Lumber prices are soaring!

Here's a great article that reinforces the need to get into a new Home sooner than later!


By Chris Hrapsky


New home builders are seeing an unexpected spike in construction costs.

Just as the housing market is starting to turn around, lumber prices have skyrocketed -- jumping 65 percent from last year.

It's good news for the lumber industry but bad news for people looking to build.


"Prices are going up, and they will continue to go up, and it's going to be a problem in the next few years trying to control that," Brett Griffin of Griffin Builders said.


According to the National Association of Home Builders, in 2005 lumber cost more than $400 for a thousand board-feet.

Last spring that price cut in half, dipping to about $200 per thousand board-feet.

A year later that price is going back up, so far at $342 per thousand board-feet.

During the recession, when homes weren't being built, production of lumber went down 45 percent. But now that the housing market is starting to turn around, the supply of wood simply isn't there.

"We will have to charge a little bit more because the cost of that home now is more than it was a few months ago," Griffin said.

In fact, Griffin says a person building a home who bought lumber four months ago saved about $20,000.

While consumers will have to pay more for lumber, one Green Bay distributor says the price increase is a good sign for the industry.

"The industry has been so depressed with pricing over the last five years that this is a necessary part of the business," Weeks Forest Products division manager Roger Thompson said.

It could take a while for lumber mills to catch up to demand, so experts say buy now before it goes higher.

"We'd be happy to sell more product today, yes!" Thompson said.