Gonzalo herman
02/03/2021 6:10 AM
Clarín.com
Society
Updated 02/03/2021 6:57 AM
With the pandemic and the expensive dollar, many people, finding themselves unable to travel, used their savings in pesos or dollars to reform homes.
The demand was so high from October that for three months it was very difficult to get construction materials.
The problem continues now in March
and they speculate, from the sector, that the situation of lack of materials will be seen again, with force, in March and April.
The shortages of materials had exploded at the end of last year and it seems that they are not finished being solved.
In the latest survey of the
Argentine Chamber of Construction
, with data from November, 80% of the companies in the sector (dedicated to large works) said that they had problems obtaining cement that month, 91% iron rods, 77 % bricks, 59% concrete and 63% coatings.
In addition, the boom in home spare parts as a result of the increased time that families spend in their homes due to the coronavirus and the shot in the blue that reduced the cost of materials to a minimum, measured in dollars, generated a shortage that slowly began to be transferred to prices .
According to Indec, in September, October and November of last year the prices of inputs for the sector advanced 5.6%, 7.8% and 7.5%, respectively.
Cement, ceramic bricks, fine sand and steel led the increases
in recent months.
Cristian Blanco, CEO of tualbañil.com, explains what is happening to the "high demand that was and still is" of people who, in order not to lose purchasing power due to inflation, turned their savings to spare parts.
"There are many complications to get irons, plates, adhesives and bricks," he says.
It also ensures that in January, with the start of the holidays, the exchange gap between the blue and the official narrowed and that generated less demand.
"However, we continue to have a lot of people who want to repair and are not being able to because they cannot get the materials."
Blanco assures that there is no stock because "the factories do not want to invest due to the economic uncertainty and the health crisis that exists," he said, adding: "They are afraid of a new quarantine, having to close everything and stay with stored stock without being able to sell it ".
Later he said that the corralones had committed stockpiles for large works, leaving "the parts without material to work with."
According to Blanco, the lack of stock generated
"delay and disorganization in the works."
"You are doing the terrace and you lack material, you cannot continue. It is a complex situation for the execution."
He said that in January the situation improved very little and believes that in March and April, when people return from vacation and want to fix their house, "we will be in the same situation of lack of stock."
For his part, Jorge Huck, president of Home Solution, assured that the situation was also complicated because "on the supply side, there is a significant amount of materials that come from abroad and with the unstable exchange rate, it was not possible to define a price. That made many keep their stock. "
He explained that local production was very "affected by the anti-covid protocols, since they could not work at full capacity, which affected what the local supply was."
He says that "in March the exchange rate will have a tendency to rise, with which those who have pesos may want to capitalize those pesos by buying things for the house. Therefore, it is very possible that there will be a lack of material again. In addition, the part Productivity will not be normalized either. It will be an issue that we will have to deal with in the first three quarters. "
Huck listed that it is in short supply: "all those aggregates such as cement and sand; brick and iron materials. And those linked to imported inputs. Boilers are missing, there are none."
José Luis Bortolín
,
director of ByC Refacciones, said that "the situation normalized very little."
And he said that the lack of stock is very noticeable in "national products such as porcelain and also backpack toilets."
The explanation given is that
"the factories were stopped for several months"
and that "to put them fully functional they take a long time."
"It is not that they manufacture materials from one day to the next. That created a delay in the supply due to so much demand. They did not give enough."
Bortolín describes that this situation of high demand and little stock generated a "rare" situation.
"The large chains say there is no stock but the smaller ones do have materials. What you have to do now is look for more. Because you may not get what you want in a large chain but you can find it in a small store. You have to look for them. ".
In these months, says Bortolín, "we noticed a considerable lack of aluminum enclosure; lack of profiles, mosquito nets. There were four months without mosquito nets. Only now did he begin to notice some material."
And he added: "The stock is scarce with the demand. We have many people who want to reform. And there is no stock. One is obsessed with the merchandise that he likes and does not get it."
He also explained that "what is happening with prices is strange: we looked for a hole and they
asked for up to 12 thousand pesos but later in the free market they sold it for 7000.
There is a very high disorganization in prices. That is why it is very important not to buy what first you see because there is a lot of difference ".
He says that "now in January there are no national taps."
"You go to buy and ask for a model and there isn't. It's very rare. In 20 years I've been working on this, I've never seen that there isn't an intermediate model from Blaisten."
It also warns what March and April can be.
"I have a lot of demand from people who want to start in March. That is why I think it will be quite the same as it was until now. To achieve what we want, we will have to track a lot. The demand for works is very fluid, especially the bathroom and kitchen renovations ".
