SPECULATION IN WELLINGTON.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7963, 14 February 1906, Page 7

SPECULATION IN WELLINGTON.

Id an article in the January number of the Australian Aocounfcant, Mr A. De R. Barclay, writing of Wellington, and its progress, says:— "The spirit of speculation has taken possession of the people to an extent that is startling when you cotne to realise it suddenly. That is why the land boom is what it is just now. It is a bubble that is swelling too fast, and it will burst unless there is a check. The price of land at Island Bay can't go on lifting much above £ls a foot without a smash. The strruehtening of I the Hutb railway doesn't justify £l6 **,•* foot and over at Petone. The 'land market is io a state of ridiculous flatulency that should be cured, beoause it is unhealthy. One man told me how he bad made 600 per cent, in a land deal in twelve months. He was in the Urst Miramar -syndicate. He put in £3OO. After 'five months he got it baos again, and at the end of the year he lifted another £I,BOO clear profit. When news of that bind of business gets about it is not good. It sets up a sort of inflammation in the publio mind that leads to raahuess and 'false progress. At present land ia changing hands in Wellington every flay, and men have been making money fast. Prices have gone up -ridiculousy, and the cost of living has become exorbitant. But the whole thing—or a great part of it \ —to paper dealing, and.there is no 1 "bottom to it. Boys whose available ? capital, somewhere abou pay day, might be estimated in hundreds of sixpences are dealing in hundreds of pounds. Where will they be when 'the slump comes? A very shrewd man of business told me that he thought there would be a pinch before lone:, but that that pinob would seriously effect only a few holders"that it would not be muoh diffused over the community aa a whole. May be. But it seemed to me that the speculating mania was pretty -general, and that there would be a •great many burnt fingers, if the Are grew too hot. At any rate the road to richness looks too easy juat now to be safe."