average American to repair his or her appliance. Yet, that same person is 44 percent less likely to tackle a DIY repair project than someone living in Sante Fe,” says Graham.

PartSelect.com also uncovered the cities whose residents are least likely to do their own repairs. With the residents of number one being least likely to DIY, those areas are:

1. 1. Brownsville-Harlingen-Raymondville, Texas
2. 2. Lumberton-Laurinburg, N.C.
3. 3. Lubbock-Levelland, Texas
4. 4. Monroe-Bastrop, La.
5. 5. Midland-Odessa, Texas
6. 6. Jackson-Yazoo City, Miss.
7. 7. Columbus-Auburn-Opelika, Ga.-Ala.
8. 8. Fargo-Wahpeton, N.D.-Minn.
9. 9. Youngstown-Warren-East Liverpool, Ohio-Pa.
10. 10. Corpus Christi-Kingsville, Texas

DIY appliance repair has become more accessible with the growing number of online resources such as PartSelect.com’s how-to videos and Instant Repairman. These tools empower more people to take charge of their own appliance repairs, enabling them to save money and increase the life expectancy of their appliances.

A complete ranking of the 120 combined statistical areas most (and least) likely to perform a do-it-yourself appliance repair project is available upon request.

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