The incurable tendency of most nationalities to hover together and create colonies and centers of their own, forces values in such districts as they select to abnormal prices, such as $25,000 for Henry, Delancey and. Mulberry Street lots. If you follow the rise of price of tenement house lots in the entire city, you will notice that as the number of unimproved lots are few, in any neighborhood that can be reached within thirty or forty minutes by transit, the lots work up to $12,000 and $15,000, the most recent example being that in 1904, when the subway was opened.

The Donnelly tract, from 134th to 137th Street, Amsterdam and Broadway, was sold two weeks before the cars ran at $6,000 a lot, and within three days resold at an average of $9,500. Now most of the lots are worth $12,000 to $14,000. At the same time, lots from 140th to 146th Street, Fifth to Seventh Avenue, were selling at $5,000, and now they are worth $12,000. The rents that can be obtained justify a price of $15,000 per lot, but not more.

As to apartment houses of higher grade, always give the broad avenues, especially such as have views overlooking parks or rivers, the preference. Any apartment house that has exceptional light and outlook is bound to pay well. The tendency is entirely in that direction. There is one Central Park apartment house where forty-three families out of forty-six are living on their incomes.