RICHES RESULTING FROM REMOVALS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2253, 6 May 1897, Page 49

RICHES RESULTING FROM REMOVALS.

Ifc ir. unquestionably "luck" of tho most, tautslieing description which enables ts. person nowadays to make money, aud even a fortune, without goiag an inch out of his way to do it. With so rnar,y people scheming 1 and sweating all their lives to got ricb, it is Xxo wonder Fats has earned a reputation for irony when one hears of fat cheque fiutterieij voluntarily to a man's door and staying there. But this frequently happens.

Tbe majority of people, for instance, reckoc to be afc some expense when they " move " from oae house to another ; with others ifc so happens that tho necessity for chacgiag residence proves the very thing that patrt into their pockets wealth which they could never otherwise have obtained. Somatimee, in fact, the windfalls experienced in this novel fashion are nothing if not startling.

Jtißt recently, in North LondoK, two shopkeepers in a modest way netted hfcudsome sums of money through a mere change of residence. A rich dealer had cast as* Ltvious oye upon tha block of buildings wliich included their two chops ; He wanted it for a cooperative atore, and pretty goon .-succeeded in buying up all the properties with the exception of this pair.

Overture after overture was made, the cnta tradesmen shaking thsir heads at 'each, and speculative curiosity as to tha result ran high in the neighbourhood. Fiaally tbe big dealer, evidently, regarding these two old-fashioned shops aG an intolerable blot upon his redecorated block, had his way at the cost of what, in the circumstances, was locally considered &. fabulous expense. It meant that the two tradesmen were sat up for life.

Instances of money made by moving in tbi3 way are becoming commoner every day, especially now that the co-operative store system, on the American plan, is coming so much into vogue. A certain site suits, and ifc must be had at any cost. In all parts one may see prosaic buildings making way for handsome edifices, with a uniform frontage, that will lure the eyes of the public, and they have to be paid for. The well-known case of three big firm?, who combined their capital a year or two back to buy out a number of small shopkeepers in Holloway, and had to spend over half a million in the operation, is by no meanß an exceptional instance. Private house occupier?, too, often pocket considerable amounts by moving at a time when their premises are wanted by someone who can afford to pay. A friend of the writer's recently purchased for £600 a villa in a row of six, and, only a few months later, was offered just double that amount by a man who badly wanted to run up, a suburban theatre on the spot. In the end a bargain was struck at £1500, while the remaining five changed hands at an average of £1250 — not at all a bad speculation that !

In Hertfordshire, again, the writer knew a labouring man who made enough to keep him independent for life by Bimply " moving:" Twenty years before, he had built himself on the edge of a wood a small wood-and-plaster cottage — intrinsically not worth £20 — and also inclosed a garden space. As the lord of the surrounding manor took no steps to claim a rental all that time, he had the right,

according to an old law, to occupy it rent free until his death.

Then the landowner died, and his heir immediately wanted to raze this particular cottage, as he wished to extend the woods for shooting purposes. For a year the occupier stuck to bis rights, and then consented to move for the modest consideration of £100 down, another cottage rent free, and 153 per week for the rest of his days. And he got it, so determined was the proprietor to keep his woods private and get rid of this excrescence upon his estate.

Stiff prices, too, are often paid cheerfully by railway companies to the owners of houses which stand in the way of projected new lines of rail. The amount to be given in such a case, of course, can be fixed without alternative in a court of law, but even then there is generally a nice margin on the side of the householder ; while it frequently happens tbat railway companies, sooner than waste time in haggling and litigation, hand over compensations that are far and away in excess of the value of the building they intend to demolish.

When — as occurred at Lsighton Buzzard, to the writer's knowledge, a few years back — £800 is given for a house standing at 7s per week, all told, it can literally be said that some people make small fortunes by •' moving."