black walnut logs

[tlooney]

Saw an ad for black walnut logs for sale today so I went and checked them out. There were three logs from the trunk and then some limbs that would make short logs. The three were 9, 10, and 11 feet long and the butt log was 25" diameter.

I don't know what black walnut logs are worth when buying them in log form so I offered him $150.00 for them. He laughed and said someone told him he could get $3000.00 per log!!

Can someone tell me if he was lied to or should I have offered more cash or what. I can tell you that I would not have offered that much for them.

[Phorester]

He needs to ask the feller that offered him $3000 per log to put his money where his mouth is.

One way to figure out how much they are worth to you is to determine what you would do with them, and how much money could you get when you did that.  Then you would have an idea of how much to offer him.

[metalspinner]

That guy is nuts! :D    What I think happens sometimes is that people see that a little piece of wood (like a pen blank or turning square) at some retail outlets sells for x$ then try to extrapolate that to their tree.  Or they see a table built with walnut at a gallery with a heavy price tag on it and think their tree should be worth ten times that because after all, a fella can make ten tables with this wood. :D  He needs to be educated. :P

[tlooney]

He asked me what I was going to do with them? Cut gunstocks or what and I told him I did not know because I had never cut blackwalnut before so I would probly just make lumber.
Kinda made me mad when he said three grand  a log cause when I first got there to look at them I asked him what he wanted for them and he said he didn't know what they were worth.  Then he tells me that after I offer what i offered for them,  he could have saved me the time and  told me up front. >:(

[Bill]

To be fair this isn't really the same because even though it had 14" to 15" at the butt it wasn't straight ( about twenty some crooked feet to a spindly top ) and had branches coming off it - so it became firewood - I really feel guilty sometimes about burning some of the high dollar hard woods but they just aren't straight enough nor branch/knot free for even a few feet.   :'(

Price to me - two tanks of fuel and some bar oil
Price to homeowner ( my aunt ) - zilch .

[Ron Wenrich]

Walnut hasn't set anything on fire in a number of years.  Veneer quality walnut will fetch about $4/bf in the log, but you also have to deliver the log to the buyer's yard.  Walnut lumber is only worth about $2/bf for the upper quality in trailerload lots.  It drops off in price as the quality drops.  But, you can't pay those amounts to the landowner, since you have some value to add to it.

If you're looking at buying the whole tree, then you might be looking $.50/bf.  Your price may be a little low, but that's what they're worth to you.  You may want to give him your card and tell him you can saw them up into lumber for him when he can't find a buyer.  If he does find a buyer at that price, you should also get to meet the guy.  He has some knowledge of markets that you don't have.

[woodsteach]

Great answer Ron! 

[urbanlumberinc]

I've run into the same thing a few times recently, both times with walnut logs.  One guy seemed to think that two grand for a 20" x 7' trunk log and some branch wood seemed fair.  I passed on the logs but did offer to purchase a bag of whatever he'd been smoking :D :D :D

[VA-Sawyer]

If he does find a buyer at that price, you should also get to meet the guy. He has some knowledge of markets that you don't have.

As far as I know, he would have knowledge of markets that none of us FF members have.     

I have only seen a few Black Walnut logs I would be willing to pay much money for, and they weren't for sale. I only knew about them because their owners had hired me to saw them up.
VA-Sawyer

[Gary_C]

By my rough estimates, those three logs would average 150 bd ft each. If you paid $3000 per log, that would be $20 per bd ft or about 10 times the maximum value. Since your log costs should not be more than one third to one fourth the selling price, you would have to be selling that lumber for $60 to $80 per bd ft.      Good luck!!

This is a very common misconception about walnut logs. I have had so many calls to sell walnut logs or trees where they are expecting big bucks that I refuse to even go look anymore. The last one I recall was one tree in a farm yard, right beside the house, and hemed in by the electrical service to the farm. All that was by their description. I was very nice and polite and told the lady that even it I was interested and I was not, the tree would be worth a few hundred at most. She got very angry and said she would have it cut up for firewood and then she hung up on me.!!   

What she wanted was enough to pay one months rent in the nursing home for her husband and that was about $3500. 

[Sawyerfortyish]

I run into this all the time. Everyone thinks that every walnut is worth thousands because they only remember that one tree in several hundred that brought big bucks several years ago. But just in case I have a picker truck load of sound walnut logs with good diameter and nice butts I would sacrifice for say 1500 each :

[Frickman]

There's still alot of stories going around about some of the prices walnut brought back in the 1970's. Just like a fish story, the story gets better every time.  ;) ;)

[Ron Wenrich]

I remember they ran a story in the local paper about someone who paid $36,000 for a walnut tree in Indiana.  The year was around 1978.  I happened to show some timber to a veneer buyer and asked if he would pay that much for a tree.  He said he would if it was worth it.  Typical stumpage back then was about $100/Mbf. 

