Surging lumber prices make wood a hot commodity for homebuilders and thieves

Between high demand, all-time high prices and high interest from thieves, plain old lumber has emerged as the hottest commodity of this year's home, deck and fence construction season.

"In the last year, we were buying the same product right here for $10, $11 a sheet. Now, we're paying in the neighbourhood of $90 a sheet," said Garth Babcock, a construction manager for Akash Homes, which builds close to 250 homes each year in Alberta. "It's unheard of."

The two-by-fours used in construction are bought by builders in bulk, with the price for 1,000 board feet typically in the $400 range. But not anymore.

"We'd take a spike in the past, maybe $600, $800 [for] a thousand board feet. Now, it's over $2,200, and we don't know where it's going," Babcock said.

An 1,800-square-foot duplex that cost $25,000 to frame last year now costs three times as much, he said.

What happened?

Shortages were already being felt last summer, after several mills in British Columbia were closed due to a shortage of wood fibre after wildfires and a mountain pine beetle infestation. Many North American mills also temporarily curtailed production earlier in 2020 because of COVID-19 lockdowns.

Then, a nation of people stuck at home started building more decks and fences. People renovated to accommodate their new work-from-home lives — not just in Canada, but in the U.S. as well.

And that's left mills scrambling to get logs, lumber yards short on supply and contractors forced to pay more for what supply is available.

Nail it down

It's also brought out the thieves.

Akash Homes has been hit at several job sites this spring, causing losses of around $100,000. After dark, thieves use on-site machinery to load the massive bundles of wood onto their own trailers, Babcock said.

"They're hot-wiring zoom booms on sites, taking product from maybe two or three builders in the same neighbourhood," he said.

In response, Akash Homes has ramped up security, installing cameras at project sites and marking materials with coloured spray paint to help identify the wood if turns up at another job site or for sale online.

Securing product is also a major concern for those outside the home-building industry.

Barb MacTavish and her husband, Scott, run Wild Rose Fencing and Decks in Edmonton. The company recently installed security cameras at their warehouse to keep an eye on their fence board and decking material.

'Never been this busy before'

More people staying home during the pandemic means a busy season ahead, regardless of the higher cost for materials, MacTavish said.

She said she quoted a new fence for a customer last summer at $10,000. Now, it's $14,000.

"I really thought it was going to be a tough year from what I saw with the [price] increases, but we've never been this busy before."

Fence boards that sold for $4 each last year are twice that today. In the past, suppliers would hold a quoted price for a month but that has dropped to days, she said.

It's the same story on the home-building side.

Babcock says some of their properties are sold before the foundation is even poured.

It's good for business, but now there's another issue looming.

"Supplies are short, and we're getting told in the future, not too far down the road, we may not get as much wood as we need," he said. "So that makes another problem for us."