Materials costs rise but may slip again as office, retail rents and vacancies stay weak

Prices for numerous construction materials have risen recently. The national average retail price of on-highway diesel fuel hit a 17-month high of $3.07 per gallon Monday [April 12], up 84 cents (38 percent) from a year ago, the Energy Information Administration reported. The agency “projected annual average retail diesel fuel prices … at $2.95 and $3.12 per gallon in 2010 and 2011, respectively” in its April 6 Short-Term Energy and Summer Fuels Outlook. The New Mexico Department of Transportation announced on Tuesday [April 6]that its liquid asphalt rack-price index for May would be $659, the fourth monthly increase in a row and $116 (21 percent) higher than in May 2009. A N.M.-based contractor on April 5 sent AGC a list of April price increases ranging from 2 percent to 15 percent that it had received from a variety of plastic, copper and brass plumbing suppliers. Purchasing managers at nonmanufacturing firms in March reported price increases for copper fittings and products; diesel fuel; drywall/gypsum board; metal studs; roofing shingles; steel pipe fittings and products but lower prices for construction labor, the Institute for Supply Management said on April 5, according to an April 13 Data DIGest report.

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