Real Lumber Prices
PPI indicates they are down:
Figure 1: PPI for lumber, softwood (blue), and for lumber (brown), both 1982=100, deflated by CPI to 2020$, both on log scales. NBER defined recession dates shaded gray.
The lumber real PPI is essentially back at the levels at the 2018M06 peak.
Front-month futures through September suggest flat PPI come October’s data.
Figure 2: PPI for lumber (blue, left log scale), and front month futures, lagged one month (brown, right log scale). NBER recession dates shaded gray. Source: BLS via FRED, macrotrends.com, NBER and author’s calculations.
Disclosure: None.