InstaBidsHow long does a fence last?
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) gives 20 years to wood board fencing of at least one by six inches in its Family column, a multifamily planning figure, not a measured life (structured on the ASTM E2018-08 outline, no issue date, read 2026-10-17, national, multifamily, n not published by the source).
Source: HUD CNA e-Tool EUL table, read 17 October 2026.
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Of US owner-occupied homes, 6.6% had a job coded “Added or replaced fencing or walls” in the two years before their 2023 interview (Census AHS 2023, read 2026-10-17, n = 28,192, SE 0.2 points), InstaBids found in the public microdata of the 2023 American Housing Survey (AHS), whose original data come from the U.S. Census Bureau. The item takes in fencing or walls “that have been added, replaced, or improved” and “Excludes repairs of fencing or walls”. Improved, in those definitions, means that “the construction of the fencing or walls has been upgraded with more durable materials”. Ahead of the job questions the questionnaire reads “please do not include any part of the MAJOR disaster work already reported”, which keeps that disaster work out of the figure. Read the share as how many homes had fencing or wall work in that window, not as the life of a fence.
In our own counts, n is the number of surveyed households behind a share and SE is its standard error, a measure of sampling error, in percentage points.
How long it lasts, by source
- Seven fencing rows sit under “Landscaping and Appurtenances” in HUD's table. Family column: wood picket 15 years, wood board 20, PVC 15, steel or aluminum 20, concrete masonry unit (CMU) 30, chain-link 40 and wrought iron 60 years. The Elderly column runs longer on four of them, 20 for “Fencing, wood picket”, 25 for “Fencing, wood board”, 25 for “Fencing, steel or aluminum” and 20 for “Fencing, PVC”, while chain-link, wrought iron and masonry keep one figure in both (structured on the ASTM E2018-08 outline, no issue date, read 2026-10-17, national, multifamily, n not published by the source). All are planning standards for multifamily capital needs assessments, not a measured life of a fence around one house.
Each of these figures is HUD's fixed “Standard EUL” for a component type, EUL being estimated useful life; for an existing component, the table's notes read “The user may estimate the Remaining Useful Life of any existing component independent of the Standard EUL” (structured on the ASTM E2018-08 outline, no issue date, read 2026-10-17, national, multifamily).
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Sources for the figures on this page
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, CNA e-Tool Estimated Useful Life Table, read 17 October 2026. U.S. government work, public domain.
- U.S. Census Bureau and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 2023 American Housing Survey (AHS), national public use file v1.1, read 17 October 2026. U.S. government work, public domain; Census Bureau cited as the source of the original data only; the estimate is InstaBids'. Microdata file: AHS 2023 National PUF v1.1 CSV.zip. Definitions: 2023 AHS Definitions.pdf. Value labels: AHS 2023 Value Labels Package.zip.