Selling Rough Sawn Air Dried Walnut Lumber

[WDH]

An associate has several thousand board feet of rough sawn walnut that he wants me to sell for him.  It was cut in 1982 on a cirlce mill.  6 feet to 10 feet in length, mostly 8 feet.  The widths are a little narrow, probably averaging about 5" in width.

The grade ranges from #3 common (firewood) to select.  I am planning to sell it by grade.  I have not sold much lumber, so I wanted to ask what would be a fair price for walnut:

#3 common
#2 common
#1 common
Select and Btr.

It is hard to get around these parts.

[thedeeredude]

Heres some ballpark for what I pay for 4/4 walnut.  Junk-60¢ (or free if its in the way ;D)  #2-$1(AD)       #1-$1.80(KD)      I never bought select and better, is that FAS?  Either way, I think the other mill I buy from is over $2, maybe $3 by now for top grade(nearly clear) walnut, kiln dried though.  From what I see these prices are a little lower than average, but I get direct from the mill.

[WDH]

Select is #1 common on the worst face, but FAS on the best face. 

Thanks thedeerdude.  Those are very good prices if you are buying.

[Larry]

Walnut has it's very own grading rules.  Bigger boards are graded similar to the normal...clear area cuttings.  Smaller boards are graded by defects...ya count and measure the knots.  Only 1 out of a hundred woodworkers understand those rules.  Plus you have the issue of sapwood.  Typical grade spreads would be 10% to 20% 1C with the balance split between FAS-1F and 2C.  Almost no 3C.  I've not seen sel & btr come into play with walnut.

So if you sell it by grade you will have woodworkers dropping by that will want to sort through a 1,000 bf and buy maybe 50.  After 15 customers show up you will be left with something like 40% 2C that nobody wants (except for expert woodworkers).

The best way I've ever found to sell walnut was mill run, say in 500 bf or larger lots with no mention of grade.  The buyer thinks they got a bargain...and I didn't have to clean up the scraps.

[MikeH]

So true... Larry