There’s no way North American stud lumber sawmills will be able to keep up with the recovering U.S. housing market, new research being compiled by the International Wood Markets Group shows.
The shortage of studs — boards used to frame walls in residential houses — is expected to lead to record lumber prices and will make construction lumber profitable enough that European sawmills will likely make inroads into North America, where a supercycle is shaping up for commodity lumber, Wood Markets president Russ Taylor said Friday.
Lumber prices today are high, having broken through the $400 US a thousand board feet barrier, but Taylor said this is just the beginning.
