Take all the wood to build the frames of all the homes permitted in the past 12 months in Lee, Charlotte, Collier and Palm Beach counties — the places where Florida Weekly is distributed. Take all those two-by-four pieces of lumber, and they would stretch 26,000 miles.
That’s two-by-four enough to stretch around the circumference of the world with more than a thousand miles left over to tie a bow on the gift of good news for local lumber suppliers. About 9,200 homes were permitted in the four-county region from April 2014 to March 2015. Increased demand for lumber, tied to homebuilding, has grown steadily for the last five years, leaving companies that survived the Great Recession in a strong position.
“Man, I can tell you at least a dozen big lumber companies in Palm Beach County alone are gone since 2008, so that’s made a big difference,” said Brad Haylett, co-owner and president of Palm Beach Woodwork Company. “As it’s coming back there’s not a ton of players like there used to be.”
Those 9,200 single-family home permits represent a 100 percent increase over the same period in 2011-12, show records compiled by the Florida Building Material Association. Permits in SWFL counties, one of the areas hit hardest by the recession, have in return come back with larger gains than other areas. During the same time, for instance, Palm Beach County’s single-family home permits grew by 32 percent.
“There are certain areas of Florida and the nation, for that matter, that are just rebounding differently (and) Southwest Florida has been one of the brighter spots,” said Dave Weston, chief operating officer of Naples Lumber & Supply Company. “And that directly impacts us and every industry that is in this supply chain or trade group that contributes to that. That’s led by residential construction more so than commercial, at this point in the recovery.”
From Florida Weekly: https://fortmyers.floridaweekly.com/news/2015-05-13/Business_News/South_Florida_lumber_companies_looking_solid.html