After that story ran, I got several calls and they were all worthless.  I had one where the guy wanted to sell 12" walnut with a fence running through it.  He had several acres of veneer quality white oak that he wouldn't part with. 

I also remember a few years back where one of our truckers took some veneer logs down to the a German veneer yard.  They had a log they paid $50,000.  It was a large log; I'm thinking about 36" at the end of a 15' log.  The growth rings were evenly placed and a perfect log.

My point is that there are some logs that are worth that price.  But, you're not going to find them in someone's back yard.  The better quality walnut are woods grown.

[tlooney]

Thanks to all, I feel much better now.

But as rude as the fellow was to me, he can cut it into firewood for all I care.

[rebocardo]

Great answer Ron.

> But as rude as the fellow was to me, he can cut it into firewood for all I care.

Hey, that sounds like a line I have used before :D

I thought your $150 was a generous offer, I usually have people pay me to remove their "logs" after their $3000 buyers disappear.

[twoodward15]

It's always the walnut logs that are worth so much.  Where do these people come from.  That wood grows on trees.  Don't they know that.

[Brad_S.]

There were three logs from the trunk and then some limbs that would make short logs.

Don't even pay for these. Limb wood usually does not make good lumber. The heart is usually off center and the lumber is full of tension.

[Ironwood]

Yeah,

  Folks are living in a dream world. I have had a number of times were the folks were.............well fishing for a nest egg. Sorry, cut it up for firewood.

                         Reid

[treecyclers]

I have an ordeal like yours on hand right now.
I was contacted regarding 3 very large Alligator Juniper by the homeowner, that they wanted to get rid of.
Between the husband and wife, they didn't have their stories straight, and it led to some confusion.
Long story short, they want some cash out of the deal, which I am fine with, but they have some champagne hopes and caviar dreams.
Someone along the line told them that they are worth about $5K, and when I told htem that I would buy the logs for $500, they about had a heart attack!
What I explained to them was that, I have costs associated with removal, milling, hauling, and storage, to the tune of about $1200, by my estimations, assuming a 4 month turn.
Cash value of the lumber by my estimations is around $4500, less the $1200 for my work, leaving a potential net profit of about $3200. I then came back to them with the option of a percentage of hte net profit of the total lumber produced, like 25%, payable upon the sale of the lumber.
The conditions I plaed upon it was that:
1) The first $1200 is mine to recover my costs.
2) I retain all slabs as my sole property.
3) Their portion is payable upon sale of the lumber, at a price determined jointly based upon current market conditions, subject to negotiation upon the lumber being saleable.
4) I have the markets available, the network in place for distribution. I am responsible for hte sale of the lumber, and all costs associated theretofore.
As I have yet to hear from them, and it's been about 2 months, I dunno what the answer is.
Oh well.
SD

[redpowerd]

anyone care to explain the reasoning why walnut is/was so popular, brings high prices, or commands such attention from folks with little wood knowledge to them thinking theyre sitting on a pot of gold with a walnut tree in their backyard?

im interested in the bit of history here that forced black walnut into sky high prices. my buddy has a few rows of saplings in his yard that he plans on retiring with. whenever he talks about his trees i ask him when he plans on mowing that sumac plantation down in his yard. he he.

[ARKANSAWYER]

  I love these stories.   Run into this quite a bit.   Most of the time I buy walnut for $0.50 to $0.80 a bdft which is the going rate in the Ozarks.   Then you get these yard trees worth thousands.
 I started giving them a bid and on the back of a business card I write the bid and the date.   Then I tell them the bid is good for 30 days and after that the price drops 10% a week after that.   I make a note in the book in the truck and call them back in 30 days to see how the sale went.  ;D   I may be a crook but I am upfront and honest about it.     About a third of them I get a return call in two weeks and buy the logs.

[thecfarm]

Seems like in my area red oak is the million dollar baby here.Was a guy at work that asked me about his oak on a stone wall with fields on each side of the wall.He was about to buy the field next door to him.Nice and limbing,should be worth alot he thought.  :-\ I never saw them,but asked him how high the first limb was.It wasn't good,8 feet or so.He didn't know if the trees were used for fence post or not.And you know how the rest went.I suggested firewood or pallet logs,from what he told me,but I told him to have someone look at them for better advise.Some people are not happy with the truth until they hear it from 4-5 people.Alot of advise comes from people that is not even in the wood industry.

[Frickman]

Alot of advice comes from people that is not even in the wood industry.

How true.

[Sawyerfortyish]

I think that brought about the saying (put your money where your month is)

[rebocardo]

treecyclers,

imo, You gave them too much information. I would not give customers my cost on anything. It just creates more problems then it solves. I learned that from selling cars.