Obscene increases in building/construction materials prices
Discussion
monthou said:
Lord Marylebone said:
You can't build houses at a loss.
We need houses to be built.
If the cost of building a new home increases and house prices don't move then the cost of building land will go down. In the short term some builders may make a loss.We need houses to be built.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/may/08/ov...
They barely employ anyone on a long term permanent basis, so an i expect it to get easier to find someone to do my pointing ?
Sorry for the guardian link.
Is the Community Infrastructure Levy more in London areas?
Which is a total joke IMHO.
New build estates the council wont adopt the roads or public areas. So residents have to pay £££ a year to a management company.
Yet the council have had in some cases millions off the developer for the CIL.
The whole thing is corrupt.
Which is a total joke IMHO.
New build estates the council wont adopt the roads or public areas. So residents have to pay £££ a year to a management company.
Yet the council have had in some cases millions off the developer for the CIL.
The whole thing is corrupt.
You feel my pain!
I'm doing the groundworks for a 22 plot development and a 45 plot development. Contracts signed November 2020/May 2020 respectively after months of negotiation.
Since then 7N trench block have gone up £10/m2 and are like gold dust. I have had to buy 10 artic loads and vest them with my very kind supplier otherwise we could be hit by further increases.
PIR board has gone up £8-10 per sheet which is fine if you only need a few but I need 2100m2 which is just over 700 sheets!
Aggregates have gone up, concrete has gone up, timber has gone up, all of my boys have squeezed a pay rise out of me that all round adds up to about £4k/month!
The daft thing is we're busy and likely will be busier shortly. We just need to be driving outputs even harder to maintain something approaching expected margins! Alternatively we could be busy fools!!!
I'm doing the groundworks for a 22 plot development and a 45 plot development. Contracts signed November 2020/May 2020 respectively after months of negotiation.
Since then 7N trench block have gone up £10/m2 and are like gold dust. I have had to buy 10 artic loads and vest them with my very kind supplier otherwise we could be hit by further increases.
PIR board has gone up £8-10 per sheet which is fine if you only need a few but I need 2100m2 which is just over 700 sheets!
Aggregates have gone up, concrete has gone up, timber has gone up, all of my boys have squeezed a pay rise out of me that all round adds up to about £4k/month!
The daft thing is we're busy and likely will be busier shortly. We just need to be driving outputs even harder to maintain something approaching expected margins! Alternatively we could be busy fools!!!
Lord Marylebone said:
We need to build 300,000-350,000 homes per year to get anywhere near equilibrium in the housing market.
Someone has to build them, and they have to be built somewhere.
Not sure what other solutions there are to all of this. If we didn't have large housebuilding companies delivering 200,000+ homes per year, we would be screwed.
Ask why we need 300k plus new houses a year?Someone has to build them, and they have to be built somewhere.
Not sure what other solutions there are to all of this. If we didn't have large housebuilding companies delivering 200,000+ homes per year, we would be screwed.
If you build it, they will come....
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42055623
Article said:
Richard Disney, professor of economics at University of Sussex, said: "The simple answer is this is a number plucked out of thin air, since affordability depends on price and income."
What we do need is more social housing and redevelopment of city/town centres to reflect changes in society. 
Mammasaid said:
Lord Marylebone said:
We need to build 300,000-350,000 homes per year to get anywhere near equilibrium in the housing market.
Someone has to build them, and they have to be built somewhere.
Not sure what other solutions there are to all of this. If we didn't have large housebuilding companies delivering 200,000+ homes per year, we would be screwed.
Ask why we need 300k plus new houses a year?Someone has to build them, and they have to be built somewhere.
Not sure what other solutions there are to all of this. If we didn't have large housebuilding companies delivering 200,000+ homes per year, we would be screwed.
If you build it, they will come....
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42055623
Article said:
Richard Disney, professor of economics at University of Sussex, said: "The simple answer is this is a number plucked out of thin air, since affordability depends on price and income."
What we do need is more social housing and redevelopment of city/town centres to reflect changes in society. The other quotes confirm that we do need 300k new homes per year, simply to meet demographic demand. Our population is growing and we need houses.
