Obscene increases in building/construction materials prices

[anonymous-user]

Sheepshanks said:

Lord Marylebone said:

If anything, local authority planning departments are overly cautious, and some have a tendency to veer towards refusals for flimsy reasons, which then get promptly overturned at appeal.

So they're in league with planning consultants and lawyers to generate more work?


I thought councils got into trouble if they ran up fees defending an appeal when they had no grounds to refuse the original application?

No, they aren't in league with anyone. They are just sometimes overly cautious about approving things for numerous reasons, not least the fact that the general pubic start arming themselves with burning pitchforks every time a decision to allow new housing is made.

The irony of course is that 'the general public' are actually desperate for new housing. Just as long as it is nowhere near them. But housing usually has to go near someone.

Yes, councils do get into trouble if they get taken to appeal for no reason, or too often. Hence my comment in an earlier post about the senior planning officer at a council begging my brother not to take them to appeal yet again, as they knew they would get their backsides kicked and it would cost them.

[Biggus thingus]

https://www.wakefieldexpress.co.uk/news/politics/c...

This boils my piss

30% affordable required by wakefield Council

Nah, you'll get 9%, we'll build more and they'll be 4 bed detached cos we get more them!

Local school over subscribed

Doctors surgery full

[Mr Whippy]

blueg33 said:

Corruption in planning is vanishingly rare, in 30 years and many hundreds of applications I have never seen any evidence of corruption, its never been hinted at. Sadly incompetence on the other hand is disappointingly common.

Council owned developer (many of these around at the moment) actually has to be even more cautious in planning as any errors would leave them wide open tpo high court challenge, plus the scrutiny of the committee is even more onerous.

In my local small town relatively recent large apps have been denied due to the narrow high street and traffic saturation.

At appeal further traffic analysis and mitigation schemes were proposed, no go.

The problem hasn’t gone away, and that first development that wasn’t passed fed 50:50 into the main road (ie half traffic might go out of town)

The current development feeds right onto the high street and yet was passed. The development is brown field however.


So maybe this recent development has passed on merit of brown field?
“Better” traffic assessment?

[TTmonkey]

Army basing program at Tidworth and other local garrison towns proves houses can be built bloody fast when needed, hundreds have been thrown up in months.

Obviously no sales office required!

[blueg33]

Biggus thingus said:

https://www.wakefieldexpress.co.uk/news/politics/c...

This boils my piss

30% affordable required by wakefield Council

Nah, you'll get 9%, we'll build more and they'll be 4 bed detached cos we get more them!

Local school over subscribed

Doctors surgery full

Contributing to the housing crisis. The 300k homes pa shortfall is all affordable. Looks like the TW land team did their job well and the council rolled over.

I can pretty much make a development appraisal say whatever I want it to say and have it look plausible. Not sure of Wakefields housing targets but I assume they traded a shortfall in numbers for the social housing. The site wouldn't be cheap to develop, but in reality were there other cheaper sites available?

[Escort3500]

blueg33 said:

Story from a planning committee meeting that I attended early in my career. Location north Cotswolds and had an application for 5 houses in, recommended for approval

various applications for development all recommended for refusal - rubber stamped for refusal

my application comes up

Member - " I cant believe that our officers have let us down by recommending an application for approval"
Member - "I move for refusal"
Member 2 - "seconded"

Vote - unanimous for refusal

Chair - what is the reason for refusal?
Member - we can think of something
Council lawyer - it doesnt work like that
Officer - there are no grounds

Chair - motion passed, application refused

2 month later at committee

Officer - application has made same application again and is appealing the first

member - these developers are taking the mickey

Chair - I think we need to be careful here, we will lose the appeal

member 3 - I move for approval we dont want costs awarded against us

Vote - 5 in favour of approval, 5 for refuse

Chair - votes to approve

Application approved - much time and public money wasted

An all too familiar scenario in my LPA days, blueg. We’d recommend approval, members (playing to the public gallery of objectors) would throw up a range of spurious and invariably non-material objections, we’d tell them we couldn’t sustain a refusal at appeal only to be told “we’re refusing this, the officers can come back to the next meeting with reasons for refusal”. So we’d return a month later, reiterate our recommendation and warn the committee of the likelihood of a costs award when it went to appeal. Sometimes they’d see sense and back down, but often they’d dig their heels in and chuck it out on the flimsiest of grounds, including on occasion ‘local opposition’! Months later we’d report the appeal decision, explain to members why the inspector had allowed it and awarded costs for unreasonable behaviour, only to be told “well, that’s the cost of democracy Chairman...”. It was often an easy way out for them politically - support the objectors, refuse it and blame the ‘man from Bristol’ for letting them down.

