Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

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REAL ESTATE ĨKi'E(§®^'»røDfln®Ê B UILDERS Vol. CII. NEW YORK, SEPTEMBER 7, 1918 No. 10 Many Private Houses East of Central Park Sold Good Demand This Year for Desirable Residences Who Formerly Lived in Apartments by People By LAWRENCE B. ELLIMAN of Pease & Elliman. THE scarcity of well-appointed a])artnieiits has led to a m'ovement iii real estate that is interesting and significant and which may easily be pro- ductive of a great change in conditions in the residence districts of the city. In the section in which my firm bperates—south of 96th street and east of Central Park —there has been, siiice January Ist of this year, a decided demand by our clients for private houses, and a considerable number have been sokl to people who formerly lived in apartments or rented houses in this or other uptown neighborhoods. The movement started in a small way, but has grovvn more important as the season has advanced, and the number of trans- actions of this character handled by our company and by other brokers has attained such dimensions as to indicate a more than ephemeral or sporadic interest in this class of property. It is not difîĩcult to find the cause for a growing change in sentiment of the large number of people who can afford to Hve in dwelHngs of the more expensive kind away from the jointly occupied apartment build- ing towards the privately owned house. There is, of course, no comparison between the free- dom and exclusiveness of the latter as compared with the former. The introduction of modern conveniences like the private elevator, which puts the liouse on a par with the apartment so far as faciHty in reaching any part of the dwelling is concerned, and of the various mechanical devices in the service part of the house reducing manual labor, have minimized many of the objections to the three or four story building as a home. There is character and exclusiveness in the private house which cannot Ije successfully emulated by the apartment building, however fine its appointments. Especially is it true that the private house affords the lîctter location for social affairs, and notwithstanding the great imjjrovement recently made in the planning of apartments there is no doubt that in the house the social and living rooms are more effectually segregated from the service departments. But while these considerations are now doing their share towards bringing back recognition of the desira- biHty of the privately owncd house they are not new, but are only eft'ective because other things have allowed their claims to be brought forward. What is, of course, the real cause for the renewal of interest in private houses is the lack of apartments such as are usuaHy in demand by our cHents, ranging in price from about $2,500 or $3,000 per year up to about $15,000. Under present war conditions, it is practically out of the question for any Ijuilder to erect a large apartment house on account of the uncertainty in gettirig supplies, building materials and labor, and there wiU be during the continuance of the war a very great shortage of such accommodations. Due to this shortage of new buildings, and also due to the fact that private house rentals and sales prices have been radically reduced so that to-day private houses are relatively very much cheaper than apart- ments, we beHeve that now is the proper time to lay the facts before owners of private houses in order that they can take advantage of this situation. In the last few years previous to 1918 there have been built each year in the section referred to an average of twelve to twenty buildings, say, from 300 to 600 apartments counting thirty apartments to the building. With a building program of this extent the supply of apartments kept up fully with the demand, but this year there has been no new building and only one which work was started last year has been thrown open to occupancy. Consequentjy there has been a great scarcitj^ of apartments to rent. The demand has been so great and the supply so small that owners have been able to advance rents from 10 to 15 per cent. Incidentally I may say that this does not indicate, nor is it, "profiteering." For one thing it is the working out of the old rule of supply and demand regulating prices. For another and more cogent reason it has been necessary for owners to secure larger incomes to offset the greater operating expenses so that they might obtain suitable returns on their investments. It can be said without successful controversy that four years ago rents could not have been advanced as they have been during the war period even although the landlords were not being adequately paid for their enterprise in building up the city. There were too many vacancies at that time and tenants could not be forced to pay more than they were accustomed to even if the landlord was out of pocket, but the situation has recti- fied itself and justly so. At that time the apartment house had tremendous vogue, due to the extraordinary success of the leading architects and builders in design- ing and perfecting this kind of domicile to the require- ments of modern life in a great city. It is not surprising that people were weaned away from the old-fashioned idea that a man's house is his castle to the later dictum that his apartment is his throne room. Certainly some of the modern buildings are regal in their appointments. There are also a great many people who prefer their' own front doors and who wish to feel that they are "lords of all they survey," which is not possible in an apartment house, subject to certain well defined rules which are perfectly proper and necessary for the peace and comfort of a majority of the tenants. But there was another reason other than the surpass-