Building Anything…
General Topic
Let me know, open to offers…Lol Frick’n nuts around here!
Lol, ya out of hand. Have lost some jobs do to material prices.
No doubt prices have gone crazy. Glad I built 2 years ago as I couldn’t afford to now.
That’s the friggen truth! I almost pulled the trigger on 40+ sheets of 1/2” OSB, about a week ago for around $36 a sheet, but I hesitated. Looked again a few days ago, and it’s gone up another $10 a sheet!
Combination of mill shutdowns last year due to Covid, and increased demand. By some estimates it might be several years before supply and demand are back in balance.
Crazy. My contractor buddy who used to throw down some sheets of OSB over muddy spots on a jobsite now saves every scrap.
Have a 30x40’ steel building shop at our SK hunting lodge with 10’ walls. Decided to insulate and use 3/8” OSB to sheet walls 2 years ago paid 16.00/ sheet. Bought enough for ceiling in February paid 43.00 / sheet. Thought the clerk was screwing with me but not.
I've bought many loads of 7/16" OSB for $5.65/sheet. My yard is currently at $44.35. It's nothing but crazy to want to build right now.
You can thank Genius Joe. How bought them gas prices?
Building shelves and a wolf k bench in shop. Rona lumber yard wanted 756.00 plus tax for 25 12’ 2x4’s and 20 8’ 2x4’s. I bought them from a local private sawmill for 350.00 cash.
The increase in softwood framing lumber, plywood and OSB , is somewhere between the mills and the end retailer. Over the last 40 years I have exported 100’s of thousands of board feet of Spruce and Fir sawlogs to Canadian stud mills in Quebec. The prices they are paying today are less than we received 20 years ago. So loggers and timberland owners are not the ones driving up prices. Democrats shutting down the economy creating disruption in supply chains is part of the problem but most is price gouging, plain and simple.
$24000 my butt. Maybe on a 850sqft home.
How is this shortage affecting standing timber prices? I’ve got 300 acres in northern NY of maple, cherry, ash and hemlock that’s hitting its prime and we’re thinking about harvesting it.
Prices on standing timber in northern PA is climbing fast, good time to be selling
2X4X8 10$ plus tax13% 7/16 OSB 52$ plus tax 3/4 spruce 4X8 plywood for only 100$ plus tax Jus an idea
I am building a sugar house. I priced out the lumber and bought a portable sawmill for less than half the price of the lumber. It’s a Logosol chainsaw mill. I own two timber lots so I can cut my own logs. I have an old collapsed barn to burn and plan to cut the big hemlock and spruce around it so as not to start a forest fire when I torch it. I will use all rough lumber and plane if a need to with my planer.
If I was building my house now it would be an additional $40-$50k just in lumber. Total insanity. I paid $23 for Advantech subfloor and today it’s $72. On and on I could go. Who knows when it will all straighten back out.
PVC pipe has gone up crazy
Almost all construction materials have gone up between 100 to 300% in the last year alone! Housing prices are soaring because of it, and it hurts everyone!
Also very weak labor forces in construction are driving prices up as well! Low supply, high demand!
Every single construction company I know is hiring and can't even get people to apply! I know this is a little off topic, but it's industry wide, and that includes raw lumber and saw mills!
How is it we are all going to "build back better"? :)
Same in NM and CO. Why work if you can make as much or more collecting government checks? I bought 2 sheets of 3/4” OSB and 10 - 2x4x10’s to safety up some penetrations and build some guard rails for fall protection 2 weeks ago. $476
PVC/ABS & plastic water piping Tubing and fittings have gone up crazy amounts. Just ordered 50k feet of water pipe and fittings and 50k feet of drain pipe and fittings to reload our shop before they get to out of hand or we can’t get anything. Ordered 8 tubs for a job we’re doing and they are already 12 weeks out
This lumber shortage mirrors the ammo shortage and it's a bit eerie. A trucker I know tells me there is no lumber shortage. The yards he hauls for are full. Ammo manufacturers are producing at 120% of capacity, yet, we are told there is an ammo shortage. ?????
The son-in-law bought a sheet of 3/4 T & G, OSB the other day...$68.00
Squash nailed it!!
I just met with a forester yesterday. Going to have 6 acres harvested so I can put in a food plot.
I figured with the lumber prices going up, now would be prime stumpage. NOPE, the loggers are not the cause of the prices going up - the stumpage prices are the same and in most cases lower than they were a few years ago.
We can thank the liberal Dumb0crats for the shortages.
" We can thank the liberal Dumb0crats for the shortages. "
Umm, because the mills slowed down when Covid hit?
