Celeb Contractors: Workers Not Easy for Us to Find, Either

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Talk show host Bethenny Frankel with Vanilla Ice at the CBS Broadcast Center on Oct. 16, 2013, in New York. He stars in Do It Yourself Network’s ‘The Vanilla Ice Project.’

Home builders and remodelers take heart: Even contractors with their own national television shows have trouble finding workers in certain construction trades these days.

“Right now, I can’t find good labor, because everybody is employed,” said Stephen Fanuka, whose Queens, N.Y., contracting business is the focus of Do It Yourself Network’s “Million Dollar Contractor” series.

Mr. Fanuka’s contracting company, Fanuka Inc., builds two luxury homes and handles more than 100 renovations each year for A-list clients such as comedienne Tina Fey. He spoke in an interview this week at the International Builders’ Show in Las Vegas, attended by an estimated 80,000 builders and suppliers. At the show, the labor shortage in some markets was a common topic of conversation.

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Video: Stephen Fanuka at #IBSvegas on labor constraints in the home market.

In the wake of the downturn, home construction has rebounded relatively slowly, with many economists and builders pointing to a scarcity of build-ready lots as the main culprit. But, on a smaller scale, a construction-labor shortage in some markets has hampered home building, too, since many workers left the industry or the country during the downturn.

Those labor constraints are likely to come to wider attention this year as many economists forecast home construction to increase to roughly 1.1 million homes this year from 923,400 last year. In addition, Americans’ spending on remodeling is expected to continue to rise this year after posting a 3.1% increase last year to $130 billion.

Even so, it is arguable that labor shortages have surfaced only in certain fast-growing markets like Arizona and Texas, because unemployment among construction workers still is high overall.

Nationally, unemployment for construction workers stood at 11.3% last year. That’s down from 13.9% in 2012 and from the 10-year high of 20.6% in 2010. However, it also well exceeds last year’s national unemployment rate for all professions of 7.4%. Thus, it appears the shortages aren’t national.

Still, it’s a pain for some contractors. Mr. Fanuka said his company has had a tough time hiring masons, wrought-iron craftsman and specialists such as plaster-crown molders. In contrast, he said he’s found an ample supply of framers, electricians, tile layers and heating and air-conditioning installers.

Robert Van Winkle, also known as Vanilla Ice for his career as a rap musician in the late 1980s and early 1990s, builds roughly three mansions a year and oversees luxury renovations as the star of Do It Yourself Network’s “The Vanilla Ice Project.” At the Builders’ Show, he said electricians and other specialists are tough to find now that construction activity is picking up.

Mr. Van Winkle says his team attracts workers partly with the unusual nature of the jobs he undertakes for celebrities such as professional basketball superstar LeBron James as well as the possibility of appearing on his TV show. “I have a good, efficient team, so we can find them,” he said of potential hires. “We do really cool stuff, not the basic stuff. They’ll take a job with me that will pay the same (as others) because of the cool factor.”

The famous contractors echo their less-heralded peers in reporting that the volume of remodeling work has increased in the past year as rising home values have allowed more homeowners to borrow against their equity. “It’s so busy that I have to turn clients down, and I hate doing that,” Mr. Van Winkle said. “I do design consulting now, and I’ll sub (contract) work out to my teams.”

Also at the Builders Show was Ty Pennington, the carpenter who rose to TV fame on TLC’s “Trading Spaces” and then ABC’s “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.” Mr. Pennington, who is building his own house in Florida, still appears on home-improvement TV shows and has authored books about home design. He, too, has noticed an increase in remodeling activity.

“There is a lot of remodeling going on,” Mr. Pennington said at the show. “People finally are looking at their home and saying, ‘OK, let’s make it what we want it to be. Let’s convert this formal dining room to a playroom or an office in the home.’”

via:http://blogs.wsj.com/developments/2014/02/07/celeb-contractors-workers-not-easy-for-us-to-find-either/?mod=WSJ_Real+Estate_BLOGSDEVELOPMENTSFEED&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wsj%2Fdevelopments%2Ffeed+%28WSJ.com%3A+Developments+Blog%29