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Post by bluemingidiot on Jan 20, 2021 15:29:35 GMT
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Post by farmerjack on Jan 20, 2021 18:10:48 GMT
So many things play into what is going on. For sure there is no more land on this earth. Guess if you listen to the experts, there will be less as the oceans rise. The population continues to grow, you can only put so many folks in a square foot.
As far as building materials goes, again there are a number of reason for the rise in costs. In some areas production was lowered or stopped because of the virus. More folks were stuck at home, so they worked on home improvement projects. I would have to presume the bad weather in the south, homes being destroyed, cause a rise in the demand.
Here in the NW, we have few sawmills left. The big push to stop harvesting timber years ago, is the cause of many mills closing down. Thirty or so, we had five sawmills in this area. They all closed down, machinery was cut up for scrap. The local tribe had to build their own mill, for harvest from the reservation. Their timber harvest is handled in a good environmental way, but harvesting goes on. They accept only tribal grown logs.
Any other logging that goes on , the logs are trucked over a hundred miles. Some cases over 150 miles. Prime logs are hauled to the coast, loaded aboard ships and sent overseas. The overseas buyers have people at the logging site, selecting which logs they will take, or don’t want.
A lot of the lumber sold at big box stores, in this area comes from Canada. They have been faced with all the same problems too.
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Post by Melissa on Jan 20, 2021 22:06:28 GMT
My son has a construction business and all building materials have gone way up in price- in many cases 40% or more. According to his suppliers prices are not expected to decrease any time soon...
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Post by bluemingidiot on Jan 21, 2021 0:41:11 GMT
I use 8' 2x4 prices to gauge the status of building material prices. In this area, 2x4s cost $6.58 on Oct 14th. They went down to $5.23 on Dec 9th. Now they are back up to $6.53.
As more people get Covid vaccinations I look for building material prices to start dropping again within the next three months.
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Post by bluemingidiot on Jan 21, 2021 13:46:44 GMT
December housing starts were just reported. They were estimated to be up .8%. They were actually up 5.8%. As we saw, building materials were down in December from what they had been in September and October. Most likely some of the increase in housing starts was from postponement of starting construction in September and October due to high building material prices.
Likewise, some of the January increase in building materials prices comes from December's higher than expected demand. So January housing starts should be less than December's. I do think that the closer we get to herd immunity with increased vaccination that building material prices should level off.
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