There is a Cement shortage going on as well. At least in Texas anyway. I need to pour ruffly 38,000 yards of concrete by July 20th. To pull that off we need 8 to 10 semi loads of Cement a day to supply our on site batch plant. We are currently getting a load a week.
Good thing all our forms are metal. My budget would be killed with these lumber prices.
Work for a logging contractor in Wisconsin. We sell quite a bit of wood to the potlatch mill in Michigan. They have lowered the price they pay by a couple dollars/ ton. They said that this is the first time in a long time that they are making a profit.
That on top of the fact that it is getting more and more difficult to get rid of softwood pulpwood (think the top couple sticks of a lumber producing tree), idk what will happen.
Also heard that their are a f##k ton of empty rail cars that carry lumber sitting in the US side of the border. Canada won’t let them back across due to Covid concerns
Standing timber prices are through the roof. It’s not related to dimensional lumber in anyway except by economic principles. Supply is low so, it’s rising. However, it tends to be regional most times. Yet, Covid has been the common denominator for all things. I’d advise selling now.
I had a forester mark 70 trees in my woodlot almost 2 years ago and put the timber up for bid. I wasn't happy with any of the bids so I declined all offers and re-bid it last October. The highest bidder the first time was once again the highest bidder the 2nd time but was higher by $6000.00
You don’t even want to know what this load cost the costumer... that’s 14 pieces of 3/4 CDX plywood
I saw a piece that went down the line starting with the consumer, to the grower, and the middlemen in between. Seems there are about 5 large saw mills in the US making money hand over fist. (Gouging if you ask me) while the little guys are barely keeping their sawmills above water. They didn’t talk about Canada. They showed literally acre upon acre of stacked up lumber along a rail line somewhere in the west.
Obummer’s side kick Obiden is proving his former bosses claim “You didn't build it” by disrupting everything. The new mantra: “you can’t build it or afford to build it.”
Remember when the Big Guy is in the Big House . The buck stops there. Success or failure on his watch.
I watched a guy buy a 3/4” sheet of plywood yesterday for $99.99. Marine grade is $1.29, a bargain. The big sawmill below us is paying nothing for softwood logs, and the huge yard is full of lumber. The only logs I will sell off my land right now are birch veneer, and they go overseas. I won’t cut softwood with these low prices. The yards are absolutely full of fir, pine and hemlock. Worthless right now.
I'm in the retail/wholesale lumber business. Many factors have led to these prices. In no particular order:
1)Starting around 2017-2018 the BIG sawmills (West Frazier, Canfor, Weyerhaeuser, Etc) start curtailing production from the slow and stagnate housing market in the US. Some reduced production by 10% and some 30%.
2)When Covid started mills immediately cut production even farther not knowing what would come of the pandemic. Another 20-30%
3)Once the builders got back to work in May, June or July they found very low inventory levels at the retail and wholesale levels. This quickly pushed the skeleton crew mills to long lead times and rapid price escalation.
4)The building industry has been modeled to handle 1.3 to 1.4 million new home starts. For several years the market was oversupplied but starting in July 2020 new home starts eclipsed the 1.4 mark and last report for March 2021 was 1.7 something. With lumber production reduced 10-30% pre covid and reduced another 20-30% post covid this is probably the single biggest reason for the prices we are seeing. Consumption is high and production is low
5)Canada is also having a housing boom. More and more wood has been kept in Canada to avoid paying tariffs on it. Depending on the sawmill tariffs range from almost 30% for the largest to around 10% for the smaller mills.
I could go on and on about smaller things also effecting the prices but these are the biggest reasons for the mess we're in now.
On a typical year I will contract 50% of my OSB needs but this year I contracted 60%. Right now if you don't own OSB contracts these greedy bastard mills are getting a 200-300M premium over contract pricing. That's anywhere from $6 to $10 per sheet higher price yards have to pay. On a typical year the difference is around $.25 to $.50 per sheet. This is why you might find 7/16 OSB for $40 per sheet and some for $50+ per sheet.
OSB mills are breakeven when OSB is around $6.40 per sheet. Right now they are making between $28,000 and $37,000 profit per truckload....depending if it was a contract or open market pricing.
Good info^^^^
Do your see lumber pricing coming back down to more “normal” pricing in the next 6-12 months?
Supply and demand it sounds like. The worm will turn at some point and the people with timber will make bank again.
"Do your see lumber pricing coming back down to more “normal” pricing in the next 6-12 months?"
Million dollar question haha. I can't see it sustaining these prices but I don't really see any correction coming for at least 60 days. It's taking 30-60 days to ship loads right now and the loads that have yet to ship are very high priced wood. I'm selling wood 20% under my cost of loads coming in. Prices will only get higher for the next 30-60 days or longer. Unless we see a huge economic downturn, I think pricing will be very volatile for the foreseeable future. I'm not sure we ever return to "normal" pricing. The new normal could very well be 50% higher than previous "normals". I think we will see higher floor pricing and much higher ceilings now.
