REAL    E S TAT E

m®m)





AND







BUILDERS





Vol. CI





NEW YORK, JUNE 1, 1918





No. 22





Realty Board Ready to Put Down Profiteering





Offers Aid in Any Investigation Made by Board of Aldermen of

Oppressive Rental Conditions.





V





ICE-CHAIRMAN MORAN of the Board of
Aldermen has introduced a resolution which
reads as follows:

WHEREAS, Statements and complaints are
being made to the effect that the rents of apart¬
ments and flats in this city are being unduly
increased, with a resulting hardship in many cases
to an already overburdened citizenship; Therefore
be it

RESOLVED, That the Board of Aldermen here¬
by requests every member of this body to inquire
into these conditions in his respective district, and
also calls upon the citizens of the city to com¬
municate any information they may have concern¬
ing rent profiteering to the Aldermen of their
district to the end that this board may be in a posi¬
tion to determine the necessity of an official
investigation by the Board of Aldermen into this
important subject.

Several persons have expressed concern over this
proposal, and have coupled it with a more or less
sensational campaign being made by an afternoon
newspaper against so-called rent profiteering.

The resolution was considered at a meeting of the
Board of Governors of the Real Estate Board of New
York, held on Tuesday, May 28, and it was decided
to notify the Board of Aldermen that if a committe
should be appointed to investigate rent conditions the
Real Estate Board of New York would be glad to
co-operate to the fullest extent.

In relation to this matter the following statement
was issued by Richard O. Chittick, Executive Secretary
of the Real Estate Board of New York:

"The Real Estate Board of New York in ofifering
its co-operation to the Board of Aldermen had a very
definite object in view. Rents have increased in the
past few months. In some cases the increase is slight;
in many it represents only a return to the rates obtain¬
able at an earlier period; in some cases the increase
has been considerable. There may, of course, be
individual cases where the increase has been too great.

"But well informed persons do not believe that rent
profiteering exists to any appreciable extent. It is
well to know that the operating expenses of buildings,
just as in other lines of enterprises, have increased
greatly. Recent investigations, applying to office build¬
ings and apartment houses, have shown that while
gross incomes have increased the increase in operating
expenses has left a margin of profit about what it was
before the rents were raised.

"What the Real Estate Board of New York wishes
to make sure of is that any investigation should be
thorough and impartial so that the resulting report
may be based on actual facts. If there is any extensive
rent profiteering the. Real Estate Board of New York
is as anxious as any one else to bring it to light. If
there is not, the impression already created in the
public mind that there is should be removed."

Vice-Chairman Robert L. Mpran, of the Board of Alder¬





men, said yesterday: "I was inspired to introduce this
resolution in the board because of the many complaints
received by President Smith, myself and other members of
the board from people in all parts of the city who charged
landlords with profiteering and demanding an official in¬
vestigation.

"I am in the real estate business myself and therefore
know just what the condition is as regards realty. Of
course some landlords have raised rents for the purpose
of profit. I know of an instance where a man had his
furniture in storage because he was unable to secure an
apartment in which to iive. Apartments are mighty scarce
these days and tenants know this. The man in question ap¬
proached a certain landlord and offered him fifteen dollars
more for one of his apartments than the landlord was re¬
ceiving. The latter by various means succeeded in com¬
pelling the tenant of the apartment to vacate and at once
leased it to his friend at the increased rental. The landlord
then went among his other tenants, told them that he was
receiving forty dollars for the apartment just leased as
against twenty-five previously and demanded and received
increases from the other tenants of from five to twelve
dollars an apartment.

"As a real estate man myself I know pretty well what
it costs to own and maintain property these days, so that
I would hesitate to bring about an investigation of a charge
of profiteering which is too broad in its scope, but after
consultation with President Smith it was decided to put
the matter up to the individual aldermen, let them make
investigations in their own districts, receive complaints and
affidavits and then present them to the Rules Committee
for action if such complaints warrant such action."

A representative of the real estate firm of Cruikshank
& Company of 141 Broadway, which manages many
estates, said: "Profiteering? Why owners are lucky now¬
adays if they are able to keep their properties going at all.
Take the cost of coal. It is hard to get and when we do
succeed in getting any we must pay an increased price
and pay extra for hauling it from the yard to the
property. Where it used to cost seventy-five-cents for
a pane of glass it costs today nearly four dollars by the
time it is in, and it is hard to get at any price. Labor is
high and the class of labor we are compelled to accept
is far below the standard.

"Wages were never higher for elevator operators, en¬
gineers, firemen, janitors and others, and it is mighty hard
to procure help at all.

"Everything pertaining to the maintenance and upkeep
of property has advanced, and if the landlord asks the
tenant to bear just a little bit of the increased cost he is
accused of profiteering. We are not brokers, we manage
estates and are in a position to say authoritatively that land¬
lords are facing each month a deficit and the increase in
rentals is only to help keep this deficit down."

Chairman John P. Leo of the Board of Standards and
Appeals who has built many apartments and tenements
in  New  York City,  s^jd;    "I own twelve apartment