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US Existing Home Sales: February 2019
Important data for North America softwood lumber manufacturers is out Friday; US existing home sales for February 2019. After three consecutive months of decline, existing home sales in the US, released by the National Association of Realtors, rebounded strongly in February. This is the largest monthly gain since December 2015. Total existing home sales in…
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US Home Builder Challenges: 2019 Survey
Building material prices topped the list of problems builders in the United States faced in 2018, but cost and availability of labour is expected to return to the number one spot in 2019, according to special questions on the January survey for the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index. The survey results, released Monday, showed that material…
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Recent Softwood Lumber Price Volatility Settles Down, China Ports “Bursting with Wood”
As delayed data releases out of the US catch up to usual schedule, recent indications out of China show a sizeable drop in log and lumber imports for full-year 2018. Traders report zero ordering and the ports have been choked with wood — some unsold — for at least a month. Next week the latest…
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US Single-Family Built-for-Rent Construction: Full-Year 2018
The number of single-family homes built-for-rent in the US increased over the course of 2018, as construction starts of this type of housing totaled 43,000 homes, compared to 37,000 for 2017. There were 10,000 single-family built-for-rent starts for 4Q 2018. According to data from the Census Bureau’s Quarterly Starts and Completions by Purpose and Design…
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North America Softwood Lumber Production, Sawmill Capacity Utilization, WWPA: Full Year 2018
The latest issue of the Western Wood Products Association’s monthly Lumber Track, for full-year 2018, shows a +3.3% increase in US softwood lumber production volume, while that in Canada dropped by a similar ratio.US softwood lumber production in 2018 ended strong compared to the previous year, jumping by +3.3%, totalling 34,873 million board feet (MMBF)…
