i'm diana olick for "nightly busines report." >>> thanks so much for watching "nightly busines report." i'm tyler mathisen. have a great weekend and we'll see you ba

diana olick takes a look at the potential ripple through the housing market. >> reporter: it takes a lot of lumber to build a home. and the price of that lumber is going up. the trump administration's new duty on canadian lumber has already increased lumber costs for builders. and that will be passed on to buyers. >> above all, the losers in the softwood lumber dispute are middle class americans who want to buy an affordable home. >> reporter: fully one-third of lumber used in the u.s. last year was imported. the vast majority from canada. lumber makes up 10 to 15% of the construction cost of the average home. that goes to framing, molding, flooring. commerce secretary wilbur ross says he does not expect costs for lumber to rise much. >> we don't think that the price of lumber will go up anything like the 20%. but there may be some small increase in the price of lumber for the house. >> reporter: lumber prices were already up 22% so far this year, just from the uncertainty surrounding a possible tariff. estimates are that increased lumber costs will add about $1200 to the sale price

for "nightly business report," diana olick in washington. >> to read more why this may be the strong spring season ever, head to our website nbr.com. >>> coming up, high-tech tools to capture the bad guy. >>> i'm julia boorstin. taking a look at all the cool cutting edge technology used to fight crime, including unmanned aerial vehicles. that story coming up on nightly business report. >>> finally tonight, law enforcement has a new partner on the beat. the tech sector. julia boorstin got a firsthand look to how it's being used to fight crime. >> reporter: forget stun guns and body cams. the next generation of gadgets are designed to prevent police from being in the line of fire. while helping protect the public. gunshot detection systems can pinpoint the exact source of gunfire. while another system shots gps enabled darts to attach to and attack fleeing vehicles. the captain at the los angeles sheriff's department said no matter what the cost of the new technology, if it saves lives, it's worth it. which is why they're using more high-tech gadgets than ever. >> the technology improv

diana olick has more. >> reporter: of course spring is the best time to sell a home, right? the warm air brings us outside in the blooming blossoms suggesting change. the perfect time to make that move. or is it? >> i think any time of year is okay as long as your expectations are correct. >> reporter: veteran real estate agent has weathered a lot of seasons in the housing market and notes that while more homes are listed in the spring, offering more choice for buyers, that also means more competition for sellers. she suggests a different strategy. >> if you're in the winter market, then you know that there's not much out. you're going to be one of two or three houses and you're going to get almost every one in your price range looking at your house. >> reporter: she held an open house for agents, a new listing that came on as the d.c. cherry bloos somes finally came out. she expected it to sell in a week, not because it's spring but because she's playing the spring market right. >> so in the spring, know that you have lots of competition. you better be in perfect condition

diana olick has the story from washington. i thought sales were pretty good?uple months they were. seeing changes now. the market is great for sellers, awful for buyers and would-be shoppers choosing to sit the market out. deand in from home buyers fell 14% from january to february. measuring demand looking at the number of customers requesting home tours and writing offers. demand hit a record in january as consumers felt better about the economy and anticipated a strong spring market. compared with february, the number of buyers requesting tours fell 5.5% in march and the number of buyers writing offers dropped nearly 23%. so it's not that americans don't want to buy homes. just that there are too few homes for sale. across the 15 metros covered by the index, 12.5% few are homes than march 2016. inventory falling annually 22 straight months. the drop in demand showing up in mortgage applications to buy a home. perhaps the most current indicator of housing demand. the applications are less than 1% higher than they were a year ago and at the same time last yea

d diana olick knows and it's surprising. diana? >> it's millennials. those who bought in the past years have more equity and are tapping it faster than their parents. the number of borrowers with tapable equity up to $40 million according to black night financial services. those borrowers have at least 20% equity in their homes. nearly half the refis last year were cash-out, as homeowners withdrew a collective $31 billion. that was the most since 2008 and represented a 50% increase from the same quarter of the previous year. but interest rates are higher since the election, so borrowers won't want to refinance. instead, they're using home equity lines of credit more now and millennials are leading the pack. more than one third of millennials surveyed by t.d. bank said they're considering plying for a home equity line of credit in the next 18 months, which is more than twice as many as gen-xers and more than nine times more likely than baby boomers. why? because they want to renovate. they're leaving about 35% equity in their homes, even though banks wi

