Dive Brief:
- The renovation backlog for college facilities has hit its highest point in years as institutions wrestle with budget pressures, according to the 2026 annual report released Wednesday by building intelligence firm Gordian.
- Deferred capital renewal — for major upgrades such as new roofs and mechanical components or aesthetic refreshes — reached $156 per gross square foot in 2025, an 8% year-over-year increase and nearly double 2007 levels, according to the report.
- At the same time, spending on existing buildings is only 73.5% of what is needed to prevent the backlog from growing even more. The data “tells a story of structural underinvestment colliding with an accelerating pace of institutional change,” Gordian said in a news release.
Dive Insight:
Facility backlogs can become a self-feeding negative cycle. While financial pressures on colleges might lead officials to defer maintenance and renovations, waiting to do the work creates its own risks.
In 2024, Moody’s Ratings pointed to a nearly $1 trillion “hidden liability” in physical capital needs at colleges over the next decade, and that was just for the roughly 500 institutions it rated. That could lead to future debt as colleges take out new loans to work through their deferred maintenance.
Gordian’s report framed the capital backlog in similar terms. “The sustained underinvestment continues to add to the embodied debt obligation in higher education facilities,” wrote report author Pete Zuraw, Gordian vice president of market strategy and development.
The backlog is growing as many colleges face a tough financial landscape with “extraordinary stressors,” according to the report.
Gordian also highlighted a yearslong slowdown in the construction of new college buildings, with overall campus growth hitting the lowest levels seen in four decades. While Zuraw acknowledged some might see this as a “stagnating” pace of construction, he described it as a positive change in how officials approach campus spaces.
“Schools appear to recognize the real threat of being overbuilt for the likely community population moving forward,” Zuraw wrote, pointing to projected declines in the traditional-aged college student population beginning this year. “This ‘right-sizing’ is bold and courageous in the face of a history which has asserted strongly that not growing is dying.”
But if colleges are neither improving existing structures nor building new ones, out-of-date campus facilities can exacerbate enrollment and other problems in a tight marketplace.
The Moody’s analysts noted in their 2024 report that “colleges and universities that are unable to offer updated facilities, advanced technology and an attractive physical environment risk losing competitive standing.”
Gordian President Arul Elumalai pointed to similar risks.
“Without sustained and strategic reinvestment, institutions risk deeper operational challenges,” he said in a Wednesday statement.
