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US New Home Sales: May 2019
Contracts for new, single-family home sales in the US declined to a 626,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate in May according to estimates from the joint release of HUD and the Census Bureau Tuesday. This was a surprising drop due to recent softening of mortgage interest rates and continued low unemployment. Recent months’ data have been relatively positive,…
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North American Softwood Lumber Prices Continue Dizzying Reversals
The sheer plummet, then flat-line, of North American construction framing softwood lumber prices for most of this year continued last week the massive reversal of the previous week. Wholesaler prices of benchmark dimension softwood lumber commodity Western Spruce-Pine-Fir KD 2×4 #2&Btr (RL) (net FOB sawmill) last week corrected up somewhat further. The ability of Eastern…
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US Existing Home Sales: May 2019
Boosted by lower mortgage rates, existing home sales, released by the National Association of Realtors (NAR), rebounded in May. This is the first gain in two months. Total existing home sales, including single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops, climbed 2.5% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.34 million in May. On a year-over-year basis, sales…
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US Lumber Imports & Exports vs Softwood Lumber Prices: April 2019
US lumber imports from the world crashed in April, down -22% from March, said US Census Bureau in the latest data release Tuesday. US lumber imports from Canada are down almost -25%. US lumber imports from China are down only -5% in April 2019 compared to March. US exports of softwood lumber for April 2019…
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Canada Lumber Manufacturing & Sales, Exports vs Softwood Lumber Prices: April 2019
Lumber production in Canada increased by +18.7% from February to 5,528.3 thousand cubic metres in March, said Statistics Canada in the latest data release June 5. Production was -5.3% lower than in March 2018. Sawmills shipped 5,145.1 thousand cubic metres of lumber in March, up +15.7% from February and -2.1% lower than in March 2018.…
