Free Republic

Lumber futures on Chicago Mercantile Exchange posted their largest-ever weekly loss, extending a multi-week decline as sawmill output increases and buyers hold off on purchases, according to Bloomberg. On Friday, lumber futures fell 5.61% to $1,059.20 per thousand board feet. For the week, prices plunged 18%, the most significant decline since 1986, one year before the 1987 stock market crash.Lumber prices have crashed 40% from the record high in May of around $1,711.Lumber prices have catapulted into the stratosphere in the last year, hitting renovators, home builders, buyers, and anyone else extremely hard. The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)...

Soaring lumber prices are holding back a U.S. housing market. The number of building permits issued in March rose 2.7% month over month to a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 1.766 million. The uptick is a mere blip on the radar compared with the 19.4% increase in housing starts, which grew at their fastest pace in nearly 16 years. Typically, building begins within two months of issuance, according to the National Association of Home Builders. Some developers have "held back on projects on the expectation that prices will soon fall back," wrote Matthew Pointon, senior property economist at the research...