A faucet used to cost 160 dollars, but now it costs at least 200 dollars; In the past, steel windows were in their early 300 s, but now they are 370 s; In the past, LED downlights cost 12 to 15 dollars, and now they even exceed 30 dollars ... When it comes to the price increase of building materials, Jincheng, the manager of Los Angeles Dui Construction Company in California, USA, is quite helpless.
Recently, Jincheng took Xinhua News Agency reporters to check the construction progress at a construction site in Temple City, Los Angeles County, and introduced the additional costs brought by the US government tariff measures to residential construction, taking all kinds of accessories necessary for construction as examples. "Basically, the prices of all building materials are rising recently, and building a house will only become more and more expensive."
In order to maintain the basic profit level of the enterprise, Jincheng has been forced to start to raise the quotation of the building contract, and the price of one square foot (about 0.09 square meter) will increase by 30 to 60 dollars.
David, an independent construction contractor in Los Angeles, also complained to reporters that the prices of wires, PVC pipes, cabinets and other building materials in his contracted projects are all rising. He said that the cabinet supplier has informed the price adjustment in June, and after estimating the cost, he can only go to the owner to renegotiate the price and share the pressure. He hoped that the tariff measures imposed by the United States on foreign goods would be ended as soon as possible and the stability of industry operation would be restored.
Builders are not only worried about rising costs, but also about possible shortage of imports. "The stock is still in use, but high tariffs may lead to the interruption of imports. What I am most afraid of is that some goods may not be bought for a while." Jincheng said.
The April data released by the National Association of Home Builders, one of the largest trade associations in the United States, shows that the recent tariff policy has led to a sharp increase in the cost of the construction industry in the United States. Sixty percent of American builders said that their suppliers had announced that they would raise the price of raw materials because of the tariff increase. "Each house is on average $10,900 more expensive."
According to the data of the Federation, the total import of building materials in the United States in 2024 was about $14 billion. At present, the confidence of American builders "continues to be in a negative range" due to the rising cost of building materials and the increasing economic uncertainty caused by tariffs. Robert Dietz, chief economist of the Federation, said that policy uncertainty is having a negative impact on residential builders, making it difficult for them to accurately evaluate and make key business decisions.
The Federation expressed its opposition to the tariff policy at its official website: "Tariffs are equivalent to taxing American builders, buyers and consumers ... and consumers will eventually pay the bill in the form of rising house prices and commodity prices".
Anil Ban Basu, chief economist of American Association of Builders and Contractors, also said recently that the impact of tariffs is obvious. In the first quarter, the prices of construction inputs, which measure the cost of housing construction, continued to rise rapidly, with an annualized increase of 9.7%. The prices of steel, steel products, copper wire and cable all rose by more than 5% in March. Once this increase continues or the uncertainty of the operating environment continues to rise, the project delivery will be postponed or even cancelled.