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| Having a sawmill I get frequent calls from people looking to sell me a log. I do buy some logs, most I get delivered for free by tree services I work with. I am not a tree service and will not fell/remove one from your yard for the wood (I get that call alot). I will gladly refer you to one though. I will always entertain making an offer on a log that has value to me, feel free to give me a call. I am adding this page to try to explain how logs are bought. There seems to be some uneducated notions about the value of wood in Iog form. Some people see what finished lumber sells for and think the tree in their yard is worth a small fortune. There are many steps in making a log into valuable lumber. First and foremost the tree has to contain quality lumber, not all do. I cannot saw perfect boards from an imperfect tree, I get what usable lumber I can but it may be lower quality meaning lower value. The remainder of the steps all include expensive equipment and experience. This page is to help anyone looking to sell a log and to dispel some of the confusion and often inflated expectations of a logs raw value. Having said that, they all have value to me, way too much to just burn. I am just trying to put things in perspective from a factual financial standpoint to help potential sellers and myself work better together. |  |
Lumber is a commodity sold in a unit called a "board foot" or the abbreviation "bft". Logs are bought and sold in the same unit of measurement. I have a chart on the side here (click to enlarge) that gives a close approximation of the potential yield of a log in bft. A log is measured on the small end inside the bark. If you have a larger log than is on my chart here is a link to a board foot calculator .http://www.timberbuyer.net/sawlogbf.htm When I look at a log and "scale" it, the term used for this bft estimate, there are other factors than simply size. The chart is for straight logs, crooked logs just yield less. There are other obvious defects like rot, big knots, etc.. In the case of yard trees like I deal in I can most often count on metal in the log, if I see signs of it the price goes down it is just too hard on equipment and can significantly lower the yield. I have had assurances that "There is no metal in this tree". Trust me from my years of experience sawmilling if it came from town 90% chance there is metal, that is just part of the business. Have a look at the chart. Let's take a 12" x 8' log for example, it should yield 40 bft. The same length log, 8' x 24" diameter contains 210 bft. You can see this is an exponential equation, a log twice the size does not just have twice the lumber...it is five times as much. The larger logs most often yield better quality lumber as well not just quantity. That makes them more valuable to me. |  | This picture on the side is a copy of a report from the Illinois Dept. Of Natural resources (click to enlarge). It is data collected from log buyers/sellers for current hardwood prices in the log. You will notice two prices listed, stumpage and delivered mill price, stumpage is like it sounds trees on the stump bought by loggers. I am not a logger, the delivered mill price is the one I use. These prices are listed in M bd ft., or 1000 board feet. To calculate the price per board foot divide by 1000, for example sugar maple sells to the mill for 300-600/1000 board feet or $.30-$.60 a board foot. There is also a wide price range listed for 2 reasons, quality and current lumber market. Quality is obvious, I will expand on lumber market value fluctuations. Right now the red oak lumber market is low, the wood is inexpensive compared to recent prices...thusly the value of the raw material (logs) is less. Even a high quality oak log is going to be in the low end of the price scale because the current down turn in the oak lumber market.
I want to use another example, one of my favorites because it generates so many calls from sellers, walnut. The majority of calls I get from people wanting to sell walnut logs think they are growing a goldmine in their yard (also keep in mind the prices published by the DNR are for timber harvested logs, not nail infested yard trees). I will do a quick ball park on a walnut log using my charts assuming I am looking at an average log in all forms, relatively straight and free from major defect. The DNR's price varies from $.25-$.80 bft, this in itself gives you some idea of the quality issues I mentioned, that is a wide range. The walnut market is usually strong for better quality lumber, I will go towards the higher end for pricing in this example $.60 bft. For this let's say I am looking at a nice walnut log 22" on the small end and 10' long, the chart above says 210 bft, a fair price is $.60 bft. 210 x .60 = $126, not bad but not a fortune like most think.
The chart list some species, but not nearly all I am interested in. I like the unusual it makes for more difficult marketing on my end but I do not want anything to go to waste and I just like these types of wood. Here is a short list, feel free to contact me if you have anything you have seen on this page or others species for that matter. Oak, elm, hard maple, birch, hickory/pecan, catalpa, persimmon, beech, ash, honeylocust, black locust, walnut, cedar, tulip poplar, hedge (osage/hedge apple/horse apple it has many common names) mulberry, and fruit of decent size (apple/pear/peach/apricot...) some species of pine, sycamore, black cherry (wild cherry), bald cypress, sassafras...
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