June 15, 1907.





RECORD  AND  GUIDE





1151







0^61* TO Rea.!. Estate.BinLDijfc AftpKiTEeTu;\E,Houss{(HiDEi3ai«K»f,
PRICE   PER   YEAR   IN   ADVANCE   EIGHT   DOLLARS

Published eVery Saturday                  .

Communicatlona should be addreased to

C.  W,  SWEET

Madison Square: 1 1-15 East 24th Street
Toloplioiie, 4430 Madiaon Square

"Entered al tlie Post O.ffice at J^^eio Yorl; JV. T„ as secoitd-class maltei:"
Copyrighted,   1907,   by The  Record & Guide Co.





Vol.  LXXIX,





JUNE 15, 1907,





No. 2018.





INDEX TO  DEPARTMENTS.
Avertising Section.

Page.                                               Page.

Cement  .......................vii  Lumber'.......................xx

Consulting Engineers   ..........vi   Machinery..................viii

Clay Products ................xviii   Metal   Worlt   ...................xv

Contractors and Builders.......iv Quick Jot) Directory............xx

Electrical  Interests............ix Real   Estate..................xl

Fireprooflng...................ii Roofers  & Roofiug Materials.,xix

Granite   .....................xvi Slone.. .♦...................xvi

Iron and Steel.................x Wood Products ................xx





THIS has .been another week of dulness and irregu¬
larity in the stock market, and the Indications are
that such eonditions will prevail throughout the summer.
The price movements were in narrow limits, and when a
little activity developed prices at the end of a session were
about where they were at the beginning. The Govern¬
ment's suit against the coal roads, talk about war with
Japan, Treasury calls for many millions, and rumors of
business firms in distress, had practically no effect on the
market. Wall Street is sensitive, but of late years it is
more and more difficult to foretell with any degree of
certainty the effect bad news or good news wiil have on the
market. Those with years of experience on the Street are
frequently as much at sea as the mere neophyte in spec¬
ulation. This condition of affairs arises because there are
now three or more rival camps controlling great railroad,
banking and industrial interests, aud wliile bad or good
times are reflected in prices of stocks, the mere surface
indications in the way of fluctuations have no significance.
Thus, the failure of a large corporation engaged in the man¬
ufacture of steel scarcely caused a ripple iu ciuotations
generally any more than did the favorable news of the veto
by Governor Hughes of the two-cent fare bill applicable to
steam railroads in this State. .That there is not much fear
of there being very poor crops—or as some would have it
no crops at al]—is shown by the violent break of wheat
in Chicago. When holders wished to secure their paper
profits, wheat declined three cents a bushel without a,
rally. The professionals are reported to be out of the mar¬
ket and are preparing Eor a new movement, but be this as
it may, one thing is very evident. Unseasonable weatlier
such as we are having tliis summer is not going to send
the country into bankruptcy; uncertain conditions of tiie
money market, gloomy outlook as to crops, aud the feel¬
ing of unrest in industrial and commercial centres, to the
contrary notwithstanding. Money rates have stiffened, as
we predicted, and a rate higher than three per cent, may
not be far off, but there sliould be no cause for anxiety on
this account for real estate and buikling interests for the
expected summer dulness still prevails.





AMONG the other events of the past week has been the
failure of a builder, who had erected a good many
houses in the Washiugton Heights district; but the news
need not disturb anybody not immediately interested in Mr.
Arnstein. The wonder is that there have not been more
cases of distress among the builders who a year or more
ago were erecting so many fiats in that region. They ran
into a situation which is about as bad as that which can
face any group of builders. They were obliged, that is, to
face a stringent money market, which prevented them from
securing good permanent loans, a declining demand for
apartments and a consequently increasing difficulty in sell¬
ing out. But the consequent distress has not been any¬
thing like so great as it was during certain analogous
periods of development on the West-Side and in Harlem,
because the title companies are much more powerful than





they were ten years ago, and their influence has been ex¬
erted in favor of conservatism. It is not so easy as it used
to be for a builder without any mouey at all to obtain
enough credit to start a considerable building operation,
and while many operations are started under such condi¬
tions they are fewer than they once were. The consequence
is that' when conditions are unfavorable, a smaller propor¬
tion of builders are closed out. Moreover, there is, uuder
such circumstances, less general demoralization. A re¬
munerative level of rents is more likely to be maintained,
and the conservative builders are not pulled down with
their more speculative neighbors. It is probable tbat next
spring will disclose a much more favorable condition foi;
building on Washiugton Heights than has recently beeu the
case. During the past year the over-production of living
accommodations, at least in Manhattan and the Bronx, has
ceased, and in a short time vacancies will be much less
numerous. It is improbable that even then building will
obtain the proportions that it did in 1905, because it looks
as if money would not be easily available for such purposes
even by next spring. But there will be a gradual recov¬
ery. Every newly settled part of the city has to pass
through these vicissitudes. They suffer more from unfav¬
orable conditions than do the older sections, just as they
beneflt more from favorable conditions. Wasiiington
Heights will be lucky in case it does not at some future
period in the eourse of its upbuilding encounter real estate
and  building conditions no worse than they are at present.





General Business Prospects and the  Real
Estate  Market.

vT-sHE general business outlook for the coming year is man-
J. ifestly clouded with a good deal of uncertainty. The
great majority of manufacturers and merchants are still
.reaping the benefit of a large volume of trade; but they
are scrutinizing the future much more carefully than they
were a year ago, and they are much less willing to embark
on any plans of business expansion that will seriously in¬
crease their responsibilities. They are unwilling to expand,
not only because of the tightness of money, which will not
be permanently loosened up for some time, but because they
feel really uncertain in respect to the future market for
'their product. They are obliged to consider the possibility
of a diminished rather than an increased demand, and they
are obliged_ to ask themselves what their own condition
would'be in the event of such a diminished demaud. This
state of mind will undoubtedly have an important effect on
the volume of business transactions during the coming.year.
It is not possible that business will increase during 1905
as it has during the past four years, and the important
question is whether such a failure to expand will run over
into a year of business depression. If so, it will undoubt¬
edly have a serious effect upon the local real estate* market,
because at the present time the most important single cause
of real estate activity in Manhattan is the prosperity of
general business. The demaud for real estate in the whole
central part of that borough is profoundly stimulated by the
constantly increasing need of more space by retail and
wholesale business and by the manufacturiug industries
carried on in those vicinities.

So far, however, as existing indications go, it looks as
it general business during the coming year would be char¬
acterized rather by a slower rate of increase than by the
appearance of hard times. The business situation has as¬
suredly stood the collapse of speculation in the stock mar¬
ltet much better than it did during the summer and fall of
1903'. During the past winter and spring the prices of se¬
curities diminished in much the same proportion as they did
in 190?.. Good railroad stocks are, on the whole, cheaper
now than they were even in that year, and their cheapness
has been brought about by analogous conditions. In both
instances the business prosperity of the country and the de¬
mand for large supplies of money, resulting from this pros¬
perity, interfered with a rise In the price of seciirities pro¬
portionate to their increase in actual value. A group of
speculators who had bought large amounts of securities in
anticipation of this rise in values were in both cases caught
out, and were obliged to liquidate, with a result disastrous
to themselves' and harmful to a large number of timid in¬
vestors. It should be added, however, that the collapse of
prices in Wall Street has so far had a much smaller effect
on general business than in 1903. In that year the indus¬
trial stocks suffered as severely as did the railroad stocks,
if not more so, whereas during the current year the Indus-