Real  Estate   Record





AND BUILDERS' GUIDE.





Vol. XXYI.





NEW TOEK, SATUBDAT, OCTOBER 23, 1880.





No. 658





Published Weekly by

TERMS.
ONE VEAR. in advance....SIO.OO.
Oommunications should be addressed to

C.  W.  SVirfiET,

No. 137 Broadway

The time has come when the Real Estate
Record may congratulate owners of and deal¬
ers in realty on the healthy condition of the
market. Never having been identified with
the small, though reckless, crowd of specula
tors who see a " coming boom " in the sale of
every vacant lot, we cannot be charged with
taking, at all times, a too sanguine view of
the situation. On the contrary, if any fault
has been found with us, it has always been
on the part of those who claimed that we
erred when, in years past, we did not endorse
their rose-colored views.

Now, however, with the evidence before
us of renewed activity, not observable, al¬
ways, to the uninitiated, we can point to
the observations made in these columns for
a year past, as to the i)rogress this market
was making toward a position where all the
energy and activity of those interested would
be called into play. Not that there is any
occasion for boasting, as to greatly enhanced
prices. Such a condition w^ould be fatal to
a permanent healthy state of the real estate
market.

On the contrary, with the exception of
some notable Broadway and Fifth avenue
property, there has been no extraordinary
increase in values. And yet, activity, at
reasonable prices, has at last set in, and there
is a market, not only for improved and un¬
improved city property, but, also, for su¬
burban acres.

The various items of news, given in our
market review, this week, embrace import¬
ant transactions in almost every part of this
city, Westchester county and New Jersey,
and these, added to the successful public
auction sales, give indication of as lively and
sound a market as we have seen since the
close of the panic.





NOTES, POINTS AND FORECASTS.

That New York Central wiU double its
stock and declare thereupon five per cent,
dividends, the law not permitting the pay¬
ment "of more than eight per cent, on the
present capital stock.

That Erie will either declare no dividend
on the]Preferred stock or else a disappointing
one. The road has earned six per cent, on
the Preferred and two and a half on the
Common, but there are so many improve¬
ments needed that the surplus will be used





up in making them, for Erie cannot come
into the market for a new loan.

That Missoiu-i, Kansas & Texas is an ex¬
cellent purchase for a long term, in view of
the enormous growth of Texas, the business
of which, in a railroad way, is monopolized
by the Iron Mountain and the Missouri,
Kansas & Texas.

That an effort will be made when Congress
meets to open up the Indian Territory. The
agitation will add to the market value of
St. Louis and San Francisco, and Missouri,
Kansas and Texas pending the discussion.

That there may be a partial break in stocks
next week, due to a doubt as to who may
carry the election November 2d, but a buoy¬
ant market is expected just immediately
before and immediately after the election.

That stocks will be duU toward the end of
November and through December, with per¬
haps a serious break in prices, to be followed
in January by the highest prices known in
the history of the "street."

That mining shares will continue to drop,
unless there is a " strike " on the Comstock.

That there can be no revival of the specu¬
lation in mining shares without the help
of the Comstock, unless some of the new
mines come to the front as dividend payers.
The most hopeful properties are the Horn
Silver, the Bassick, the Bull Domingo, the
Silver Cliff, the Plata Verde and the Chryso¬
lite. The Hukill also ought to be a dividend
paying property soon.

That there may be something in Erie after
all; for now a sti-ange rumor is ch-culated
to the effect that the Lackawanna extension
to Buffalo has really been undertaken to
capture Erie stock at low figures. The ex¬
tension will cost 110,000,000; but vastly
more than that sum will be saved in the
price of Erie, for those who intend to pur¬
chase it and make it a part of the Wabash
system. In other words, the Erie and
Lackawanna combined will enter the field in
opposition to the New York Central and with
as many tracks, and the advantage of a
water line to Buffalo.

That the great ambition of Jay Gould's
life is to once more become possessed of
Erie. He was expelled from its manage¬
ment in disgrace ; and it will be a fitting se¬
quel to his financial career were he to capture
it and make it a part of a great trans-conti¬
nental Hne.

That the rise in St. Paul has caught Russel
Sage and Jay Gould short of that stock in
the eighties. The street has lots of paper
bearing Russel Sage's signature, in which he
gives calls on St. Paul for ninety.

That the weakness in the Gould stocks is
because that great operator is really crippled
by having. made mistakes as to the future
price of the Grangers and Lake Shore.   He





was short of Lake Shore last spring, and is
short of St. Paul and Northwest to-day.

That Huntington and the California rail¬
way operators are preparing for a grand coup
shortly after the completion of the new line
to the Pacific Ocean. When the Atchison
& Santa Fe reaches Florida City, about Janu¬
ary 1st, it will be found that a combination
has been made between the Central Pacific,
the Atchison & Santa Fe, the Louisville &
Nashville and the CJiesapeaka & Ohio for
through traffic between NorfoUi and San
Francisco.





WHOLESALE BROADWAY.

In hurrying to and from their places of
business, New Yorkers are aj)t to overlook
the changes that have been wrought of late
in that section of our great thoroughfare,
which ought, henceforth, to be known as
"wholesale Broadway." We have, hereto¬
fore, alluded to the extraordinary improve¬
ments, projected and underway, as well a3
the great demand for offices from the Bat¬
tery up to Murray street. To-day, we desire
to call attention to the improvements and
changes along that great thoroughfare above
Murray street, and the shifting of various
Hnes of trade. We then find, with, of course,
here and there minor exceptions, the whole¬
sale business lines defined as follows:

Mun-ay to Duane street—shoes and hard¬
ware.

. Duane to Canal street—drygoods, commis¬
sion and wholesale.

Canal to Great Jones street—^wholesale
clothing, hats, millinery and notions;

This section includes, of course, the cross
streets, of which Broadway is the centreline
of demarcation. Property that has been lying
dormant along Broadway, in the vicinity of
Prince and Bleecker streets, now shows con¬
siderable signs of activity, as the clothing
and miUinery trade is demanding constantly
more and more room; and this increased ac¬
tivity, continuing up to and even beyond the
Grand Central Hotel, shows itself by the
renting of stores and lofts at figures which
would have been considered high, two or
three years ago. The increase, also, in that
section has not been made at the sacrifice of
property located further down town. It
does not at all, for instance, affect the rental
of stores in and around Worth, Thomas,
White and other streets. On the contrary,
several drygoods firms, that were above Ca¬
nal street, have recently moved again below
that street, so as to be in the midst of the
wholesale drygoods market, which now
stretches from Duane to Canal street.

Rents, all along Broadway, went up last
year twenty per centi, and present indica¬
tions axe that another increase, from ten to