The construction of residential housing remains a strong point for the economy during the COVID-19 pandemic, but there's a catch.
Rising demand has pushed up the cost of the lumber needed to build new homes, and framing lumber prices have increased more than 110% since mid-April, according to a new report from the National Association of Home Builders. Lumber prices dipped in the earliest days of the pandemic, but quickly recovered and then some.
"[The association] estimates that these recent gains have boosted typical new single-family home prices and apartment prices by approximately $14,000 and $5,000, respectively," according to the report. "Without increased domestic production and reductions in Canadian tariffs on softwood lumber, these higher input prices will slow the market."
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Karen Sloan
Karen Sloan is the Legal Education Editor and Senior Writer at ALM. Contact her at [email protected]. On Twitter: @KarenSloanNLJ Sign up for Ahead of the Curve—her weekly email update on trends and innovation in legal education—here: https://www.law.com/briefings/ahead-of-the-curve/