The article goes on to say that if we want to have any meaningful impact on house prices, or at least slow the rise of prices, we need to be building even more than 300k homes per year.
I agree about social housing. Delivering new social housing developments is the sector I work in. We are always looking to build as many new homes as possible, but we face the same challenges as everyone else who is building homes.
I also agree about the redevelopment of town/city centres. We need to turn centres in much greater areas of residential homes, leisure, and entertainment, as well as places of work.
I think we can sum this up by saying we need s
tloads of new homes, both affordable and open market.Supply and demand?
A local branch of a major builder merchant had a sign on their gate 3 weeks ago. No cement in stock.
The last year has resulted in manufacturers shutting down or reducing output. With furloughing causing staying at home creating a lot of diy or demand for work to be done the demand for materials has increased versus reduced supply. Even Ikea who make their own stuff were showing items out of stock with no expected date for supply.
We were looking for some items for the garden, dining set and Keter storage but it was nowhere to be found. We eventually got some but it took repeated searches.
The stamp duty holiday has spurred a surge in house turnover resulting in high demand and price increases. Go read the posts about it in the Forums. Working from home has spurred house mods for office space. Pubs were charging higher prices when they were allowed to open with outside drinking/ eating.
You might even think of conspiracy theories around creation of demand and manipulation of economic forces to force prices up !
A local branch of a major builder merchant had a sign on their gate 3 weeks ago. No cement in stock.
The last year has resulted in manufacturers shutting down or reducing output. With furloughing causing staying at home creating a lot of diy or demand for work to be done the demand for materials has increased versus reduced supply. Even Ikea who make their own stuff were showing items out of stock with no expected date for supply.
We were looking for some items for the garden, dining set and Keter storage but it was nowhere to be found. We eventually got some but it took repeated searches.
The stamp duty holiday has spurred a surge in house turnover resulting in high demand and price increases. Go read the posts about it in the Forums. Working from home has spurred house mods for office space. Pubs were charging higher prices when they were allowed to open with outside drinking/ eating.
You might even think of conspiracy theories around creation of demand and manipulation of economic forces to force prices up !
We've just had pricing for some work that we were considering 3yrs ago @ £70k, come back at £110k, not including about 15k's worth of additions.
So that's been shelved.
Seems like the sensible play is to sit it out for a couple more years - I think the combination of lockdown ending + Brexit has caused a perfect storm.
Our offsite manufactured houses use quite a lot of steel. Prices have indeed gone up a lot regardless of where we buy it from. However, we set up and control our own supply chains for every single component (last year I negotiated a deal for 6 million screws for example). We have been able to manage most prices and with a bit of redesign have actually reduced the cost of our homes by 10% over last year. I am looking for another 10%.
Our homes are exclusively for social and affordable housing.
On the housing crisis here are some stats borrowed from a white paper last year
3.6 million living in overcrowded conditions
2.5 million unable to afford rent or mortgages
2.5 million ‘hidden households’ who can’t afford to move out including
house shares and those living with parents
1.7 million living in unsuitable accommodation including - older people,
families and people with disabilities trapped in unsuitable and
inappropriate housing accommodation
1.4 million households living in poor quality homes
400,000 people homeless or at risk of homelessness
135,000 children homeless or living in temporary accommodation,
Our homes are exclusively for social and affordable housing.
On the housing crisis here are some stats borrowed from a white paper last year
3.6 million living in overcrowded conditions
2.5 million unable to afford rent or mortgages
2.5 million ‘hidden households’ who can’t afford to move out including
house shares and those living with parents
1.7 million living in unsuitable accommodation including - older people,
families and people with disabilities trapped in unsuitable and
inappropriate housing accommodation
1.4 million households living in poor quality homes
400,000 people homeless or at risk of homelessness
135,000 children homeless or living in temporary accommodation,
Some builders and manufacturers are just taking the piss. I was talking to the manager at my local merchant this morning, timber has risen 50% year on year, he says it’s predicted to increase another 35% by the end of this year, whilst that’s a lot it doesn’t impact an extension by tens of thousands of pounds. I was paying £30 for a sheet of 100mm celotex last year, its around £40/45 now, so yes quite a large percentage increase but that would only add around £2/300 to a loft conversion. Building materials have been in short supply for a number of years now, especially bricks and roof tiles, this goes back to the last recession when plants were closed or mothballed, Persimmon were so fed up they built their own brick manufacturing factory a couple of years ago. Demand for labour and materials is outstripping supply, prices only go one way when that happens, just look at the price of used cars and vans recently.
