The news scimitar. (Memphis, Tenn.) 1907-1926, 1920-01-27

| menage, although the blue prints show
mat the dish washing will be done
mostly by electricity. Refrigeration also
WI be accomplished by electricity, so
mat the tenants will not be troubled by
the loud and impatient knocks of ice
men at their doors In fact, they will
not be bothered with the business of
keeping house at all, They will have
all the ease and comfort of it, while
| the management will have all of the re-
| sponsibilities. OF course they will have
! the bother Of hiring the management
This particular house is not to be
built on the mortgage system. The
owners are to pay cash They will live
in two-thirds of the building and rent
the other third, which will provide an
income of about $270000 a year This
amount will more than pay the running
expenses of the house, so that the own
ers will be able to live in their apart
| ments for the interest on their invest
ment, thus reducing their rent to about
one third of the usual. price for such
| establishments.
Although so popular at present, the
comparatively. owned apartment house
is not a new idea, More than 40 years
| ago group of Missionaries, noted for
their responsibility and impractcabil-
| ity, conceived the idea as the logical
way to reduce their rent. 1t is hard to
believe, but even in those days the mat
ter OF rent was causing prolonged
grouches and gray hairs; home pro-
| viding reasonable comforts was as far
beyond the average income as at pres
ent. Then the very poor and the very
rich were accepting their stations in
| Ire with much greater equanimity and
as usual it was the respectable middle
| class which was having the greatest
battle with the housing problem
This battle was particularly difficult
ana irritating for the painters, mu-
sicians and writer's of the community,
whose homes were also Of necessity
! their workshops. The artist had to have
his north light, and the writer and the
musician had to have their quiet and
the children of both had to have an
agreeable environment. So, eventually,
they got together and planned sort of
dreamy Utopia cat least so 1t appeared
to their contemporaries. where each OF
them would have the kind of a home
he wanted and yet all of them would
pay for it, In other words, it would be
co operative. After much discussion, a
group OF them worked out the plans
Tor such = home and decided to risk
scribe 50 per cent of the cost of the
land and building, and the remainder
was to be provided by mortgage. Each
member was to receive stock in propor-
ton to his investment, which stock
should entitle him to a lease for APP
| Dor
ton Of the building. Those who invest
ed the most money naturally secured
the choicest locations
In addition to the space for their own
suites, there was also space for rented
apartments, the rent from these BEING
relied upon to pay the operating costs
the interest on the mortgage, taxes
and fund for depreciation While. ir
the beginning there were a few failures
the experiment proved successful, and
since then whole clusters of co operative
apartments have sprung UP in various
parts of the city
In a strict sense they are not co.
operative, and the real co-operatives
including the Cooperative League OF
America resent your calling them that
1t would be more correct perhaps tc
call them Incorporated, because the co.
operatives insist that no enterprise is
truly cooperative unless the control is
shared equally by all who share its
benefits. But whatever YOU call them
these new apartment houses are salts.
factoriy solving the rent question for
their owners. They are the best method
which has yet been found for beating
: 1.-The rent profteer, and it is interesting
to know that anything so profitable ant
businesslike should have been discovered
by few dreamy, temperamental artists