. >> diana olick. reaction from across the border.he forest products association of canada provides a voice for a $67 billion a year industry that represents 2% of canada's total gdp. great to have you with us. >> thanks for having me. >> i would think that your concern could be that this could impact the demand for new lumber. is that really the worry for you at this point? we could be raising costs at a time the industry could p potentially take it. >> i think, first of all, we respect any country's right and interest in ensuring trade deals are working for them. in canada i think about states like ohio and wisconsin and pennsylvania and it's a lot of the blue collar communities that will be hurt from this. from a canadian inward looking selfish perspective i'm concerned about the impact on our mill communities in northern c canada but, furthermore, the thing that's bizarre about this, there's not a win in this for the u.s. consumer. we are seeing an upparticular in housing starts in the u.s. our forecast suggests that will continue

diana olick joins us with more on how this could impact the housing market.ts are under pressure. >> absolutely. home builders are not happy to say the least. the industry association out this morning calling the up to 24% duty on canadian lumber "short-sighted." chairman granger mcdonald a texas home plr sabuilder said i "harm consumer answer housing affordableability." one-third of lumber used in the last year was imported that grows to framing, moulding, floors, mattress box springs. it takes 15,000 board bead to build a family home and the lumber increase up 22%, that just from the uncertainty surrounding a possible tariff, added almost 3600 bucks to the price of a new home. nahb estimates the tariff on canadian lumber will cost over 8,000 u.s. jobs, higher cost, fewer homes and can afford fewer workers and hits businesses that sell and transport building materials. they say this is a net figure including added jobs from the increase in domestic lumber jobs. i spoke to a home builder in denver earlier this month. he could be building twice as many homes i

blackstone's global chief of real estate is standing by with our diana olick. >> tyler, we're standingn 5th avenue at the nyu rate conference just six blocks north of the polo ralph lauren flagship store. tell us what that tells you about the future of the retail sector? >> i don't know if that specific incident or closing impacts the whole sector, but there is broader pressure on retail. what's happening is the share shift is under way from land-based retail to online retail. pretty much all around the world what we're seeing is sales growth of 15% to 20% online and very little sales growth for land-based. what that means for retailers, they have to look at their models. should they do multi-channels, should they go online. that's putting pressure on retailers and retail landlords. >> how does that change your retail strategy? >> i think for us roo he tail in the u.s. has not been a huge part of what we've done but we are definitely gravitating more to things like convenient supermarketing, that's harder to disintermediate. in urban areas, like we own a big shopping center in queens w

diana olick joins us now from washington with a roundup of the housing market. so true. mortgage rates fell to the lowest level of the year last week but weakness in refinance is still keeping the mortgage business a lot lighter. total mortgage application volume rose 1.5% on a seasonally adjusted basis last week compared to the previous week. volume was 21% lower compared to the same week one year ago. that according to the mortgage bankers association. and that's because the refinance market is so bad. interest rates fell for the third straight week but applications to refinance a home loan why unchanged for the week and are 40% lower than the same week one year ago when rates were lower. now the average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed conforming mortgages fell to 4.28% from 4.34% for borrowers who put 20% down. hope you got all that. mortgage applications to purchase a home fared better, rising 5% for the week although they're just 3% higher than the same week one year ago. purchase applications are less sensitive to weekly rate moves despite the fed'

i guess looks are deserving, diana olick joins us now. >> you might think that, despite the big headlinese closures at manhattan's fifth avenue and sears, retail is not in quite as desiire straits as think. there may be deals to take advantage of it. the vacancy rate steady at 9.9% unchanged for the quarter and year. asking rents increases 0.4% this is according to a real estate research firm. analysts say store closures are not significantly impacting overall rents as new retailers fill the space. at big malls, vacancies increased 7.9% to 7.8%. mall rent is up a little bit as well. it's helping that there's very little new retail construction. the lowest in fact since 2011. now, class "a" malls which are those with high-end anchor stores are doing well, but the reits behind them, general growth, simon, macrich, they're getting whacked. they make up over 85% of the value in those reits. they should have pretty good prospects according to a recent report from green street advisers. analysts there say the stocks were hit way too hard with the hype and current valuations they could be good b