"Hardwood sawtimber has consistently sold for less than pine, and the price gap has continued to widen in this latest quarter." Clemson Extension Forestry and Wildlife wrote that in its Q3 2025 stumpage update. It was true then, and it matched how most people in the Upstate think about wooded land. A planted pine stand is the asset. The hardwood draw along the creek is scenery.
One year later, the South Carolina Forestry Commission's statewide table shows it running the other way. If you're pricing a wooded tract in Anderson County this fall, as a buyer comparing listings or an owner deciding whether to sell or cut, the stand that looks the most valuable may be adding the least to the deal.
The table a buyer is really paying against
When a wooded tract is listed, part of the asking price is a quiet claim about what the standing timber would bring at harvest. That claim is usually made by eye. Rows of pine read as money. Here is what the SC Forestry Commission's current timber price report shows for statewide stumpage, in dollars per ton, over the last five quarters:
| Product | Q3 2025 | Q4 2025 | Q1 2026 | Q2 2026 | Q3 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pine sawtimber | $22.78 | $18.46 | $21.12 | $21.91 | $21.47 |
| Pine chip-n-saw | $16.71 | $15.17 | $15.65 | $15.69 | $16.31 |
| Pine pulpwood | $5.67 | $5.08 | $5.39 | $5.27 | $3.79 |
| Hardwood sawtimber | $16.04 | $17.43 | $17.87 | $18.72 | $22.52 |
| Hardwood pulpwood | $4.49 | $6.32 | $6.51 | $5.73 | $3.96 |
Two numbers in that table change how a wooded tract should be valued.
First, pine pulpwood fell from $5.27 to $3.79 a ton between Q2 and Q3 2026, a drop of about 28 percent in one quarter and roughly a third from a year earlier. In Q3 2025, a ton of pine sawtimber was worth about four tons of pulpwood. By Q3 2026 it was worth more than five and a half. So the dollar value of a pine stand now depends more than ever on how much of its volume has grown into sawtimber. A 12- or 15-year-old plantation that's mostly pulpwood-size can look like a solid timber asset from the road and still bring very little at a first thinning.
Second, hardwood sawtimber climbed to $22.52 a ton, which puts it $1.05 above pine sawtimber. Over the year it gained $6.48 a ton, while pine sawtimber lost $1.31.
Why the bottom of the pine market dropped out
Pulpwood prices hang on pulp and paper mills, and that side of the industry has been shrinking across the South. A January 2026 Southern Ag Today analysis counted more than 10 major Southern pulp facilities closed from 2023 to 2025, which took over 25 million tons of annual fiber demand out of the market. It also tied part of the decline to more recycled fiber and to Hurricane Helene salvage wood flooding affected areas.
University of Georgia Extension's 2026 timber forecast names closures close to home. It says the Georgia-Pacific Cedar Springs mill and the International Paper Savannah and Riceboro mills took away an immediate market for about 8.3 million tons of timber a year. Roughly half of that wood came from Georgia, and the other half from Alabama and South Carolina.
Losing pulp mills hurts sawmills too, and that is the part most landowners miss. When a sawmill cuts logs into lumber, it sells the chips and leftovers to pulp mills. On November 6, 2025, West Fraser announced it would permanently close its Augusta, Georgia lumber mill by the end of 2025. The company cited weak lumber demand and the loss of viable outlets for its residuals. The closure took out about 140 million board feet of capacity and affected about 130 jobs. Forisk's February 2026 mill update lists the Augusta sawmill among the mills that closed in late 2025.
Pine sawtimber's own weakness follows from the same chain. Southern Ag Today cited U.S. Census Bureau figures putting lumber mill utilization at 68 percent in Q3 2025, noted more curtailments and downtime, and linked it to soft housing demand. Fewer outlets for pulpwood and residuals, plus sawmills running below capacity, means fewer competing bids for an Upstate landowner's wood.
The hardwood reversal is one quarter old
The hardwood number cuts the other way, and it calls for more caution. A year ago Clemson described hardwood sawtimber down about 37 percent year over year. It said the decline was steeper in the Upstate than in the Lowcountry, and it called the market "challenging" for hardwood sellers. One quarter of statewide data now puts hardwood sawtimber above pine, and no extension or industry commentary published so far explains the jump.
