RECORD   AOT)   GUIDE





123







DflÔTĩD p RfVLEsTAjE^BuiLOlifc A{^lTEeTUR,E.KcrtJS£iíoiDDE6aF!Anoií,
Bl/SlÆSSAtfoTHEMESOFGEIÍERíiV lifrEi^si..

PRICE    PER   YEAR   IN   ADVANCE   EIGHT   DOLLARS

Commimĩcations  sliould  be  addressed to

C. W. SWEET

Publisfied EVerp Saturdap

Ey THE BECORD AND GTJIDE CO.

President.  CLINTON W.  SWEET                        Treasurer, F. W. DODGE

Vice-Pres, & Genl. Mgr., H. W.  DESMOND         Secretary, F. T. MILLER

Nos.  XX  to  IS East 24tli  Street,  New  York  Cĩty

(Telepboũe,   Madíson   Square, 4430 to 4433.)







"EHl<;reã at




the l'ost Office nt Ncio




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Copyrigbted,




1007,   by




The




Record




&




Guide




Co.















Vol.




LXXX









JULY 20,




1907.



















No.




2053.





INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS.
Advertising  Section.

Page.                                                    Page.

Ceraent .......................viii  Lumlier   ....................xx

Consulting Engineers  ...........v  Machinery   ....................vi

Clay Producls   ...............xviii  Metal  Work   ...................xv

Coutractors   and   Builders......iii Quick Job Directory............xx

Electrical  luteresls   ...........vii   Real   Esiate   ...................xi

Fireprooftng  ...................ii  Roofers & Roofing Materials, .xix

Granite   ......................xvi  Stone   .......................xvi

Iron   and   Steel    ................x  Wood  Products   ..............xxi

THIS weeiĩ's stock iiiarket has been almost a duplioate
of last, aiid in spite of several depressing infliiences
tliere has been a inai'lcing of tíme índicating tUe sonnd
basis oí business. The failure of a large commercial lirm
naturally affected sentiment. The house was not inter-
ested in stoeks, but speculators reasoned tliat they could
get little aid from banks if the latter declined to aeconimo-
date commercial concerns. Although fluctuations have been
comparatively insignificant there is undoubtedly a gradual
improvement in the inarket. As a writer on flnance says,
"T'he things which directly and properly affect the stock
líiarket have been so thoroughly discoimted that the bear
party is compelĩed to look outside for argunients." That
the market is in a good technical condition for hardening
prices cannot he denied, though there may be niany ups and
downs before the advance is established. On Wednesday
of this week there was a slump at the close, there being a
loss of 2 points in Steel Comnion, breaking to 36. It after-
wards recovered somewhat, On the other hand the snpport
accorded Union Pacifle was aggressive. Higher figures than
150 for this stock are freely talked of and whether there is
aiiy manipulation or not in advanciiig the price it is un-
doubtedly a good investment security even at S per eent.
But this ís, after all, a purely mid-summer market and it is
not easy always to find reasons for tlie action of the stock
market. The publie is certainĩy not în the market and it
ĩs not likely that it wil! be for some time to come, so long
aS savjngs banks pay 4 per cent. and profttable employment
can be found for funds in general business. War talk has
subsided, and Japan is ready to guarantee a loan of ?20,-
000,000 to be fioated in London for the development of the
Manchurian railway systeni. Money is lower this week,
which is news always welcome to building interests and real
estate operators, but iu these dog days there is little activ-
ity and co.nsequently less demand. Call money has not ex-
eeeded 4 per eent. and time money, six months, 6 per cent.
Eates are much lower abroad, and why they should be so
miich higher Iiere is a problem yet to be solved.





DURING the past three years there has been a gradual
decrease in the number of private residenees and
apartment hotels erected in Manhattan, but during the first
six raonths of 1907 the tendency towards such a decrease
has culminated. Not a single apartment hotel has been
projected so far during the current year; and it becomes a
matter of some interest wĩiether' this type of residential
building is onĩy suffering a temporary eelipse, or whether
it will disappear as one of the popular cĩasses of residences
in Manhattan. The truth would seem to be somewhere
between these two opinions. There can be no doubt that
during 1901, 1902 and 1903 the erection of apartment
hotels was very much overdone and tliat there was no de-
mand for this class of accommodation sufflcient to fill the
100   large   residentia!   hoteis   erected   during   those   years.





