The herald., 1897-04-21
LAND VALUES IN SOUTHERN
CALIFORNIA

growth on these lands in places like Pas
adent. Pomona, Alhambra and many
other places that gave birth to the great
boom of ten years ago. 1t was the rec.
ognition of their great productive power
| which held their value steady and in
most places kept them slowly rising after
the collapse of that memora BILE excite
ment 1t is this power even more strong
| ly proved in the past few years that has
held their values up so well during the
trying times when almost everything
else in the land has fallen so far below
what many years had led people to think
an established value.
There are a few places where people
have been too careless, extravagant or
inclined to outside speculation, where
some irrigated land may be had a trifie
cheaper than it was four years ago. But
where the land owner has attended to
will be some extraordinary reason in
the way of sickness or something similar
that will make him part with the land at
a reduced price The principal reason
of this is that you may destroy the fruit
industry entirely, drop the price of grain
to a point at which the peon of Mexico
would starve. abolish hay, and shut up
all markets for produce, and the owner
of a ten-acre tract with good water
right in the greater part Of Southern Cal
ifornia can work ii for d living alone ana
defy hard times. Such land has spe-
cial value that times cannot affect IN
less too many owners of 1t go into out
side speculation. become involved and
the owner has to throw it on the market.
Too much of it would then be like too
much gold. Any market can be drugge1
with the best Of real estate. But as most
of the occupants of such land have at
tended to their work there is no danger
of any such result and the price gener-
ally will remain about as before, though
a few pieces can always be found at
lower prices in any times by those who
take the trouble to lovK them up.
AS much cannot be said for the dry
lands. We do not mean desert lands.
which are worthless without water, but
those that on the rainfall alone produce
in a series of years as much as the prai-
ries of Illinois. On most of this with
good work and reasonable economy a
fair living can be made on eighty acres,
though it must be farming of the old
fashioned kind, with very little hired
labor and very few luxuries. The price
of such land has fallen almost every
where, and in many places it can now be
had for $40 to $40 an acre. In places a
little remote from large towns, but in no
sense in the backwocds, it can be had
for $40 cash. This land was always
too high for the stage of settlement ami
has just reached living figure. 1t must
be farmed largely in grain and hay.
with winter vegetables in places, and
summer garden in others. In some places
one has to grow Egyptian corn and other
things that bear dry weather well. 1t
was an outrage always to ask $75 to 800
for such land, though the man who
bought it had no one to blame but him
self But all such sales have done Cal
ifornia far more harm than good by
giving the idea that all land values were
too high. Irrigated land is generally
cheaper at $500 an acre than such stuff
is at $780, People having large tracts of
such dry land should either put living
price on it or keep it out of market
What scares the stranger is to have half
the country thrust in his face at tow
erng price.
1t is useless to ignore the fact that
California lands now have the reputa-
ton of being too high. Ther0 is another
reason for this beside the one above
given, and Californians themselves are
to blame for it. From the earliest settle
ment it has been the practice to estimate
the value of all productive land by wha.
it will yield to a man who sits in the
shade and looks on while hired hands
do everything. 1t has in later times been
carried so far beyond this that it is con-
sidered quite the proper thing for the
owner to live in town and leave the
ranch to the tender mercies of the hired
men; the owner returning TO take 4
glance at it at stated periods that the
men know so we'll that they are all hard
at work a about the time the train whistles
at the station. 1t is the duty of the land
under these conditions TO yield so much
net profit If it does not then California
is a fraud. Nothing whatever
is allowed for the power of the place to
sustain a family in comfort and, pay
some profit over to a man who will man
age it as farms of every kind are man
aged in every other part of the world.
Take the best farm to be found in the
eastern part of the United States and
estimate its value the same way and
the results will be zero minus nothing
divided by naught. No part of the woriG
will show anything better except for
short exceptional periods. The fact that
California has for so many years been
able to maintain it's land values and
make any showing at all on a basis of
valuation so absurd as this is the best
possible proof that its conditions of soil.
water and climate are the best on earth.
But it is time to change the basis The
world is growing intensely practical Of
ate and is looking more closely for GER