Hurricanes Katrina and Rita were a twin blow to consumers and builders heading into fall projects. Numerous reports forecast steep price hikes for building materials as a result.

Gulf Coast residents have few options but to pony up for pricier lumber and other assorted products for a reconstruction process that will drag on well into 2006.

Even homeowners hundreds or thousands of miles removed from harm’s way will need to make what is largely a financial decision: Do we plow ahead with renovations or sit tight and wait for prices to drop and supplies to increase?

Tough call. And it’s tougher still for homeowners caught in mid-project. Your budget may be blown out of the water, and if your locale isn’t high on the priority list for materials that are instead diverted toward much-in-need Southern markets, you might kiss your completion schedule goodbye, too.

Homeowners will want to broaden their search for materials across multiple communities. Home store Web sites typically list store addresses and contact numbers. You may be forced to work the phones to locate adequate supplies of plywood, oriented strand board, drywall or other lumber products.

You might step up your procurement schedule for items slated for use later in your project. This includes plumbing hardware, counters, flooring and fixtures. Such look-ahead thinking will be important if you involve subcontractor specialists. Indeed, some of the product pressure may fall on contractor shoulders. Contractors usually patronize a select number of outlets where they have a line of credit or the staff knows their needs. You may need to talk about secondary outlets for some products.

For particularly hard-to-get products, the homeowner-contractor conversation may become quite candid on material substitutions.

When it comes to costs, once prices rise, at least part of the increases tend to stay in place. To what degree the spikes in cost stay elevated is anyone’s guess. If you can delay a project, chances are product prices may drop somewhat during the construction off-season as manufacturers gear up for building to come. This means make your purchases before homebuilding starts in earnest in the spring of ’06.

Homeowners who involve contractors in remodeling or renovations also may want to stick up for themselves when it comes to product buys usually left for contractors. Rather than allow contractors to buy significant quantities of materials – on which they build in a margin – homeowners should make those buys and avoid the contractor surcharge.

Material prices are a supply-and-demand reality caused by large, horrific storms. Homeowners will need to rely on their own pluck, persistence and sense of timing to grab the best available materials at the best prices.