There  was   so   much   over-building   during   the   yeî-f Brooklyn.H. Y.

tioned   that   the   deinand   for   hotel   accommodation*^ ^^^^"

likely   to   overtake   the   supply   for   many   years;   buf'^''"""""'**''-^™'

probable   that  eventuany  there  will   be  a  moderate  v.

of hotel  building.     The position oE New York  as the   k^^^gni^g   pg^k

ness  metropolis  of  the  country,  which  is  likely  to   beecn, Waltíut st;

more rather than  less  important in  its  effects,  wil!  alwã'.'^^-_ „,

bring to the  city  a  large fioating population,  who  will  re"á'^Í7;iu°^s''t

inain  there  long enough  to  want  something  different from '

a  room  or  two  in  a  noisy  Broadway  hotel.     Then  regular   '™*ii'-'

residents  of  New  York  show  an  increasing  preference   for

a  country  home  near  the  city, the pleasures  of  which  are       -liinBĨe

varied by !ife for a few months each yeai' în a Manhattan            '^    '

apartment  hotel.     It  is  likely,   however,   that  the   eoijpera-              'st,

tive apartment house, whieh is at the present time the most                '"*

popular   type   of   large   residential   building,   will   compete

with   the   apartment   hotel   for   the   eustom   of   this   seeond

elass   of   people.       The   coôperative   apartment   is   cheaper

either than a private residence or than a rented apartment

of the same size.    Ít ís peculiarly adapted to the needs of

a well-to-do family, living in the neighborhood of New York,

who  want to  have  a  place in  the  city  whieĩi  is  ready  for

occupation at any time, and on the shortest notice.    Tiiere

can be no doubt, also, that the cooperative apartment house,

if  it  coutinues  to  sueeeed,  will  also  prove  to  be  a  severe

competitor  with  the private resideuce.     It enables its  own-

er  to  obtain a  permanent  dwelling  in  a  good  location  for

iess  money than  he would have  to  pay  for an old  brown

stone house in a very much inferior location, and the num-

ber of people  who have been buying these apartments  may

partly account for the fact that the building of new private

residences  is almost  at a standstill.    The  plans  have  been

filed  for  only  about  a   dozen  of  theni,   so   far,   during   the

eurrent year,  whicli is a new low record.





Manhattan and the Other Boroughs.

WHATBVER may be the course of generaĩ business
during the coming year, the existing situation and
the future prospects of the real estate niarket in New York
City do not raise many questions which cannot be answered.
The wave of speculation in Manhattan real estate which be-
gan în 1901 and reaehed its height in 1906 is now deftnitely
subsiding. It is receding slowly and its effects will linger
for some years; but its force is none the less spent. It was
dependent upon conditions whieh have now been partially
superseded, and the next boom in Manhattan real estate,
whenever it comes, will take on decidedly different charac-
teristics. Manhattan will cease to be tlie eomparativeiy in-
dependent city it has been in the past. It will become more
and more in an economie sense what it has been for ten
years in a legal sense. It will beeome more and more
merely one borough of a greater eity; and its desirability
both for residential and business purposes will become more
and more strictly specialized. It will come to have, that is,
a special and limited function in that larger economic or-
ganism, whiéh is known as Greater New York.

The recent speculative boom in Manhattan real estate
was remarkable for its diffused effeet upon aĩl classes of
property and all parts of the city. It affected either suc-
cessively or at the same tinie gilt-edged real estate ĩn the
ftnancial distriet, the new wholesale section north of Four-
teenth Street, the streets and avenues devoted to retaĩl
trade and amusements, the private residential guarter soutli
and east of Central Park, and tĩie neighborhoods all over the
island in which tenement houses were built. Of course it
affected some classes of property much more than others; and
there is one district, viz,, Greenwich village, which it passed
by almost entirely. But on the whole it is distinctly true
to say that this long and lucrative speculative exploitation
of Manhattan real estate was as far as possible from being
limited or specialized in its influence, It was based upon*
the growth of Manhattan as an independent eeonomic and
domestic organism, in which all phases of business and res-
idential activity were deveioping side by side. The only
class of buildings which had beeu of much importanee in tho
past life of Manhattan and whieh were neglected during the
reeent speculative movement, were tlie cheaper grade of
private residences. The eost of land in desirable neighbor-
hoods had become so high that New Yorkers of moderate
means, who wanted houses of their own, were pretty well
foreed to live outside of Manhattan, and this stoppage in
the eonstruction of eheap írivate houses in Manhattan con-
tained a plain prophecy of simiĩar changes to follow, but
the.'ĩe changes did not develop during the course of the re-