For the first time in a while, a tract with mature hardwood sawtimber on its slopes and bottoms can't be treated as having zero timber value in an appraisal or a negotiation. Whether that holds will show up in the Q4 2026 and Q1 2027 reports. Until then, a buyer who discounts a hardwood-heavy tract as "only good for hunting" and a seller who prices a young pine stand as if it were ready to harvest are both working from last year's table.
What the Honea Path plant settles, and what it doesn't
The biggest local timber headline this fall came from Anderson County itself. On September 30, 2026, the South Carolina Department of Agriculture announced that Adeptus USA will invest $215.56 million in a plant at 1205 Hamby Road in Honea Path, creating 217 jobs. The company says the plant will make value-added pine products: painted and primed moulding, boards, shiplap and panel products. Operations are expected to begin in the second quarter of 2027. The state's Coordinating Council for Economic Development awarded Anderson County an $850,000 Closing Fund grant for building improvements.
The plant moves into the shuttered Belton Industries textile building. The SC Daily Gazette reported that Belton Industries had 55 workers when it closed in 2025, down from a peak of 132. Anderson County Councilman Greg Elgin put the new jobs' average wage at nearly $36 an hour.
For anyone holding pine in Anderson, Abbeville or Greenwood counties, the natural question is whether this is a new buyer for their logs. Here's what the public record shows so far:
- CEO Billy White credited "the local forestry community," along with the state and county, in the announcement, but gave no wood volume or sourcing commitment.
- The release doesn't say whether the plant will take in logs from landowners or buy finished lumber from other mills, and it doesn't mention a log yard or sawmill on site.
- Adeptus's own company history says White built partnerships with leading timber producers in Brazil.
- Woodworking Network identifies Norfolk, Virginia, as the company's headquarters and Honea Path as its first South Carolina operation.
A moulding and shiplap plant could still make a real difference for Upstate pine. If it buys lumber, it supports the regional sawmills that buy logs. If it builds log intake, it competes for wood directly. But nothing published yet supports adding a "Honea Path premium" to the timber on a tract listed today. Any seller or buyer who builds that into a price is betting on a sourcing plan the company hasn't announced.
Reading a wooded Anderson County tract this season
Clemson's guidance on local prices explains why statewide figures only go so far. What a specific stand brings depends on size and species mix, timber quality, total acres and volume, how easy the tract is to log, distance to nearby mills and overall market conditions. Those factors suggest an order for sizing up a tract.
- Get the product mix, not the acreage of "timber." A cruise from a forester separates sawtimber, chip-n-saw and pulpwood tons. With pine pulpwood at $3.79 in Q3 2026, two tracts with the same wooded acreage can have very different harvest values.
- Count the hardwood instead of writing it off. Mature hardwood sawtimber in drains and bottoms now carries a statewide average above pine sawtimber, at least for Q3 2026.
- Ask where the wood would go. Mill closures have lengthened the haul for some Upstate wood, and haul distance comes out of stumpage.
- Time the decision to the product. A stand close to sawtimber size may earn more by growing another few seasons than by being cut into a weak pulpwood market. That trade-off belongs in a conversation with a forester before a listing price is set.
For more on how standing timber shows up in a land sale, our earlier piece on how timber adds value to land in Franklin County covers the basics. If you're weighing a split of acreage, see what to know before subdividing land in Anderson County.
FAQ
Are the SCFC prices what I'd get for my timber? No. They're statewide averages, and the Forestry Commission presents them as a general picture of price trends. Actual bids on a specific Anderson County stand depend on its volume, quality, logging access and nearby mills.
When does the Adeptus plant open? The state's announcement puts the start of operations in the second quarter of 2027.
Will hardwood stay ahead of pine? The Q3 2026 figure is a single quarter. The next few quarterly reports from the SC Forestry Commission will show whether it holds.
Pricing a wooded tract means pricing the trees as well as the dirt, and in 2026 the trees aren't valued the way they were a year ago. Joseph Cann and Cann Realty pair Clemson forestry training with years of Upstate land sales. If you own timber in Anderson County and want to know what it adds to your sale price before you list or cut, request a free property valuation or reach out to Jody Cann directly.
