Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 74, no. 1896: July 16, 1904

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July 16, 1904 RECORD ANB GUIDE "ey -^ ESTABUSHED-^JAfcRpHSLii^lBea. Dev&tzD to RfA.L EIsTAit. Building ApoKtTEcnuRE ,}{m snlom DEBOffnoil. Bush/ess Aji) Themes OF GETiER^I iKiti^sT. PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE SIX DOLLARS Published eVerp Saturday Communicatlona should be addressed to C. W. SWEET, 14-16 Vesey SJreet. New Yorh J, T. LINDSEY, Business Mann-or Telephone, Cortlandt 3157 "Entered at tlie Post OJi:-e at N'eio York, Jf. Y., as second-class inalter." Vol. LXXIV. JULY IG, 1904. THE stocli market does well to be more cheerful, for it is bpcoming more than ever apparent that the year 1905 will see a restoration of .'ictivp. and profitable business. It is in¬ credible tbat the excellent crops which are promised, and v/hich will be sold at good prices, will not give the West and the South a new period of prosperity. Of course, the present crop prospects may not be fulfilled; but it is a fair gamble that they will be, and a man who can buy stoclis now and can afford to carry them into the new year, has as good a chance of malting money as often occurs. No doubt he should limit bis purchases to gcod railroad securities—particiilariy of the better Western roads; but eventually the continued prosperity of the West and * the South must react upon the great industries of the Middle West and the East, and restore the value of the industrial securities. It is evident, also, tbat the financial community will take the election without much perturbation or disturbance. The ex'isting monetary standard is .secure, in any event; and the tariff or the trusts cannot be issues in any very genuine sense of that word. The big issue will be the personality of the President, which W^all Street does not altogether like, but which it does not fear as much as it once did. The election, consequently, will not stand in the way of a recovery in values, which is in other respects justified. And if the market should recover completely during the next six mcnths, it will be an extraordinarily rap>id recuperation from a malady that looked at one time about as serious as possible. "p HE EVENING POST, in a recent comment upon the real ■^ estate situation, makes a good deal out of a table showing the real estate transactions for the first six months of the last four years. The table runs as follows: CONVEYANCES. Year. Number. Amoiinl 1™".................. 7 0IS .?02,150.83!) 19(>2.................. 7,37fi 815.230,384 J^«-?.................. S.HU 72.357.261 1904.................. 9,2:J2 38,700,101 MORTGAGES. S.................. O.'ISS $150,738,958 ^™2.................. (i.23i> 170.619.10S 1«03.................. 0.0-5 159,104,767 l'J04.................. S.328 151.176.6CO BUILDINGS. li'll.................. 1.205 $69,642,860 } "l;.................. 51.3 50.258.180 ' 1^ -J.................. «1"' 42.G43.6S5 19U4.................. 658 37,322.715 About this table the Post says: "The most remarkable feature, of course, is the great falling off in conveyancing. A drop from $92,000,000 to $38,000,000 may be partly explained by the growing habit of suppressing considerations—especially marked since the scheme of full valuation was adopted, but the custom was pretty well esta,blished in 1901. The figures represent a distinct falling off of outside capital going into real estate." No doubt, the fig¬ ures do represent a "distinct" falling off in the investment of ■capital, whether outside or inside, in real estate; but the de¬ crease, while "distinct," is by no means "great." The difference between the $92,000,000 which was the sum total of the expressed considerations in 1901 and the ?38,000.000 which was their sum total in 1904, is to be explained very much more by the increas¬ ing practice of recording transfers with nominal considerations than by the decrease in the amount of money invested in real estate in Manhattan during the four years. It will be noticed that the decrease in the total of the considerations has pro¬ ceeded steadily in spite of the fact tbat the number of transfers has steadily increased, so that although there were about 1,300 more conveyances recorded during the first Six months of 1903 than during the first six months of 1901, there was a decrease of $20,000,000 in the amount of money apparently conveyed. Dur¬ ing the first six months of 1904, there was a further increase of almost 1,000 in the number of transfers and a further decrease of about $33,000,000 in the sum of the considerations. But it was only during 1904 that property owners began to realize that they would do" well to conceal from the Tax Department the prices their property bad cost; and at the present time it is only in the cases cf property sold