"I was afraid of not being able to deliver to my client who will build an extension of a single-family house this summer, so I anticipated the order" explains Mikael Lopes, CEO of the AP materials trade located in Poigny in Seine-et- Marne, one hour east of Paris.
For his clients, candidates for single-family homes, Benoit Cuvelé, masonry contractor in Douy-la-Ramée, a few kilometers away, sums up the situation: "This is not a year to build, it will cost you more. and it will last longer. "
Because with the exception of concrete blocks, "everything is missing": wood, glass wool, plasterboard, scrap metal, and even tiles or water pipes and PVC plastic windows.
In the Tout Faire network, which supplies construction craftsmen in France and Belgium, delivery times "were counted in days before the Covid, today they are in months" adds Mr. Lopes. And prices are soaring, between 30% and 100% depending on the materials, according to him.
The United States "buys a lot of wood in Europe, more expensive and in large volume because of the economic recovery there, and we are running out of bastaings, planks, floor slabs," he says.
Side scrap, it is China which takes "all the steel", "while the Europeans are subjected to quotas".
In its storage shed, where 200 building craftsmen from the Meaux region come to stock up, the piles of wood are dwindling dangerously.
“Normally, this stock corresponds to a 15-day reserve”. However, it will have to hold out until the end of September: "the suppliers no longer even take orders." Mr. Lopes admits that he is not sure how the construction companies are going to do during the big construction months of June and July.
Partial unemployment on construction sites?
"If there are too many supply disruptions, there will be partial unemployment" on the sites, he fears.
Only the 2008 financial crisis had such an impact, but not in the same way: "In 2008, we had the materials and not the sites. There, we have the sites and not the materials", summarizes the entrepreneur Benoit Cuvelé.
At the moment, its clients, individuals who wish to build a detached house, have only "two weeks to accept a quote or to refuse it". "Beyond that, we cannot commit to the prices", explains the craftsman.
The reasons for this historic crisis? In addition to the raid on international purchases, the decline in the production of materials during the pandemic due to sanitary constraints in manufacturing plants, and breaks in supply chains.
"There are shortages of containers for importing into Europe, they are all taken by storm in Asia," Eric Quenet, managing director of the PlasticsEurope association, which brings together European plastics manufacturers, told AFP.
This all coincides with a sharp increase in demand, driven by the launch of major renovation plans or thermal insulation projects as part of economic recovery plans in Europe.
Recently, even basic products manufactured locally, without importation, such as bricks or concrete, have suffered price increases ranging from 2% to 20%, underlines the European Federation of Building Materials Traders (UFEMAT).
She nevertheless wants to believe in "a drastic change in the situation at the end of the year and next year, when consumers will start spending again on leisure activities at the expense of their interior investments", according to a written response. sent to AFP by its two leaders, Marnix Van Hoe and John Newcomb.
The major materials groups, such as Saint-Gobain, took full advantage of the construction craze and the surge in prices, posting "record" results in the first half of the year.
Mr. Lopes also admits to having had an “excellent year” 2020, like his entire network, classified as “priority trade” during the pandemic.