TILE AFFLICTIONS OF LANDLORDS. [To THE EDITOR Or TEE "

SPECTATOR.") Sin,—The Spectator is the only paper I am acquainted with in the London Press which gives a fair hearing to the unfortunate landlord now being slowly ruined by the Rents' Restriction Act.

I should like to place before you some of the consequences

entailed by the above-named Act, which is absolutely indefen- sible from any point of view, whether such be moral, com- mercial, or economic. I am the owner of a house in a London suburb which, before the War, I "converted " into flats at a cost, roughly, of £1,000. This included an entirely new system of sanitation, some building, and recarcassing for water and gas. My object was to provide for a distinct demand that obtained for small three to six-roomed fiats, suitable for single women, young married couples, or married couples without children. The flats were practically never vacant. I fitted the best material, porcelain baths, the most expensive geysers, and the like. I received no 25 per cent. grant from the Government;

I did it, in common with other landlords, "on my own." Then came the War, and, later, the Rents' Restriction Act, and as a necessary consequence profits began to decrease, until finally any fair return upon one's capital reached vanishing point.

But let me show in detail how it has affected me in the specffie case under consideration. My total rent receipts amount to £166 p.a. My expenditure on repairs alone for last year totalled £59. Rates accounted for £40; ground rent another £10; gas, water, and interest on mortgage £25. Insurances and incidental expenses £7. On the top of this came a demand for £12 for Income-tax. This I refused to pay, and after a pro- longed correspondence I escaped with £5 8s. 9d.

Now for the other side of the pictufe. One of my tenants

last year, who had about nine months of his agreement to elapse, sublet his flat for the remainder of his tenancy, and demanded, and received from the tenant to whom he let it (ostensibly the sum was for furniture, but really as a premium), £140! As regards the actual value of the goods, the tenant herself told me that she got rid of the whole lot, except a tab!e, chairs and a Chesterfield which she had re-covered. It is there- fore apparent that, as the incoming tenant knew that the Rents' Restriction Act comes to an end in July, 1923, she assessed the market value of this flat—for one year and eleven months—as follows:—

Year and 11 months' rent ... ... .2101 Premium, allowing £50 for furniture ... 90 In addition, tenant redecorated flat ... ... 20 It is important to note carefully that the above sum represents, in the opinion of two tenants, the true market value of the flat, and that the rent so agreed on is more than double that to which the landlord is limited by law.

Now, take another aspect—expenses. Costs of the same repairs before the War and that paid for them last year :- Painting £ s. d. Pro-war.

9 0 0 25 s. d.

1921.

0 0

OP

3 15 0 8

15 0

Rain-water pipes, three lengths... 2 15 0 9

10 0

Whitewashing (basement flat) ... 3 18 0 9 10 0

19 8 0 52 15 0

So, while I am allowed 40 per cent. increase of rent, my expenses in ratio are 150 per cent more!

One more point. A lady I know has recently taken two rooms —unfurnished, undecorated. There are no separate sanitary conveniences nor private bathroom. For this accommodation she pays £75 per annum. A single unfurnished room in the same street where my house stands costs, I am informed, from 12s. 6d. to 15s. 6d. per week. I am compelled to let a flat of five rooms, self-contained, for £68 a year ! But this is not all. Not only is the landlord compelled to run his property in the interest of the public, but the whole administration of the letting of his flats has become virtually a vested interest of the tenant. This is how the thing is worked. The tenant, who has any- thing from six months, or less, or more, as the case may be, of his agreement to expire, and who has reasons for desiring a change of residence, lets it be known in likely quarters that he has a flat to let. Naturally, he is besieged with applicants. He then says, in effect: " Of course, you must take the furni- ture—at an agreed price—with the flat. If you don't, plenty of others will. You must remember that though I am ostensibly only letting you the remainder of my term, which is six months, actually I am letting you the flat right up to the day when the Rents' Restriction Act ends. The landlord? My dear sir, surely you know that the landlord doesn't count nowa- days! He simply doesn't come into the picture at all. He can't turn you out. And don't forget, if you wish to leave. that you can do exactly the same as I am doing now ! " As a

corollary to the above, I may mention that only once in the last six years have I been allowed to choose my own tenant. In this case my outgoing tenant, being a sportsman, wrote me that he should return the flat to the person to whom it belonged—myself. He further added that, although not a land- lord himself, his sympathies were entirely with the landlord of to-day. On the other hand, I have at the present moment a flat which has changed hands three times, and only on one of these occasions has my permission been asked. I did not even know of the last advent until I was casually informed of it by another tenant.

Every trade and undertaking in this country—so far as I know—can make unrestricted profits. I know of none who are compelled to trade at a loss or entirely alienated from the control of their personnel. The wretched landlord alone has his capital confiscated and his rights destroyed. He cannot even sell his property at a fair price, people naturally refusing to buy any undertaking under such hopeless conditions as these. Those bright spirits who sat on the Commission, whose recom- mendations are embodied in the provisions of this infamous Act, performed their task for the Government which employed them with admirable subserviency. They arrived at the sapient conclusion that 150 per cent. increased expenditure in materials and wages—the raw material of the landlord—was amply compensated for by a 40 per cent. increase of rent. They further found—this body of fatuous incompetents—that if the open market price of a thing was really double that fixed by law. and the rightful owner was debarred from receiving the actual value which through time and circumstances had justly accrued to hie property, while the one of the other part was not, the ethics of altruism would prevail over a perfectly human and intelligible desire to take an easily obtained profit, even if it came out of another's pocket!

Anyway, their findings would be on the popular side. That was the main thing. A majority of the voters would be bribed at the expense of the minority. The London Press, which had a single eye to the same principle, and which, with admirable consistency, had increased the price of its journals 100 per cent., applauded the findings. The slovenly, unbusinesslike methods and hopeless incapacity of these "hardheaded busi- ness men " is aptly illustrated by the fact that though the landlord was given the right to increase his rent in ratio to the increase of the rates, they never took the trouble to find out on what date the landlord received the rates' demand note If they had, they would have made the discovery that such are only received midway in the quarter or half-year—as the case may be—and that consequently the landlord was bound to lose half of the benefit he was supposed to receive. I commend to Lord Heneage's passionate admiration this tonic example of " our great leader and eminent statesman's " legislative triumphs, so distinguished by common sense, justice, and fair