Can't wait to start on site with 60 units in three weeks time 
You can add plastic drainage pipe to materials that are going through the roof...
Land isn't going down in price anytime soon, quality will do though.
Blueg33 has dealt with housing demand & need
The Guardian article is simply them spinning a LGA press release to target a favourite bete noir. A chunky chunk of those planning permissions are simply spec applications made by landowners to boost land value. Also houses tend to take quite a while to build and sell. A 1000 unit scheme will take 10 years to build/sell which can be spun as greedy developers land banking 900 units after a year.
You can add plastic drainage pipe to materials that are going through the roof...
Land isn't going down in price anytime soon, quality will do though.
Blueg33 has dealt with housing demand & need
The Guardian article is simply them spinning a LGA press release to target a favourite bete noir. A chunky chunk of those planning permissions are simply spec applications made by landowners to boost land value. Also houses tend to take quite a while to build and sell. A 1000 unit scheme will take 10 years to build/sell which can be spun as greedy developers land banking 900 units after a year.
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.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.Pit Pony said:
monthou said:
Lord Marylebone said:
You can't build houses at a loss.
We need houses to be built.
If the cost of building a new home increases and house prices don't move then the cost of building land will go down. In the short term some builders may make a loss.We need houses to be built.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/may/08/ov...
They barely employ anyone on a long term permanent basis, so an i expect it to get easier to find someone to do my pointing ?
Sorry for the guardian link.
red_slr said:
Is the Community Infrastructure Levy more in London areas?
Which is a total joke IMHO.
New build estates the council wont adopt the roads or public areas. So residents have to pay £££ a year to a management company.
Yet the council have had in some cases millions off the developer for the CIL.
The whole thing is corrupt.
Or in my town, the local council dropped the levy for certin big developments to sweeten the deal. It's all a fWhich is a total joke IMHO.
New build estates the council wont adopt the roads or public areas. So residents have to pay £££ a year to a management company.
Yet the council have had in some cases millions off the developer for the CIL.
The whole thing is corrupt.
kin racket.blueg33 said:
Don’t start me on land banking. People who claim developers sit on consented land are idiots without the first blue of development economics.
I'm not sure of your point to be honest.Developers do sit on land, both consented within LPO and begging for consent due to demand outside of current LPO.
Housebuilders would be fools to compete with themselves or their rivals if they both have consented land areas in proximal areas. No point in having two half completed developments up to base course waiting to be finished/sold when you can nail
one, gain 38/278 adoption and move on.
Development economics is about keys in doors, LA adoption of roads, adoption of sewers etc.
Land banks are speculative in the hope of being drawn into LPO. Pay a farmer 30k for 10 acres now. Put 300 homes on it in 20 years.
Always remembering that there is one thing that can never be built. Land.
scottyp123 said:
Our cable has gone up a fair bit but not doubled yet, we could get 100m 2.5 T&E for £48 last year, even slightly cheaper for the crap stuff you couldn't strip. Now its well over £60, copper prices are quite dear at the minute though.
https://www.lme.com/metals/non-ferrous/copper/#tab...
The dearest I have ever seen copper is about $8,000 a ton but back then it was $2 per pound so it was about £4,000 a ton, now its over $10,000 and we are only getting about $1.40 to the pound so thats about £7,000 a ton. Looks like our prices are going up then.
Copper will continue to rise. EV's are full of it, and so are the batteries.https://www.lme.com/metals/non-ferrous/copper/#tab...
The dearest I have ever seen copper is about $8,000 a ton but back then it was $2 per pound so it was about £4,000 a ton, now its over $10,000 and we are only getting about $1.40 to the pound so thats about £7,000 a ton. Looks like our prices are going up then.
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