Top 5 Takes from NAHB's 2023 IBS/KBIS/NHS Shows

Writ­ten by Dave King, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of HIRI:

I had the plea­sure of lis­ten­ing to some of the bright­est minds in home improve­ment and hous­ing at IBS/KBIS/NHS. I noticed sev­er­al com­mon ele­ments across the var­i­ous orga­ni­za­tions who pre­sent­ed this year.

Top Takes in 2023

For those who missed the pre­sen­ta­tions, here is a brief sum­ma­ry of the themes that stood out to me:

1) Seek Data From Multiple Sources, Now More Than Ever

Fore­cast­ers mar­gin of error is high­er now than any point in the last 10 years. There is so much uncer­tain­ty in the home improve­ment mar­ket right now. This will con­tin­ue in 2023. Con­sid­er mul­ti­ple data points in mak­ing your assessments.

2) Fundamentals Support Strong Growth Over the Next 2 – 10 Years

Reces­sion­ary talk will play on con­sumers minds but the fun­da­men­tals sup­port very strong growth over the next 2 – 10 years with only a small blip in the near term. Home equi­ty and demo­graph­ic shifts are two such met­rics that sup­port 2 – 10 year growth. Most fore­casts are + or — a few per­cent­age points of flat in 2023. The news will be mis­lead­ing as they focus on the neg­a­tive press.

3) Construction Labor Challenges Will Persist

Labor is unlike­ly to see any sig­nif­i­cant relief in the next cou­ple years. Fix­ing the labor issue is more of a 5 – 10 year solution.

4) Changes in Building Product Costs Will Vary By Category

Build­ing mate­ri­als will have vary­ing lev­els of price change depend­ing on the prod­uct cat­e­go­ry. You will not see a wholis­tic increase or decrease in BP mate­ri­als costs.

5) Price Should be Top Priority in 2023

Avail­abil­i­ty was the rage in 2022, being price com­pet­i­tive will be the issue in 2023 for man­u­fac­tur­ers, builders and remodelers.

Many thanks to our indus­tries thought lead­ers includ­ing Ali Wolf, Danielle Hale, Ed Hud­son, Grant Farnsworth from The Farnsworth Group, Mal­lo­ry Micetich, Robert Dietz and Todd Toma­lak.

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