{"id":1785525,"date":"2022-12-24T06:06:02","date_gmt":"2022-12-24T11:06:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1785525"},"modified":"2022-12-24T07:03:47","modified_gmt":"2022-12-24T12:03:47","slug":"lumber-prices-hit-2022-low-as-homebuilder-sentiment-collapses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/lumber-prices-hit-2022-low-as-homebuilder-sentiment-collapses\/","title":{"rendered":"Lumber Prices Hit 2022 Low as Homebuilder Sentiment Collapses"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Flumber-prices-hit-2022-low-as-homebuilder-sentiment-collapses%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1785525&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Lumber prices hit an all-time low after homebuilder sentiment\u00a0tumbled for the twelfth straight month in December.<\/p>\n<p>The building commodity peaked at $1,336 per thousand board feet in late February, but has settled <a href=\"https:\/\/markets.businessinsider.com\/commodities\/lumber-price?utm_medium=ingest&#038;utm_source=markets&#038;utm_medium=ingest&#038;utm_source=markets\">to around $379, as of Dec. 22<\/a>, to its lowest level since the pandemic in June 2020.<\/p>\n<p>The price of lumber is down by 72 percent from this earlier year\u2019s peak, largely due to rising mortgage rates, a decline in housing activity, low builder confidence, and fears of recession, which together have lowered sales.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCME lumber futures have been, by far, the worst-performing commodity futures in 2022,\u201d Walter Kunisch Jr., senior analyst at HTS Commodities,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.barrons.com\/amp\/articles\/lumber-prices-housing-market-51669882501\">told Barron\u2019s.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The \u201clack of confidence in the U.S. housing market, amid the sharp rise in interest rates and mortgage rates, is creating headwinds and lackluster demand for lumber.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The sluggish housing market is expected to be a continued drag on lumber demand and prices.<\/p>\n<p>Kunisch claims that strong American lumber imports combined with weakened local demand have become a \u201ccombustible cocktail\u201d for lumber price futures in this country.<\/p>\n<p>Lumber has long been an \u201ceconomic bellwether\u201d for the U.S. economy, he said, explaining that a fall in prices for the building commodity is likely indicative of a slowdown.<\/p>\n<h2>Home Sales Collapse and Its Effect on the Construction Industry<\/h2>\n<p>Home sales for October dropped 6 percent, falling for\u00a0the ninth consecutive month,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nar.realtor\/newsroom\/existing-home-sales-slumped-5-9-in-october\">according to the\u00a0National Association of Realtors.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The housing market is down 28 percent from 2021, while the Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index showed that home price growth slowed for the sixth straight month this year.<\/p>\n<p>This has put a serious dent in homebuilder confidence, which is at its lowest reading since mid-2012, <a href=\"https:\/\/eyeonhousing.org\/2022\/12\/reflecting-a-weakening-housing-market-builder-confidence-declined-every-month-in-2022\/\">according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The industry is a prime mover in\u00a0market demand for lumber, which is essential for new home construction projects<\/p>\n<p>The National Association of Home Builders\/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index dropped two points, to 31, in December, its lowest level since 2012, except for the early months of the pandemic.<\/p>\n<p>Economists said that construction activity has slowed as the\u00a0housing market faces\u00a0rapidly rising mortgage rates.<\/p>\n<h2>High Mortgage Rates Have Led to Housing Market Slump<\/h2>\n<p>The Federal Reserve\u2019s hawkish policy against <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-inflation\">inflation<\/a> has led to a jump in mortgage prices, \u201cscaring off would-be homebuyers and has them running for the safety and comfort of the rental market,\u201d said Kunisch.<\/p>\n<p>However, the 30-year <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-mortgage-rate\">mortgage rate<\/a>, which was at a high of 7.08 percent, has fallen in the the past few weeks, to the current rate of\u00a06.78 percent, but it is still at twice the rate at the beginning of the year.<\/p>\n<p>Skyrocketing mortgage rates have decreased affordability for new homebuyers, which led to the major slowdown in existing home sales.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, any reversal in the Fed\u2019s aggressive rate policy could have a strong effect in boosting confidence in the U.S. housing market.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, housing starts and building permits for both single- and multi-family homes also showed declines, while the number of housing starts dropped to the lowest since June 2020.<\/p>\n<p>Construction on new single-family housing fell in October by 4.2 percent, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.425 million, according to the Department of Commerce.<\/p>\n<p>Residential construction permits, a bellwether for future home construction, dropped to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.526 million in October from 1.841 million in January.<\/p>\n<p>Single-family building permits are expected to continue declining as homebuilder expectations for future sales slump to an historical low.<\/p>\n<div class=\"author_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"one_author_block round\">\n<div class=\"top_row\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/author-bryan-jung\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/ttl7daySGw_WEB_BrianJung.jpg\" alt=\"Bryan Jung\"   style=\"display:none\"><\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<p>Bryan S. Jung is a native and resident of New York City with a background in politics and the legal industry. He graduated from Binghamton University.\n<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lumber prices hit an all-time low after homebuilder sentiment\u00a0tumbled for the twelfth straight month in December. The building commodity peaked at $1,336 per thousand board feet in late February, but has settled to around $379, as of Dec. 22, to its lowest level since the pandemic in June 2020. The price of lumber is down &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1695376,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[6962,3990,5458,3961,9025,10383,11239,11558,4590,3819,3837],"class_list":["post-1785525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report","tag-the","tag-3990","tag-bongino","tag-collapses","tag-hit","tag-homebuilder","tag-low","tag-lumber","tag-prices","tag-report","tag-sentiment"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1785525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1785525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1785525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1695376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1785525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1785525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1785525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}