The Expert Podcast

…For a couple of years we've talked about the lack of skilled trades people and employees in the construction industry. Well that's now starting to show up in the housing market Like we've talked about before. Here's an article from the state of Oregon where one of the largest factors. In getting more housing and lowering the cost of new homes and also getting more homes for people to solve Homelessness is workers, headline workers needed to close housing gap. And sure there were. factors. of supply chain issues and lumber prices and all the other factors but many of those have been resolved supply chain is getting better Lumber prices are way down. But there's still a housing shortage. Which is worse today than it was before the start of the pandemic. The economist for the state of Oregon…Was talking about ways to solve this problem. And some of the…methods that could be used were increase land availability turning land into buildable lots allowing more units per lot. stabilizing development costs but he focused on another issue increasing the construction workforce. If we want to build more units we have to have more workers That was the headline. From his talk and it's. Really under appreciated how much this factor goes into getting new construction done. Right now you can get lumber You can get. There's land available. However having the workforce to construct the homes do the, The subcontracting. all the, installation of mechanical systems. There's not enough skilled trades people out there. developers and contractors construction companies are having a tough time Filling roles. Look not enough skilled trades people out there. Look if you're a developer contractor put your message below. And tell us what you're running into for getting good help We see ads all the time. For, construction labor. Whether it's basic hourly labor all the way up to skilled trades people, you know paying 30 40 $50 an hour. We've seen some of the skilled trades at the 60 or $70 an hour range and there's not enough workers to go around. Sometimes the problem is the workers that do show up show for a day or two and then disappear. After they get a couple of days paycheck, according to this article just in the state of Oregon. It needs 13,000 more construction workers per year. Per year to close the gap. That's a lot of people. Right In two or three years that's you know 50,000 people. that you have to come up with. To build these homes and the number of new homes needed is getting more and more. dire every year. As it says the number of households in Oregon increase from 2019 to 21, people broke out on their own They got rid of roommates they wanted more space and they don't want to be jammed in together when there was a pandemic And now that people have done that they realized the benefits of, having more space and having your own home. So labor force is a big problem It's off often I'm…not talked about as much as some of the other factors permitting. cost of lumber cost and materials. But the labor force is something that's been lurking for many years It's chronic. And now it's starting to rear its head. As a major factor in both the price of homes that are available but also the number and availability of new inventory.