Eye On Housing
Author Archives
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Builder Confidence Edges Lower as Material Challenges Persist
Strong buyer demand helped to offset ongoing supply-side challenges of labor shortages, regulatory costs, and rising prices of materials as builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes inched down one point to 80 in July, according the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). Among the supply-side challenges, the price of OSB (oriented… Read More ›
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Led by OSB, Lumber Products are Now Adding $30K to House Price, $92 to Rent
According to NAHB’s latest estimates, changes in prices for softwood lumber products that occurred between April 17, 2020 and July 08, 2021 are enough to add $29,833 to the price of an average new single-family home, and $9,990 to the market value of an average new multifamily home. The increase in multifamily value, in turn, translates to households paying $92… Read More ›
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Remodeling Industry Confidence Improves Year over Year
The NAHB/Royal Building Products Remodeling Market Index (RMI) increased for the second quarter, posting a reading of 87, up 14 points from the second quarter of 2020. The increase in the index is a sign of improving remodelers’ confidence in their markets, for projects of all sizes. The RMI is an average of two major component indices: the Current Conditions… Read More ›
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Why Builders Still Use Lumber Despite the Price Hikes
Although lumber prices have declined somewhat recently, this follows a period of record increases that started in mid-2020 and have left prices at historic highs. In a recent NAHB survey, 94 percent of builders reported a shortage of framing lumber. Despite this, as Tuesday’s post showed, wood framing remains the dominant construction method for single-family homes in the U.S., accounting… Read More ›
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Shortages Cause Builders to Raise Prices, Pre-Order Materials
Recent posts have discussed how builders are facing widespread shortages of many building materials, and how materials prices for the same house have increased by 26 percent over the past year. Results from a follow-on NAHB survey show that builders have reacted to the shortages in a variety of ways, most commonly by raising the prices of their homes and… Read More ›
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Home Buyers Want Energy Efficient Windows
Previous posts reported on home buyer preferences for kitchen and bath features, from NAHB’s recent study What Home Buyers Really Want, 2021 Edition. The same study also asked the panel of 3,247 recent and prospective home buyers to rate a dozen different window types and materials on the following four tier scale: The general window characteristic that home buyers value more… Read More ›
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New Home Prices Squeeze Buyers Out at the Low End
Recent Census data, combined with NAHB survey results, illustrate the way in which home buyers in the lower one-fourth of the market have been squeezed entirely out of the market for new construction, and forced to look exclusively in the stock of existing homes—where the inventory of homes available for sale remains in a historically low range (at a 2.5-month… Read More ›
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Buyers Insist on Both a Shower & Tub in the Primary Bath
Last Thursday’s post reported on home buyer preferences for kitchen features, from NAHB’s recent study What Home Buyers Really Want, 2021 Edition. That study also asked the same panel of 3,247 recent and prospective home buyers to rate 18 bathroom features on the same four tier scale: Results show that bathrooms, especially the home’s primary bathroom, tend to be very… Read More ›
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NAHB Study Finds Double Sinks & Pantries the Most Popular Kitchen Features
In the recent NAHB study, What Home Buyers Really Want, 2021 Edition, side-by-side double sinks and walk-in pantries ranked as the most popular of 30 listed kitchen features. This result is based on a comprehensive, nationwide survey of 3,247 recent and prospective home buyers conducted in the summer of 2020. Among other things, the survey asked recent and prospective buyers… Read More ›
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Builders Report 26 Percent Increase in Material Prices
A post published last week discussed how record numbers of builders were reporting on broad-based shortages of building materials and products. The source of the information was the May survey for the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). The same survey asked the HMI panel of single-family builders how total material costs for the same house have changed over the… Read More ›