Evening star., 1926-04-17

from rage lWellIg -SlA1
as they feel that the income is the
important thing and the value OF the
brick and mortar is secondary. we
had the pleasure of taking dinner
with the chairman and one or the
principal officers of the Oldest and
largest insurance company in Eng
land, which makes most of the large
real estate loans. He was very em-
phatic in his views that the income
from the building was the only sound
basis for value, pointing out That IL
was true In any investment that the
value was derived from the net IN
come it would produce.
IAN interesting phase of the laws
in England which affect building own
erS is that a lease is never suborul-
mated to a mortgage. In the CnHeu
States a man who has q lease on an
apartment building or an oftice oullu-
ing can be wiped out If mortgage
on the building is foreclosed. PROVIDED,
of course, that his lease Is not record
ed ahead OF the mortgage. In Eng
land this is not true. There might oe
four mortgages on a building at the
time a subject was given his lease.
but thereafter foreclosure by any OF
the holders of these mortgages would
not wipe out his lease. The lender
of the money may, II he likes, ana
often does. put a clause in the mort
gage which gives him the right 10
o. X. all leases before they are given
to tenants, but once having o. Il
them the tenant cannot be disturbed
until the leases mature, or as the Eng
lish say Fall in.
"A great majority of the important
hull
Ieaseholds. The leaSeholds, however.
are long.term leases. often for 200
years. at a fiat rental without reval-
uation, and the ground Is never mort
gagged ahead Of the leaseholds. so that
their leaseholdS provide about as
sound security as a fee.
1T is customary not to charge the
owner of the lease ground rent during
the time he Is constructing his buiio-
ing, the lease stating that during that
time ne shall pay a 'peppercorn,
which is equivalent to our phrase OF
81 and other considerations.
Those who have not been to Lon
don recently will be greatly impressed
by the improvements on Regent
street, where q great many lease
holds have expired on parcels of land
owned by the crown. The crown has
released these parcels for long terms
of years at higher rentals. with their
strict building requirements, and on
these locations have been erected
buildings Of very beautiful archi-
tectural design in white Portland
stone. These new buildings are all
about six or seven stores high, as
against the three-stoIy buildings
which they replaced. The ground
floors are apparently well rented, but
there is considerable number OF
offices on the upper floors which have
not yet been absorbed. possibly be-
cause Regent street has never been
considered much of an Office building
thoroughfare.
Some of the accommodations and
conveniences of American office build
ings are inadequate in London Struc-
elevators are only large enough to
accommodate four passengers.
Summing up. we were much i'm
pressed with the sound, conservative
viewpoints and integrity of the Brit
ish people. While their building con-
struction is not carried through as
intensively as ours, we could not but
admire the high character OF their
construction. London builds soundly
and well. We were impressed with
the very high type of men engaged
in real estate and building activities.
They are studying their problems
earnestly and seem to have desire
to bring about more efficient building
methods. While they can learn some
things from us, we can learn much
from them"