Earnings for Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) and Lowe’s Companies Inc. (NYSE: LOW) are both out now to be digested. The storyline for Home Depot is positive since its overall same-store sales rose 4.2%, even though earnings as a whole met expectations almost exactly. The story for Lowe’s, though, leans negative as earnings grew but missed estimates by three cents a share.

A snapshot in time for the two home improvement giants.

The bigger question is, with housing starts the highest they have been since 2007, how do both respond historically to changing conditions in the housing market? Which retailer is more resilient and which more dependent an improving housing market?

For these numbers, it makes sense to look at the two companies during the housing peak of December 2006, when starts reached a peak of 2.273 million, versus the trough of April 2009 at only 478,000. Both companies’ response to such extreme stress in the overall market they both depend on can give a good idea of their characters and expectations of how they will perform given similar conditions in the future.

Second, we can also compare the two at similar market conditions in the past to see which has grown more. That point in time is November 2007, when housing starts were nearly equal to the 1.2 million monthly reached in July.

First, Home Depot, which experienced a 30% drop in revenue from the housing start peak in 2006 to the trough in April 2009. The company raked in $23 billion in the quarter ending October 2006, but only $16.175 billion by May 2009. The drop in housing starts itself was from 2.273 million in January 2006 to 478,000 in April 2009, an 80% drop. The fact that Home Depot can maintain 70% of its revenues in the face of such a drop while housing starts were only 20% of what they were shows how resilient the company is.

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As for earnings, they were $1.49 billion (page 3) at housing peak 2006, and $514 million in May 2009, a drop of 65%, more in line with the general collapse, but Home Depot earnings were already recovering at that point, even though housing starts were still declining. From first quarter 2008 to first quarter 2009, revenues had shrunk another 10%, but earnings were still up 44% (page 3). Home Depot bottomed before the housing market did.

Measuring by comparable housing unit starts of 1.2 million in November 2007, revenues were $18.96 billion and earnings of $1.09 billion. Now they are $24.8 billion and $2.2 billion, for a rise of 31% and 100%, respectively, indicating strong improvement in efficiency and scale, as well as overall growth. The total number of Home Depot locations has increased 8% since the housing peak in 2006.

Financially, its debt has not increased substantially since the financial crisis either. This bodes well for the retailer going forward, not having been tempted by low interest rates to issue too much debt like so many others.

Lowe’s has a similar story to Home Depot, but not as impressive. Not much has changed it seems. Lowe’s had $11.211 billion revenues at the housing peak in 2006 and $716 million in earnings. This equates to 49% of Home Depot sales and 48% of its earnings. By trough in April 2009, Lowe’s took in $11.832 billion and netted $476 million in earnings.

What is remarkable about these numbers is that revenues were actually higher at housing trough than at housing peak for Lowe’s, though earnings were down 34%, still much better than Home Depot’s earnings drop of 65% over the same period. What this shows is that Lowe’s is actually less dependent on the health of the housing market in general than Home Depot is.

Comparing to same market conditions in 2007 for Lowe’s, revenues were $11.565 billion, with $643 million in earnings. That is a 50% revenue growth from same market conditions, and 75% growth in earnings, compared to Home Depot’s 31% and 100% growth since the same.

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The takeaway from these data points is that Lowe’s is more independent of the housing market, with higher revenue growth than Home Depot compared with similar housing market conditions in late 2007. Home Depot is more tied in with housing market health in general, and the more efficient company. Another way of putting it is that improvement in housing means Home Depot likely will outperform Lowe’s. Any decline though, and Lowe’s will probably relatively outperform Home Depot.

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