I was going to do an addition onto my house this year. Bring the living area into what is garage now and turning the last bay into a taxidermy shop then build a new garage in front of the existing garage. But, these prices shut me down. I was going to be doing most of the carpentry work myself, but wow!! I can't believe people are having contractors building the way they are with the material prices the way they are. They will never recoup their money if prices drop.
blacktail: "You can thank Genius Joe. How bought them gas prices?"
No way...Genius Joe has dementia thus is only the puppet. You have to know who's the puppetmaster.
Just starting my house. Every penny I was saving doing owner builder is going down the toilet ... and then some... I can't turn back now... Ed F
Ed if you haven't already buy the framing package, wall and roof sheathing, subfloor, trusses and floor system now! Prices at the mills have went nuts the last 3 weeks. Most of these prices haven't hit the retail markets......yet. I'm talking 25-30% on lumber, 20% OSB and 15% plywood.
I'm gonna puke... It's all out for bid right now, prices are good for 7 days. Ed F
Pat Lefemine, If your Ny place has any Ash that's still alive. I would get them all cut down. There's not a ash tree alive here in Northeast Pa. Emerald ash borer got every one.
I am no economic guru by any sense of the imagination but I just don't think this country can continue much longer on the economic path we are on.
The price of goods are getting or have gotten out of reach for those of us that live within or under our means. Trying to find service and reliable service at that, for things an individual needs help with is all but impossible.
Sometime here in the near future the dam is going to break and a whole bunch of people that spend like there is no tomorrow and those that refuse to work because the government pays you to stay home are going to take a bath.
I was at Lowes today, 2x4 studs came down nearly a dollar, they were $8.38/ea, what a steal!!!
Had a tornado ?? come calling last Tuesday we have a few loads of beautiful red oak on the ground any ideas Good luck Lewis
Had a tornado ?? come calling last Tuesday we have a few loads of beautiful red oak on the ground any ideas Good luck Lewis
Any idea on value of big walnut trees? Posted on another thread before finding this one so apology for the duplicate. Friend offered $1000/walnut tree if 24" diameter and 40' tall.
Russ........get a general idea here...................
https://www.treeplantation.com/tree-value-calculator.html
Russ, that’s a good tree average. He’s going to sell the butt cuts for $3-5/bdft. Unless it’s really special. Second and up cuts, he’s likely going to average close to $2/bdft. That’s going to be his average whether the logs get merchandised on the landing or at the resale yard. Assuming who ever cuts them up on the landing maximizes grade.
Doing the math, you can’t cut them down and deliver them for close to those prices unless you own the equipment to do so already.
Appreciate the link Joey and the input WVM.
Saw this, this morning. Just crazy!
Anyone ever used scaffolding?
I bought a sheet of 3/4" plywood with decent finish on one side a couple weeks ago. It cost me $79. Not quite as much as a 3 pack of Iron Wills, but getting there.
I used ladder jacks just once. My brother and I almost got killed. That was when I bought staging with levelers, aluminum planks, and tie downs. $1500 and worth every penny. I can go up 30 feet and dance up there if I want.
These took 8 weeks to get in
How’s the Biden economy workin for all you libs?!? If creepy joe can’t tax ya, his inflation will price you out
I've got 3 20 foot LVL's in my garage...taking offers.
The new normal excused by pandemic.Prices aren't going to go back for anything, nor are wages.$15 hour crammed down our throats
Come on man , the Dems all say this inflation thingy is transitory . ROFLMAO
"How’s the Biden economy workin for all you libs?!?"
Say it again Brother! I mean what the PHUCK!!!! The economy tanking, Southern Border out of frigin' control. Gun control is a top priority - but defunding cops is cool and crime is off the charts, HAHA whoda thunk! Gas/Diesel Up, building materials off the charts, Inflation coming like a locomotive.
But hey at least now "climate change" is the top issue...NICE!!
Oh yeah - Foreign policy..... bahahahaa!
BTW if Trump were President Canadian border would be open and the Southern border would be locked and secured!!!!!
Avocado Joe - has major cognitive problems. Will he be replaced before or after midterms?
Pa-in-law owns a window and door company(my wife is saleswoman) they go through price increases about every 2-3 weeks. Lead time for PGT windows(custom orders) is about 3 months
I was a custom home builder for 20+ years until my divorce in 2007. Got a good project manager job offer and took it. Was the best move I ever made. My stress level plummeted and I eventually made more money. Many other fringe benefits. No need to ride out BS like this.
