Los Angeles herald., 1891-02-23
THE TIME TO BUY.
7. w. Potts Throws Out Very I'M
portant Hint. N

EDrroRs HERALD: | wrote an article
for the Los Angeles Journal on the 18th
of March, 1880, in answer to questions
asked by eastern people, inquiring
whether that was good time to come
to California, or not. In it | said there
never was as good time for poor man
or a rich man to come here, not even in
'49 or since that time. Everybody who
knows what has happened here since,
can see the truthfulness of my predic
ton. Later on, in May, 1851 had just
returned from San Berna ardino-and on
the 18th of that month l wrote an arti-
Gle for your paper, in which l stated
that lands in San Bernardino and be-
tween here and there were changing
hands between farmers for cultivation
for from $3.50 to $3.50 per acre. while
there were lands within two miles of our
city plaza selling for $50 per acre, or
offered for that price without pur-
chasers. The same lands could have
been bought when the first letter was
written for $25 per acre. The lands l
referred to cannot be bought now for
less on an average than $1,000 per acre,
even under all the pressure that can be
brought against them by croakers and a
great financial depression. There are
other lands now within three miles of
the city plaza that can be bought for
$100 per acre that will soon be worth
$1,000 per acre. So l predict again that
chance to buy land and make homes in
Southern California as the present time,
and every month lessons the chances to
buy cheap, as the property mortgaged in
the late so-called boom is rapidly chang
ing hands, either by foreclosure of the
mortgages or to others at very low rates,
and when they have once changed hands
in either way they will be for sale only
at an advanced rate.
Now that the rains have come in spite
OF all the croaking about another dry
season, which fortunately does not come
(and is not likely to come again), crops
OF all kinds are assured, as they have
been for every year for thirty-nine years
excepting one single year, and even that
year irrigable lands and corn lands
brought their never-failing crops. What
now hinders our fair-famed Southern
California from a general advance all
along the line? Absolutely nothing but
for the average individual to have con-
tidence in the country and in themselves,
and pay no attention to the croaker,
who is everlastingly on the street corner
telling everybody he meets that the lands
are too high, with no better reasons to give
than that orange raising will soon be
overdone, because so many are going
into the business; or that man can
not make the raising of potatoes, corn
or other products profitable here, be-
cause he has to pay too much for wages,
notwithstanding the fact that he may
raise two or three crops year on irri-
gable lands, and twice or three times as
much each time as he could on much of
the lands in the eastern states. To
people in the eastern states would say,
don't stay away on account OF the cry
of high-priced lands, for there has been
so much land brought under good ,irri-
eating systems in the last few years
that you can absolutely buy good irri-
gable land under good water system
(by going away from the most densely
settled portions of the county, cheaper
than you could buy lands of the same
intrinsic value twenty years ago, when
it was thought that but small portion
of the lands could ever be irrigated.
J. w. PoTTs.