December 30, 1883





143





THE RECORD AND GUIDE.

191  Broadway, N. Y.





DECEMBER 30, 1883.





PRICE OF RECORD AND GUIDE.
Per Annum,             .             -             -             -

With Supplement,           -             .             _            ,

Record and Guide, Single Copy,
With Supplement,           -             _             _            .





$5,0C
6,00
10 cents,
15   "





ments were comparatively prompt. With the Bankruptcy Law in
operation, the dividends range from 5 to 10 per cent, only, as the
litigation is so prolonged that the costs of courts eat up the
assets. The lavryers who proflt by these acts manage somehow to
secure all the leading papers to advocate their passage, and thus
the curious spectacle is preserved of the business public being
entirely misrepresented by the journals they keep alive.





Real Estate and Building During the Past Year.

It is safe to assert that more houses were constructed during the
past year than in any previous year in the history of the country.
It is also certain thafc the new houses generally, both for business
and residence purposes, were larger, handsomer, and costlier than
at any previous period. This is true of nearly every centre of
population in the United States.

In St. Louis, the estimated value of the buildings for which per¬
mits were issued is $5,885,000, which is over a million dollars in
excess of the improvements made during the previous year. In
Chicago the building movement has been phenomenal. The num¬
ber of permits issued was 3,640, the street frontage covered with
new structures, lineal measure, was about fourteen miles, and the
cost of the buildings over $20,000,000, or about half that of the
year 1873, when the rebuilding of the city after the great fire was
going on.

On the whole, with all this building, it cannot be said that out-
aide of Chicago there was any unwarranted or unusual speculation
in real estate. There has been a rise of values in localities in the
line of improvement, but there has been nothing unnatural in the
prices asked for desirable real estate. In the agricultural lands in
the far West, there has been something of a speculative movement,
and large advances have been made upon the prices which were
demanded some four or five years back. Undoubtedly in some
quarters there has been too rapid an advance, but taking the West¬
ern country as a whole, it cannot be said there is as yet anything
unnatural in the real estate movement. The nevv railroads and
the immense immigration have created a legitimate demand for
land heretofore unavailable. The activity has a speculative look,
but is really entirely normal. It may be stated broadly that any
good land in the United States near a railway and a market is not
dear at forty dollars an acre. And there are many millions of
splendidly improved farms, desirably located in the West, which
can bs purchased for less than twenty-flve dollars an acre.

Here in the East, in all the manufacturing cities, there has been
a great deal of building for manufacturing, trading and residence
purposes ; but, in the slang of the day, there has been no " boom"
in real estate. This will come in time. In all speculative cycles
it is stocks which are flrst affected, then general merchandise, and
finally real estate. We may not see very high prices in 1883
but they are certain to come. Land is a fixed quantity which can¬
not be increased, while our population doubles every quarter of a
century. There is no more certain inveatment than land in good
locations.

Here in New York, while the number of houses erected was
about the same as last year, when it was unusually large, there has
been an entire absence of speculation. Some activity was devel¬
oped in one or two favored localities, but the increase in price was
not in any way unwholesome. Our local real estate market has
sympathized somewhat with the Stock Market, and has been
unduly depressed. But holders are firm in their views, and to the
great bulk of house and lot holders, there is no inducement to sell
afc the market prices.





The Growth of Speculation.

Some one would do a public service who would collect the statis¬
tics showing the growth of speculative transactions in this country.
Mr. George G. Moore, Secretary of the Cotton Exchange, stated to
the Senate Committee on "corners" that the total sales of cotton in
this city will amount to nearly $33,000,000 bales by the close of this
year, while the entire crop for the period dealt in was less than
6,000,000, and the actual "spot" transactions was only 600,000 bales;
that is to say, for every one bale of cotton actually handled in New
York there were fifty-five sold; in other words, the Cotton
Exchange exists almost entirely for speculative purposes. Not one
in twenty of the brokers could earn their living if the dealings in
cotton were confined to actual exchanges. The transactions in
wheat, corn, oats and lard are still larger in quantity; but the
precise flgures cannot be given, because an official record is not
kept as in the Cotton Exchange. Then, the best part of the specu¬
lation in food products is carried on from here in the Chicago mar¬
ket. The produce markefc reports, however, give some inkling of
the extent of the speculation in their statements of the receipts and
sales. For instance, the annual report for 1881 gives the following
flffures:





Receipts.