[blueg33]

Escort3500 said:

An all too familiar scenario in my LPA days, blueg. We’d recommend approval, members (playing to the public gallery of objectors) would throw up a range of spurious and invariably non-material objections, we’d tell them we couldn’t sustain a refusal at appeal only to be told “we’re refusing this, the officers can come back to the next meeting with reasons for refusal”. So we’d return a month later, reiterate our recommendation and warn the committee of the likelihood of a costs award when it went to appeal. Sometimes they’d see sense and back down, but often they’d dig their heels in and chuck it out on the flimsiest of grounds, including on occasion ‘local opposition’! Months later we’d report the appeal decision, explain to members why the inspector had allowed it and awarded costs for unreasonable behaviour, only to be told “well, that’s the cost of democracy Chairman...”. It was often an easy way out for them politically - support the objectors, refuse it and blame the ‘man from Bristol’ for letting them down.

Frustrating isnt it! I do feel for planning officers sometimes (mind you some dont help themselves)

My view is that politicians should set policy, officers test against policy - thats basically what an appeal does.

[Tallow]

FWIW the construction materials increases are a big issue in the US, too. We've been doing some minor work in our garden to replace some rotten wooden steps and the contractor is not happy at all! We ended up having to go halves with him over the price increase because we were reasonably sure he would abandon the job half way through otherwise.

I listened to a podcast the other day that says over here its a combination of a reduction of sawmills combined with a massive increase in demand (from restaurants building outside seating, people building decks because they are stuck at home, etc). Said podcast asserted there wasn't a quick solution in in the supply element of that problem, unfortunately.

If you're interested, you can listen to it here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-strange-...

Meanwhile, the cost of chlorine has gone up too, for similar reasons: A major plant burnt down last summer, and now more people have had pools built during the pandemic because of being at home.

Basically, a combination of factors over the past year have completely messed up the global supply chain for loads of raw materials and components of larger items. Hopefully it will respond to market forces and stabilise over the next year or two.

[Escort3500]

blueg33 said:

Escort3500 said:

An all too familiar scenario in my LPA days, blueg. We’d recommend approval, members (playing to the public gallery of objectors) would throw up a range of spurious and invariably non-material objections, we’d tell them we couldn’t sustain a refusal at appeal only to be told “we’re refusing this, the officers can come back to the next meeting with reasons for refusal”. So we’d return a month later, reiterate our recommendation and warn the committee of the likelihood of a costs award when it went to appeal. Sometimes they’d see sense and back down, but often they’d dig their heels in and chuck it out on the flimsiest of grounds, including on occasion ‘local opposition’! Months later we’d report the appeal decision, explain to members why the inspector had allowed it and awarded costs for unreasonable behaviour, only to be told “well, that’s the cost of democracy Chairman...”. It was often an easy way out for them politically - support the objectors, refuse it and blame the ‘man from Bristol’ for letting them down.

Frustrating isnt it! I do feel for planning officers sometimes (mind you some dont help themselves)

My view is that politicians should set policy, officers test against policy - thats basically what an appeal does.

That’s why I went to work for Pins!

[anonymous-user]

Drumroll said:

CoolHands said:

How can aggregates and stone etc be up? Have quarries suddenly got a supply problem? Oh no, that big hole in the ground is still there. Rip-off century I’m telling you.

Whilst the "hole in the ground" may still be there most Quarries have limits put on how much material they can take out over a set period. Companies that take aggregates from the sea can only "mine" in certain areas and can only take certain amount of material.

and HS2 is taking an awful lot of stone capacity and straight onto trains from the Derbyshire area down south.

[bazza white]

Currently doing a house up and increases are pretty harsh. Windows cost me more to buy on a trade account and install myself than they would have being supplied and installed by a fensa company a year ago. My saved kitchen quote is 20-30% more than 8 months ago.

Just building a workshop for my brother and its come in about 40-50% more than it would have 6 months ago.

[Taita]

Are there any good links or videos that explain the 'offsite building' of houses? Looks like it could be pretty interesting? eg the rooms are built in nice dry conditions, then two rooms on the back of a truck as a 'unit' and slot units together then surface finish etc?

[Mr Whippy]

blueg33 said:

Biggus thingus said:

https://www.wakefieldexpress.co.uk/news/politics/c...

This boils my piss

30% affordable required by wakefield Council

Nah, you'll get 9%, we'll build more and they'll be 4 bed detached cos we get more them!

Local school over subscribed

Doctors surgery full

Contributing to the housing crisis. The 300k homes pa shortfall is all affordable. Looks like the TW land team did their job well and the council rolled over.

I can pretty much make a development appraisal say whatever I want it to say and have it look plausible. Not sure of Wakefields housing targets but I assume they traded a shortfall in numbers for the social housing. The site wouldn't be cheap to develop, but in reality were there other cheaper sites available?

