Lead times to produce and deliver steel mill goods and products have seen the construction materials sector experiencing the biggest jump in prices the past two months, up by 81.3 percent year to date following a 2020 increase of 11.1 percent.

Although the recent drop in softwood lumber prices since mid-May is helping bring costs down (after having driven them up drastically earlier in the year), the decline has been offset by large increases in the prices of several other building material products, reported National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).

"July was the sixth-straight month of double-digit price increases for construction inputs," Ken Simonson, chief economist at The Associated General Contractors of America, a leading construction association, said last month. "Additionally, lead times to produce or deliver many items keep lengthening. Many reports since the government collected this price data in mid-July show the trend will continue, at a minimum into the autumn and likely beyond, unless tariffs and quotas are removed."