Posted on 06/15/2021 7:09:01 PM PDT by dynachrome
Lumber prices are falling back to Earth.
Futures for July delivery ended Tuesday at $1,009.90 per thousand board feet, down 41% from the record of $1,711.20 reached in early May. Futures have declined 14 of the past 16 trading days.
Cash lumber prices are also crashing. Pricing service Random Lengths said Friday that its framing composite index, which tracks on-the-spot sales, dropped $122 to $1,324, its biggest ever weekly decline. The pullback came just six weeks after the index rose $124 during the first week of May, its most on record. Random Lengths described a chaotic rout in which sawmill managers struggled to provide customers with price quotes. It said late Tuesday that its index had dropped another $114, to $1,210.
Economists and investors have wondered if sky-high prices for wood products would doom the booming housing market. Builders raised home prices and many stopped selling houses before the studs were installed, lest they misjudge costs and sell too cheaply. Lumber became central to the inflation debate: whether a period of runaway inflation was afoot or high prices were temporary shocks that would ease as the economy moved further from lockdown.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
The rest is behind a paywall.
My crypto currency has been more stable than lumber.
un-paywalled, https://archive.is/uxdov
The people that made a killing driving up the prices are now making a killing selling short. Same old story, same old song, and dance my friend.
After Katrina, Southern Yellow Pine plywood was selling for a song. I got a lot of projects done with that.
Thanks!
I live in a brand new neighborhood, moved in a brand new house we finished building in March. Now, people going under contract here have an open ended contract and won’t know the actual price of their home until the drywall is up. My old neighborhood, the builder added $15,000 to the price of each home to be built in the neighborhood.
It is insane.
Lowrs aint going to take a loss buy selling the on hand stock at the lower prices. Retail prices will stay high until they sell the old stock.
So, it was just a back log somewhere in the system.
That means anybody who just spent $15,000 on a deck has lost about $12,000.
Anybody here?
And, the same goes for the recent insane escalation in home prices. This too will soon come crashing down.
Sure glad I waited to build a new fence. And if I have to wait another year for prices to normalize, so be it!☺
It will never come back down to pre covid prices. That's just how it works. Remember when obama gas prices were $4.59 in the cheapest places? Suppliers were adding fuel surcharges etc. Motor oil went from $2-3/qt to $4-6/qt and never did come down all that much. Inflation is not 100% fedgov's fault.
Looks like Home Depot will do a lot of business this summer after all.
If you wait long enough, the desire and need just goes away.
There was another article that said it could take up to 30 months for the market to normalize.
The local Home Depot and Lowes prices have not budged yet. When one does, the other will have to. Also there are local lumber yards.
There was one guy on Craigslist advertising he has 50 sheets of OSB and he was willing to trade them for a new F150. He added he knew what he had. He’ll have to sweeten the pot now.
“The people that made a killing driving up the prices are now making a killing selling short.”
Supply and demand. Sawmills couldn’t fill demand, partially due to labor shortage during Covid.
Lumber mills.
Had a Girlfriend
Like that,
Just went away.
Correction: due to labor shortages coming out of the Wuhan Virus. That said, what I stated holds true.
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