30% affordable!

Jeez who’d buy there?

At least Taylor Wimpey have brains.

[ben5575]

Taita said:

Are there any good links or videos that explain the 'offsite building' of houses? Looks like it could be pretty interesting? eg the rooms are built in nice dry conditions, then two rooms on the back of a truck as a 'unit' and slot units together then surface finish etc?

This is a website for an Urban Splash modular house so is very Splash (as opposed to a nuts and bolts explanation of the manufacturing process etc), but it shows how off site manufacturing can be used to create something interesting and customisable/configurable for buyers. The housing sector desperately needs disrupting, this sort of thing is a start.

https://www.housebyurbansplash.co.uk/

[blueg33]

ben5575 said:

Taita said:

Are there any good links or videos that explain the 'offsite building' of houses? Looks like it could be pretty interesting? eg the rooms are built in nice dry conditions, then two rooms on the back of a truck as a 'unit' and slot units together then surface finish etc?

This is a website for an Urban Splash modular house so is very Splash (as opposed to a nuts and bolts explanation of the manufacturing process etc), but it shows how off site manufacturing can be used to create something interesting and customisable/configurable for buyers. The housing sector desperately needs disrupting, this sort of thing is a start.

https://www.housebyurbansplash.co.uk/

There are several different technologies

Look at Boklok, Edaroth, Ilke.

You have volumetric and panelised. Timber SIPS and light gauge steel.

Ours is hybrid, volumetric for bathrooms, utility etc, light gauge steel panels. Carbon zero, no combustibles in the envelope. We can access tighter sites than the volumetric players and clog up the roads less. Tolerances are tight, eg kitchen units and worktops have 0.5mm tolerance and fit first time.

More people are moving to systems like ours as most volumetric is timber panels that are not popular post Grenfell.

[Aluminati]

Aluminati said:

Little Lofty said:

crofty1984 said:

We don't know whether to go for an extension sooner rather than later as prices are rising, or hope they fall in the next year.

They rarely fall, things like roofing felt go up with the price of oil, they never seem to come down when the oil price falls though. People are spending their holiday money on their homes and many are extending to create office space as they are working from home, if working from home becomes the norm for many more workers I can’t see demand dropping for a good while yet.

Correct on the felt. Ordered 2 Artics from Germany today due to impending rise in June. And nothing ever goes down !

Informed today that Europe’s largest rigid insulation producer has mothballed their factory due to lack of raw materials. Price rises on bitumous products and insulation announced for June and July. Having been successful on a few Academy CIF bids and having a few schools lined up for the summer, I suspect scope will be getting reduced on some.

[Flooble]

Would the raw materials for rigid insulation be oil? That's something I would imagine there's no shortage of, with the collapse of aviation, rail, cars ...

[Aluminati]

Flooble said:

Would the raw materials for rigid insulation be oil? That's something I would imagine there's no shortage of, with the collapse of aviation, rail, cars ...

I understand it’s a shortage of the blowing agent ( Unsure if oil based) Could be sitting on the ship that got stuck in the Suez, and currently being held as ransom by the Egyptians.

A few years ago, there was a fire at the Chinese factory that was one of the biggest producers of this blowing agent, prices rocketed, and never came down, seems like blowing agent gate mark 2...

[Flooble]

Aluminati said:

Flooble said:

Would the raw materials for rigid insulation be oil? That's something I would imagine there's no shortage of, with the collapse of aviation, rail, cars ...

I understand it’s a shortage of the blowing agent ( Unsure if oil based) Could be sitting on the ship that got stuck in the Suez, and currently being held as ransom by the Egyptians.

A few years ago, there was a fire at the Chinese factory that was one of the biggest producers of this blowing agent, prices rocketed, and never came down, seems like blowing agent gate mark 2...

Sounds much like the chip foundries. I remember way back to when I was a teenager (and that was a long while ago) there was always a shortage of some component or other that meant computer memory prices had to go up, stay up or whatever. At one point I think it was the glue, then it was the silicon itself, then it was something else.

Global supply chain seems to have many weak links!

[Condi]

There are 2 issues at the moment,

1 is that there is too much money being printed, all looking for homes. At the moment there doesn't seem any reason for prices of anything to go down so speculation becomes as fundamental as the underlying demand in pushing prices up. For a period of time it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

2 is that China has rebounded very strongly, supplying much of the world while their factories and economies are shut. More recently America has also rebounded reasonably strongly, certainly more so than Europe. As people have moved out of the cities and into bigger houses, or wanted to extend their existing properties that creates demand which is struggling to be supplied.


Prices of every commodity are up. Wood, grain, oil, even the carbon emissions needed to produce electricity and cement are higher. Inflation is high, far far higher than official figures want to admit.