TOPEKA — Building a new home in Kansas may not yet mean skyrocketing lumber costs, but builders and suppliers warn that tariffs are driving up the price of many other construction materials — and there’s no clear relief on the horizon.

Jay Robinson, manager of Wichita’s Mill Creek Lumber and Supply Co., said while lumber prices have actually dipped recently, the same can’t be said for hardware and millwork.

“You take the hardware and the millwork portion of our business, and we’re getting daily price increases because a lot of that product is imported from China, some from South America,” Robinson explained. “The import steel business has been affected. It’s up about 15 to 18% over the last 45 days, and we’re getting pretty much daily price updates. Fasteners, nails, screws, products for building connectors, have all seen 20 to 25% price increases.”

He added that even simple items like doorknobs and hinges are now 20 to 25% more expensive.

Travis Daniels, general manager at McCray Lumber and Millwork in Topeka, agreed, noting that while U.S. and Canadian governments “keep flexing their muscles,” it’s largely non-domestic hardware and materials feeling the squeeze.

“It’s hardware items. It’s things that are not manufactured domestically or from Canada, because so far, the Canadian government, the American government, keep flexing their muscles, and nothing really has happened yet,” Daniels said.

According to Robinson, the good news — at least for now — is that lumber prices have dropped to their lowest point in years.

“The framing lumber composite is actually back to where it was in 2023,” he said, crediting Canadian and American companies for pushing as much product across the border as possible ahead of potential new tariffs.

Yet Daniels warned that Canada’s recent election, which brought Mark Carney’s Liberal Party to power, could upend the current stability.

“I’m concerned that may be setting us next up on a collision course,” Daniels said. “I think that’s how he got elected, because he said he’ll draw the hard line against the Americans. The thing is, Canadian lumber does have some other places they can export to.”

Watching the Market Closely

‍Sean Miller, executive officer of the Kansas Building Industry Association, said the construction sector is paying close attention to tariff developments.

“Canada is the source of upwards of 80% of our lumber, so that’s a huge issue for the homebuilding industry in particular,” Miller explained. “There is a 14.5% tariff on lumber, pretty consistent through the last couple of administrations. That lumber was exempted from any additional tariffs at this time, and that’s really critical for us.”

But it’s not just lumber. Miller noted ongoing concerns about supply chain disruptions, especially for materials like electrical transformers used in large-scale housing developments.

“We’ve seen so much, starting really with COVID, and it’s never really come back the way we would have liked it,” Miller said. “That can really impact us.”

He pointed to how companies like Evergy and local electric providers continue to face limits in getting enough transformers, a challenge that emerged during the pandemic and has yet to fully ease.

Lessons Learned from COVID

‍Robinson emphasized that many Kansas builders have learned from past price spikes and now include protective language in their contracts.

“I would say pretty much 99.9% of all the builders we deal with have language in their contracts for increases due to market conditions,” Robinson said. “A lot of builders took some pretty serious hits back in ’21, ’22, during the COVID run, when lumber prices doubled. They were not protected.”

Unfortunately, he added, rising tariffs ultimately impact the people buying the homes.

“Unfortunately, the end user is the one that’s bearing the brunt of all these tariffs,” Robinson said.

No Quick Fix Ahead

‍Daniels pointed out that even if tariffs and interest rates shift, there’s no fast solution to reshoring manufacturing to the U.S.

“If you’re a believer that the trade imbalance with these other countries has been tremendously unfair, not America’s favorite for years, it’s not going to fix quick,” Daniels said. “It’s going to be interesting times.”

Robinson agreed that while domestic lumber production might be able to meet current housing demand — roughly 1.2 to 1.3 million housing starts annually — other sectors, like hardware, remain heavily dependent on imports.

“What we’re seeing right now are curtailments with the prices as soft as they are — the mills are actually cutting production back because they’re over produced,” Robinson said. “I’m going to say that our domestic production on framing and lumber commodity products can sustain about 1.2 to 1.3 million housing starts annually, and that’s pretty close to where we’re at today.”

But when it comes to hardware needs? Robinson was blunt: the U.S. construction industry is “heavily reliant” on foreign suppliers, and that’s not changing anytime soon.

Originally reported by Morgan Chilson in Kansas Reflector.