Home Depot Clearance Markdown Cycles Explained

How Home Depot markdowns actually work

Home Depot clearance prices do come down in steps. An item that doesn’t sell at its first clearance price gets cut again, often reaching 50–75%+ off, and occasionally all the way to a $0.01 “penny” before it’s pulled. Tracking that progression is exactly how you catch the best prices.

What’s not real is the popular shortcut that the cents ending of the price (.06 = 6 weeks, .03 = 3 weeks, etc.) tells you the stage or the timeline. We track clearance prices across thousands of stores, and the cents endings don’t line up with that ladder — they’re mostly percentage-math and regional rounding. The only ending that genuinely means something is .01, which signals the item is being removed from the system. (Full breakdown: Do cents-ending codes mean anything?)

What to watch instead of the cents

• Has it dropped before? An item that’s already been cut once usually gets cut again. Its price history is the real signal.
• How long has it sat, and is stock still there? A deep discount lingering with inventory on hand is overdue for another cut.
• How does it compare across stores? The same SKU is often priced far lower at one store than the rest — that gap beats any cents-reading.

When to buy

• Resellers: grab deep, isolated prices (well below other stores or the item’s own history) — they don’t last.
• Personal use: if you can risk it selling out, a lingering markdown often drops again. If it’s already far below every other store, just buy it.
• Penny hunters: $0.01 items are real but rare and store policy on selling them varies — don’t count on them.