Wife saw a 18 wheeler with a load of glulam, when I explained what it was she asked, "where do the armed guards ride in the truck".
Terry
Oh, I agree with all of you about the prices. Yes, expenses got higher, especially after Covid. For example, when I started to build my house, some of my friends recommended I navigate on a man's website; his name is Pete, who can help with helpful information about scaffolding. They told me that I would have issues with scaffolds, and for sure, I had. On his website, you will find the best scaffolding services in many locations worldwide. Due to him, I saved a lot of money, and the services that he told me are very qualitative. I truly recommend you this man; he is awesome.
__________________________________________ his site: petesuen.com
i have 4 cabins and a bush plane hanger to build in the next 10 months, ive spoken to many door and window suppliers, the general consensus is. We're not actually sure how long it will take for for orders if we can even get the product at all...just great!!!
Got our framing done. I was pleasantly surprised at the cost of materials. I was worried for a while, but although costs of supplies were up, my GC had figured it in. It did hurt to see those beams, microlam, and expensive 2x12s laying around :) They put a 12 foot 2x12 on the front porch to walk on. . . . Most expensive temporary sidewalk ever :)
He also pre-bought plumbing and electrical supplies, so we're not waiting on that. I'll be curious to see whether we can get our windows and doors in a timely manner. . . . I guess we'll see.
Good luck Bake....we had delays on siding mostly. Not sure what route you are going but we waited 8-10 weeks on a standard color.
Bowfreak, we're doing a Smart LP siding, in a standard color, they didn't think they would have delays. . . .but we'll see I guess
Good idea on the plumbing bake. We made a huge order on drain and water pipe and fittings a few months ago and basically bought the supply house so we had a good enough stock of what we need incase it comes down to not being able to get anything. Crazy stuff.
I dragged my feet on buying a water heater. By the time I bought one in April the coat had gone up about $40-$50 from what I was seeing them for just a few weeks prior. It was supposed to be delivered I'm 2 weeks and it took about 6 or 7. I got frustrated about 5 weeks into it and was going to cancel and buy another model. In that time period it had gone up another $40-$50. A shower door we bought went up nearly $100 in about a month. Hopefully a lot of this craziness with pricing cools.
Double knife sheath, just finished,
Am at a fishing camp at Athabasca Lake SK helping build cedar log cabins shipped from BC. They were bought 2 years ago so owner missed the crazy prices. They go by truck to Stony Rapids then 45 miles by barge to the camp. Replacing cabins built 45 years ago.
Logs are staged where space allows.
We built 2 floors in 2 days.
Excellent fishing off the dock. Lotsa walleye also.
Just got logs for 2nd cabin delivered 9:00 PM
WF: Those are wicked looking kniives! Very cool.
I need several things built. Two decks, two sheds, and a covered stage. I haven’t even drawn up the plans because I don’t want to know the cost of the lumber and decking. So right now the only thing I’m building is preference points in a couple states.
Lumber at the mill level is very close to the bottom if not at the bottom. Between BC in a state of emergency from the fires and now some of the BIG mills announcing curtailments yesterday I don't expect much more. I'd say the retail levels should have cheap lumber arriving in the next week to three. Plywood has given up a lot the last couple weeks and should start to level in another week or two. OSB still has a ways to go but is falling hard now at the mill level. Single trucks of 7/16 can be bought for under $30 and large blocks even cheaper.
Very cool Rob thanks for sharing the pictures!
1/2” OSB here came down from $53 to $45 today. Only about $33 dollars left to drop.
Cool pics Rob, keep em coming.
Dang Rob that seems like a lot of weight on those few piers.
No way that passes inspection here. I’m building a pergola in my backyard and they require 6”x6” x5/16” steel posts and 6’x6’x3’ deep footings…and its just a shade structure.
These ones have the big cone footprint and they are sitting on bedrock. Per specs by log home company that supplied all material.
The ridge pole is kind of a big deal around here. We have a crew of newbies. The log home company sent a carpenter/ foreman/ / overseer on this job in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of rookie log builders and got er done. It is great to see a true professional at work.
I cant believe I’m saying this but I’m kinda torn the border will open! I would have loved to be here for completion of all 4 cabins this summer but have to head home soon to get ready for Fall hunting seasons. Pretty cool project, glad I got to experience it.
Sorry phone went whacko on me. This is Hugh (Headhoncho) at work.
Very cool Rob. Interesting how life changes so quick, but can allow us different experiences than what we had planned. Thanks for sharing, love the photos
Offloading 2nd cabin logs today.
Cool pics Rob -those are gonna be beautiful cabins.
Those sure are some nice looking log cabins!
