LAND VALUES

Evening Star, Issue 16629, 11 January 1918, Page 8

LAND VALUES

GREAT INCREASE IN AUCKLAND. Harold Bean champ, chairman of the Bank of New Zealand, who returned to Wellington on Saturday, spent the Christmas an j New Year holidays in the southern and eastern portion of the Auckland provincial district, and is much impressed with tire great progress that part of the Dominion has made during the past few years. Speaking to a ‘Post’ reporter, he said that time was when hundreds of thousands of acres in the Waikato, Thames Valley, Rotorua district, and Bay of Plenty were considered of little if any value. “In fact, he added, in those days the character of the country was fairly accurately gauged by an American visitor, who said : ‘ Why, I reckon this land will oidy run about one grasshopper to the square" mile, and that grasshopper, to got a living, will have to be of a. particularly active temperament.’ Now, thanks to the vast sums of money spent by the Government on draining huge, swamp areas, intensive and scicntiflc_ cultivation, a better knowledge of fertilisers and grasses required for certain descriptions of soil,_ and last, and by no means least, the high prices realised for dairy produce, fat stock, etc., settlers are in an amazing condition of prosperity, which is vividly reflected in the appearance of their homes and farms, the number of motor cars possessed by them, and the state of their banking accounts. WHAT THE SMALL FARMER CAN DO. "Here, in a concrete form, is an example of what can be dono by a small farmer, with the assistance of his family. This man. whom I met at Morrinsville, owns 98 acres at Matamata, four acres of which are reserved for an orchard. On the remainder (viz., 94 acres) he runs 40 cows, the milk from which he sells to a glaxo and cheese factory. Last month, on the basis of Is 6Jd and 2s per lb for butter-fat, delivered, for ebeese and glaxo respectively, his cheque (which I saw) amounted to £155 odd, equal to £3 7s 6d per cow. To this has to be added the value of the whey (for feeding calves) the farmer has returned to him in the case of milk supplied for cheesemaking. Allied to dairy farming is the raising of pigs, which is done on a large scale, and this 1 is a most profitable industry. (Bee-keep-ing, too, by men occupying small plots of five and ten acres, is becoming popular - . Not far from To Aroha is an apiarist whose sales last year totalled slightly over ; £4OO. Ho, of course, paid nothing fertile honey gathered by file bees from the white clover on his neighbor’s land.” ADVANCE IN LAND VALUES. “The rapid advance in land values during the past decade is almost staggering, anil, despite war conditions, buyers are operating freely, provided they can induce vendors to leave a fairly large proportion of the purchase money on mortgage for a term of years at, say, 6to per cent, per annum. It is interesting to note the increase in value of lands formerly owned by the Bank of New Zealand, say, 15 and 20 years ago. Take, for instance, the great Matamata Estate, acquired by the Government hi 1899 under the Lands for Settlement Act at a fraction less than £3 per acre. This land, subdivided and leased in perpetuity, is to-day changing hands at as high as £45 per acre, and many people regard, it as remarkably cheap at that figure. And yet, shortly after Matamata was taken up, under the l.i.p. tenure, several settlers petitioned the Government for a reduction in rent, on the ground that they could not afford to pay same In the light of after events, it is difficult to believe that a concession in rent was granted in the case of many of the petitioners. “ Another large, property owned by the bank, in the Thames Valley, was sold at prices ranging from £5 to £'l per acre, and, being badly drained, w;«» considered unattractive land at these figures. Subsequently a drainage board was created, with the result that the land was freed from water, _ and sales are now being effected at £os to £4O per acre. Again, a large estate near Te Ruki was sold by the bank about 20 years ago. In the first case, 19 sections comprising this property were submitted at auction, and two only of these were sold at £5 12s 6cl per acre. The balance of the sections was quitted privately. Much of this land is now easily saleable at £25 per acre. “ Based on prices at present ruling for produce and stock, many people contend that the Land values of to-day are justifiable, hut personally I should like to see a bigger margin for a drop in prospective values. It is, however, difficult to get the farmer to sec eye to eye with the business man on a question of this kind. As a rule he docs not look very far ahead.”