under foreclosure or by executor that the parties insert the consideration. The proportion of deeds carrying nominal prices has largely increased since 1901. and the table given above aftords not the remotest indication of the amount now being invested in New York real estate. This may be proved by the Bronx and Brooklyn figures. The number of transfers in the Bronx are fifty per cent, greater than they were four years ago; whereas, the sum of the express considera¬ tions is thirty per cent. less. In Brooklyn the number of convey¬ ances has about doubled 'in four years, while the. amount of money involved by them has scarcely increased at all. In both these cases much larger sums are "going" into real estate; but the figures give no inkling of the totals any more than they do in Manhattan. ONE phase of this redistribution of population is undoubtedly ___ [be discovery which some residents of the West Side have . recently been making—that they can get what they want in Brooklyn for a smaller price than they are paying in Manhattan. But it should be remarked that if certain families are moving from Manhattan to Brooklyn, certain other families—not so numerous, yet more interesting—have been moving from Brook¬ lyn to Manhattan. Formerly the characteristic part of Brooklyn was the Heights and the streets back of it—containing many fine residences, many old families, and a very entertaining society of ■its own. This society has net entirely vanished; but many of its wealthier members have bought houses on the East Sid© of ■Manhattan, and that part of Brooklyn has benefited only a small extent by the better demand, of late, for real estate in the borough. This reverse migration is an excellent illustration of the redistribution of which we have been speaking. The East Side of Manhattan has become the district for private residences. It is fashionaible; it is convenient for people who keep carriages; It is quite; it is near Central Park; it is expensive enough to be exclusive. It offers in a high degree the qualities which appeal to people who have exclusive social standards and can afford to pay for them. The consequence is that, although the demand far dwellings by rich people is much smaller than it used to be, there has been no recession of property values. Indeed, par¬ ticularly between Lexington and Park Avenues, south of Seven¬ tieth Street, these values have actually increased. Only this week the announcement is made that two houses with a frontage of thirty-five feet have been purchased on Sixty-fifth Street, between Park and Lexington Avenues, and that a new and handsome dwelling will be erected en tbe site. Since it has not been customary to reconstruct more than one house at a time east of Park Avenue, this announcement means a still higher standard of improvement for property in this neighborhood, and poss'ibly still higher values. Indeed, considering tbe necessary limitations of the district, there is no telling bow high values may eventually be forced. For many years to come it will be the one exclusive residential neighborhood of Manhattan. THE fact to which the Record and Guide recently called attention, viz.: that tbe present year had established a new low record in the building of Manhattan residences, has awakened a good deal of comment; and the question is fre- auently asked as to what becomes of the people who used to occupy the thousand new private dwellings which were erected every year. It is certainly an extraordinary change. Just now there can be no doubt that the stock of d^yellings in Manhattan is actually decreasing, for the few new houses erected are by no ■means sufBcient in number to make up for the destruction of old residences in districts that are being devoted to business and tenement uses. Yet the demand for residences is lively only in one part of the city; and it is evident that a great transformation has taken place in the domestic ha'bits and needs of many Neiw Yorkers, This change does not consist merely in a preference for apartment houses over private residences, although that is un¬ doubtedly an important part of the business. In spite of the fact that comparatively few new fiats, renting from eight hun¬ dred dollars a year, up, have recently been built, the demand for such accommodations, compared to the supply, has not greatly increased. The change is not simply one from private residences to flats, it is fi'om one part of the city to another. The increased cost of living in Manhattan is sending many people, who used to live in that borough, either to Brooidyn or the suburbs; and as communication with Brooklyn and the suburbs improves, this red'istriibution of population will more than ever take place. Families with incomes of $3,500 a year, or more, will have enormous variety of accommodation open to them, ranging from