WENTZVILLE (KMOX) -- Young homebuyers are camping out overnight to get their dream home, as a major local homebuilder predicts supply chain pain will be temporary like the toilet paper "crisis" was.
John Eilermann, CEO of McBride and Son Homes, says it's not just the price of lumber that's up – by 200%, he says, by the way – but labor to put all the pieces together is also more expensive.
"The impact of that is probably about $26,000 on the average sale price," he says, although adding low interest rates help ease some sticker shock.
Young homebuyers are adding to this frenzy; in fact, 12 families spent the night in tents recently at McBride's new Westhaven development in Wentzville. They wanted to have their pick of the new construction.
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McBride has had to work at keeping up with demand.
"That community in Westhaven -- most of those buyers were first-timers, millennials," Eilermann says. "Usually, being such a large builder, we like to keep 100 to 150 inventory homes for people for instant move-in. Right now, we have one completed inventory home and there's not many behind it."
And what we want inside those houses now is a little bit of everything.
"People realized when they were at home during the pandemic that their home isn't just a home," Eilermann says. "It might've been their office, their school, their gym, their restaurant."
The Hill in St. Louis City has been a "strong community" for McBride, as well as St. Charles and Jefferson Counties. He also says McBride is working on "five or six" new infill projects in St. Louis County.
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He doesn't think these shortages and high costs stay a challenge for long.
"Like toilet paper, the price and product will come back," Eilermann says.
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