Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I work in the metals industry. Yesterday we received pricing on steel plate at a record high, surpassing that of 2008. It has almost doubled since August of 2020. We have had 3 major projects postponed/cancelled due to material escalation pushing them out of budget. 2 of these were residential towers which means those units won't be coming available, worsening an already tight housing market.
Lumber is also at a record high, one 2x6 stud is $9.31 today. A sheet of 15/32 plywood sheathing $56 (our local HD has over 1200 sheets on hand). 23/32 OSB subfloor $58, 1-1/8 plywood subfloor $108!!! Yet one can drive by the lumber or plywood mill and there is plenty of logs in the yard. Log prices aren't up anything closely relative to the record high prices we are seeing.
To me, it smells of greed. Furthermore, there is no better way to ensure that the tariffs put in place to protect domestic production could be reduced or removed than to continue to gouge for materials to the point that the construction industry, it's jobs, and new home starts are stalled. It's pretty obvious we need a lot more housing in many areas across the country and this is not the way to let it all falter.
Furthermore, there is no better way to ensure that the tariffs put in place to protect domestic production could be reduced or removed than to continue to gouge for materials to the point that the construction industry, it's jobs, and new home starts are stalled. It's pretty obvious we need a lot more housing in many areas across the country and this is not the way to let it all falter.
Ah yes, the dilemma with tariffs. Despite all the claims to the contrary, tariffs are paid by consumers and those producers whose profits are being protected by them take advantage. Witness beer tariffs in the Bahamas. There is a duty of about $1 per bottle on imported beer. The local brewers wholesale locally brewed Bahamian beer for the same price as the imported beer after the $1, effectively making $1 extra profit per bottle, an undisguised gift from the government to the owners of the breweries. Crony capitalism takes many forms.
Calm down guys we're getting a multi trillion stimulus bill to create jobs and build infrastructure. We'll have a bunch of people sitting around with jobs but no materials to use.
I work in the metals industry. Yesterday we received pricing on steel plate at a record high, surpassing that of 2008. It has almost doubled since August of 2020. We have had 3 major projects postponed/cancelled due to material escalation pushing them out of budget. 2 of these were residential towers which means those units won't be coming available, worsening an already tight housing market.
Lumber is also at a record high, one 2x6 stud is $9.31 today. A sheet of 15/32 plywood sheathing $56 (our local HD has over 1200 sheets on hand). 23/32 OSB subfloor $58, 1-1/8 plywood subfloor $108!!! Yet one can drive by the lumber or plywood mill and there is plenty of logs in the yard. Log prices aren't up anything closely relative to the record high prices we are seeing.
To me, it smells of greed. Furthermore, there is no better way to ensure that the tariffs put in place to protect domestic production could be reduced or removed than to continue to gouge for materials to the point that the construction industry, it's jobs, and new home starts are stalled. It's pretty obvious we need a lot more housing in many areas across the country and this is not the way to let it all falter.
The Government has created between 7 and 9 Trillion dollars out of thin air in the last year or so, the price of everything is going to rise dramatically as the value of the USD drops like a rock. And there looking at creating another 3 trillion for so called infrastructure. This will cause even more price hikes for material.
Don't worry though the Government says that Big screen TV's and a couple of other useless items haven't risen so there is no inflation.
Food, Gasoline, Heating oil, building materials, clothing, repair parts, cars, and trucks.... Meh who needs that stuff anyway
Supply and demand will work out the problem in due time. It doesn't matter how high a vendor's price is for a certain item... if they aren't selling any of it, then they aren't making any money on that item. In fact, they're losing money because holding inventory costs them money.
OTOH, if the vendor's price is obscenely high and he's still selling a bunch of it, then competitors will soon bring their competing products to market and the increased supply will result in reduced cost to the consumer.
Ah yes, the dilemma with tariffs. Despite all the claims to the contrary, tariffs are paid by consumers and those producers whose profits are being protected by them take advantage. Witness beer tariffs in the Bahamas. There is a duty of about $1 per bottle on imported beer. The local brewers wholesale locally brewed Bahamian beer for the same price as the imported beer after the $1, effectively making $1 extra profit per bottle, an undisguised gift from the government to the owners of the breweries. Crony capitalism takes many forms.
Complete nonsense. Has NOTHING to do with Tariffs.
This is from Commodity and Asset (Real Estate and Stock) Inflation.
US has massively increased currency and debt, and it has hit the market(s) at the Top End.
If the US had sent the money to the bottom end there may have been some inflation in Consumer Markets (where we pretend to monitor inflation) -- but since we consider Asset Inflation to be a gain, everyone smiles and waves.
Construction materials prices are spiking because all the plants/mills where they're processed have had extensive COVID related downtime over the last year.
It's not having the least effect on slowing construction where I live - people are on wait lists 50 long for new houses in hot suburbs.
Construction materials prices are spiking because all the plants/mills where they're processed have had extensive COVID related downtime over the last year.
It's not having the least effect on slowing construction where I live - people are on wait lists 50 long for new houses in hot suburbs.
Here too. When you put that extra cost into a 30 year low-interest mortgage, it is much less of an issue. Apparently people just don't care right now. I think that will change at some point though.
The lack of demand for office space will have a bigger impact than the higher prices I know several people who work for companies that went from planning to expand offices for more staff to closing existing offices while still hiring more staff. Work from home has become their new standard. No need to pay the high rents of good office space in the DC Metro area for them any longer.
It’s called supply and demand. There is a list of issues for high prices that you could easily google.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
