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Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 76, no. 1962: October 21, 1905

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October 21, 1905 RECORD AND GUIDE 60s ESTABUSHED-S^ Dev&teD id REA.L Estate . BuildiKo ftppKrTECTUR? .KousEtfom IteaaijnDiti BttsniEss juto Themes (^GiiiER^l llfTra.Esii- PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE EIGHT DOLLARS Published eVerg Saturdag 'Commualcationa should no addreaaed to to throw over their holdings. At present, however, there are no vacancies and there are profits enough for everybody. It looks as if during the current season there would he a more general and a more wholesome activity in real estate than ever before.—and this in spite of dearer money and tbe mort¬ gage tax. «P C. W. SWEET. 14-16 Vesey Street,, New York Toiephone, Cortlandt 3157 "Entered at the Pott Office at New York. N. Y., as second-clasa matter." CopyriEht by ths Real Estata Record and Bidldars' Golda Company. Vol. LXXVL OCTOBER 21. 1905. No. 1962. INDEIX TO DEPARTMENTS. Advertising Section. Page Page Cement ....................xxv Law.....................xl Clay Products .............xxiv Machinery...............vii Contractors and Builders., .vili Metal Work......,..........xxl Fireproofing ..............iii Stone ....................xxvi Granite ..................xxvi Quick Job Directory.......xxix Heating ...................xxii Real Estate .............xiii Iron and Steel..............xix Wood Products ........xxviii THERE are times when it wotild be just as well if the Stock Exchange could close up for a few weeks, and the present appears to be one of them. Conditions apparently forbid any emphatic movement in the direction either of higher or of lower prices; and they also discourage the degree of activity which accompanies a movement of this kind. Dullness and irregularity characterize tbe business from day to day. The professional traders make attempts to advance specialties with occasional success; but in their operations in the general market they are lucky in case they obtain fractional profits. The underlying situ¬ ation remains very much as it was^—except there are signs that in the steel market the conditions are becoming unwholesome. Prices are high; premiums are being paid for prompt delivery; and under such circumstances there is always danger of the test of collapse which took place in the summer of 1903. In case these symptoms of a "boom" continue to be prominent throughout the coming winter, conservative investors will come to be believed that we have reached the top of the wave. That for the time being money is more valuable than securities. It must always be kept in mind that the current prosperity is not likely to last more than through the current year, and that the extent of the reaction will be measured by the extent of the "boom." !t.>';:i THE real estate activity of the past week, while it haa not developed any new characteristics, has been extraordin¬ ary in its volume in its wide diffusion. It goes considerably beyond the activity of the corresponding week last year, and it presents every appearance of being a wholesome and justi¬ fiable movement. Tbere is no excessive speculation in one section which seeks merely to advance the price of vacant land. On the contrary, the unimproved property, which is being sold, is generally purchased for improvement. A num¬ ber of important plots on the West Side are, for instance, ■ being transferred for this purpose, and it looks as if that section of the city which was somewhat neglected last season will obtain its full share of tbe business of the current year. This business will take place particularly along the line of Broadway, ■which,' owing to the Subway, is gradually gaining at the expense of Columbus Avenue. The bulk of the trading, still consists, however, in old five-story flats and tenements, which are being purchased by operators for the purpose of modernizing them and selling them at a profit. This, of course, is a very legitimate kind of trading, which seeks to make pro£ts, by actually adding to values, and which will con¬ tinue lor some time to come. Obviously, however, there must be an end to it sometime; and one cannot help wondering what will become of the large number of small operators now en¬ gaged in this business, when these opportunities are all used :up. The real estate market at the present time is practically made by these professional operators, whose number has. vastly Increased during the past few years. The scope of whose operations has very much extended most of their lives on speculation in tenement houses, which they carry upon extremely small margins; and when the time comes, as it surely will, excessive tsnement house building, and of a larger jmniber of vacancies, many of these Itttie operatora will have THE following table is the first ever published which shows the total number of mortgages recorded since July 1st; that is, since the mortgage tax went into effect. These figures cannot be elicited from the regular tables pub¬ lished by the Record and Guide, because the enormous num¬ ber of mortgages offered for record during tbe last few days of June were not entirely published and totalled until about Aug. 1st—so that the totals given each week since July 1st, include many mortgages actually recorded in June. 1905. 1904. July 1 to Oct, 12. July 1 to OcL 13 Total No. raortsages................. 3,017 5,293 Total amount Involved..............136,497,024 S83.lfl6.775 Amount at Q%....................... 21,054,368 36,135,011 .Amount at 5%%................... 3,500 ........ Amount at 5V.%..................... 5,042,933 2,795,919 ,i\iuount at 514%..................... 82,100 ........ Amount at 57....................... 6,980,462 17,177.014 Amount at 4%%............................. ........ Amount at 4'^%..................... 2,458.899 16,756,275 Amount at 4H%.................■........... 15.000 Amotmt at 4%....................... 485,562 2,098,671 Amount at 3yY<...................... ^00 ........ Amountat3%...................... 1.600 3,875 No. and amount of ahove to Bank, Trust and Ins. Companies. 1905—364 ....................... $6,S33.113 1904—747 ....................... 34.260,023 Of course the large decrease in the amount of money loaned in 1905 compared to the amount loaned in 1904 is caused chiefly by the way in which mortgages were rushed for record before July 1st. It will be seen that a small decrease has taken place in the amount of money loaned at every percentage except flve and one-half per cent. At six per cent, only $21,000,- 000 was loaned against $36,000,000 last year. At flve and one-half per cenL $5,000,000 was loaned against about $2,800,000 last year. At flve per cent about $7,000,000 was loaned against $17,000,000 during same months of 1904. At four and one-half per cent, only about $2,500,000 was loaned against almost $17,- 000,000 a year ago. These flgures do not show the actual effect of the tax so well as the table published last week, because loaning conditions have now recovered from the orgy of last June; but they are none the less worth careful study. Some Questions Regarding Fireproof "Wood. LET us take some facts regarding flreproof wood about which there is no dispute, FACT No. 1. Fireproof wood was adopted by the TJ. S. Navy Department in the construction of ships and as a protection to the same against fire. There is no doubt about that ^act. The flreproof wood people at one time made a great deal of fuss about it and placarded it around, the inference, of course, being that fireproof wood must be of substantial value if adopted by the U. S. Government. FACT No. 2, The U. S. Government have discontinued the use of fireproof wood in the construction of its ships. Why? Why do not the flreproof wood people take the same pains to tell the community of the Government's second act that they took previously to announce the flrst. Or are there no two sides regarding flreproof wood? .FACT No. 3, Why do not the Fire Insurance Companies put some premium value upon flreproof wood if there is any value in it as a protection against flre? They put a value upon half a dozen pails of water kept on a rack. Can it be that fireproof wood is not worth even six pails of water? FACT No. 4, If flreproof wood is a good thing for a big, solidly constructed ofiice building, why has it not been adopted by architects in the construction of even the larger country houses wherein construction is necessarily less substantial and where a Fire Department service is often entirely non-existent? Is tbere a single country house built of this material any¬ where? If not, why not? FACT No. 5. If it is a good thing to retain fireproof wood in the Euilding Code of New York City, why has not a single minor city in the country required the use of flreproof wood, even In theatres, churches, and public places? If flreproof wood is a "good thing," is there not an enormous field for Its use in cities, say of one hundred thousand inhabitants, and in suburban districts everywhere? Why are builders turning to reinforced concrete rather than to the wood rendered "abso¬ lutely flreproof?" Anybody can answer these questions for all alike point cumulatively to the same conclusion? Quite plainly, fireproof