Wheat, bushels..................................   44,2.S\219

Corn, bushels....................................   45,9?/2,857

Oats, bushels....................................   14,69.5,039

Lard, tcs.........................................       005,787





Sales.

488,304,200

2.33,8'9,000

62,765,500

6,923,028





It should be remembered in this connection that^theso vast spec¬
ulative sales are a comparatively recent development of the regu¬
lar business of our exchanges. " Futures " in cotton were first for¬
mally dealt in in this city in 1869, while the recent speculative
transactions in food products is an outgrowth of Chicago enter¬
prise. As our readers know, the late dealings in petroleum have
been enormous, but the precise facts are not known as the transac¬
tions take place in several different markets. In the recent specu¬
lation there was sold in the short space of seven days as much
petroleum as the country has produced during the last twelve
years.

There is, however, a silver lining to the cloud. Brokers in all
the exchanges agree in saying that speculative transactions have
fallen off enormously. The outside pablic have been cruelly pun¬
ished in their ventures, and customers are as scarce to the brokers
of the Cotton and Produce Exchanges as they are for the brokers
of the Mining and Stock Exchanges. The petroleum speculation is
the only one that can just now be called active. Of course the dis¬
position to speculate is as strong as ever and will find a vent in
other specialties, but eventually real estate will get the benefit of
the craving after additional wealth by those who, having tried
everything else, will at last settle upon the most solid of invest¬
ments—realty.





The Future of Fifth Avenue.

The past five years have seen great changes in certain portions
of Fifth avenue above Madison square. Private dwellings have
o-iven place to boarding houses, and these again have been con¬
verted into stores and places of business. Apartment houses have
become very common, and the number is likely to increase year by
year. Jewelers, tailors, dress-m.akers and milliners have invaded
the avenue formerly dedicated ,to the exclusive use of fashionable
people. A great retail grocery and liquor store is even now being
erected near the entrance to the Park, and, at the present rate of
change, Fifth avenue from Madison square to Central Park will, in
fifteen years' time, almost have entirely changed its nature.   There

Indeed, the





It is interesting to notice thafc Chicago is absolutelv as well as I ""'^^ ^" ^^ deterioration in fche value of fche property.              .
......           —     —   -           ^        '*"''"™"'®^y'^s ^®" as ' gj.^^^.gg ^^^j apaj-fcmenfc houses will yield much larger returns than





relatively, gaining on New York, The number of permits for new
buUdings is 3,640, against about 1,300 for New York City. But
then the latter will cost over $40,000,000, while the new structures in
Chicago will be worth less than $30,000,000. It would, however,
take a good many years for Chicago to catch up to New York, even
if ifc continued its presenfc bufiding activity. There is no danger
that during this century or generation New York will yield its title
as the metropolis to any other city of the United Sfcates.





This paper protested several weeks past against the passage of
any new Bankrupfccy Acfcs on the grouncl thafc fchey benefifced only
fraudulent creditors and lawyers. On Thursday, a petition was
presented to the Senate, signed by 1,380 of the first business men
in the country, taking the same view as that presented iii these
columns. The petition shows thafc without any National Baflkru]:»t
Law creditors have received dividends] of 35 per cent., aad- fiettitt-





the most luxuriant private dwellings.   Many rich persons will also
inhabit this part of Fifth avenue, but they will own suites of rooms
and apartments or live in hotels.   The rich who wish to reside in
their own houses, away from business, wiU be forced to seek their
homes in the regions east of the northeast side of the Park.   The
Tribune, in a recent article, thinks that the very fashionable may
seek new quarters on the Riverside Drive, or some other portion of
the West Side, bufc it has been found very difficult-in the past to
establish new centres, either for business purposes or for fashiona¬
ble residences.   There is a certain continuity in building whicn
prevents any serious break from costly houses to those of a poorer
character, and vice versa.   Ifc is quite possible that the splendid
apartment and other houses which are to be found so numerously
just south of the Park may continue to spread in a northwesterly
direction, in which event the fashionable quarter might extend itself
up to the Boulevard and Riverside Drive; Indeed, this is very likely