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The Canadian Commonwealth by Agnes C. (Agnes Christina) Laut
page 81 of 266 (30%)
It would be untrue to say that these investments have all been wisely
made. One wonders, indeed, at what the purchasing agents were aiming
in some cases. I know of small blocks in insignificant railroad towns
bought for sixty thousand dollars, for no other reason, apparently,
than that they cost ten thousand dollars and had been sold for twenty
thousand dollars. The block, which would yield twenty per cent. on ten
thousand dollars, yields only three per cent. on sixty thousand
dollars. Held long enough, doubtless, it will repay the investor; or
if the investor is satisfied with three per cent., where Canadians earn
twenty per cent.--it may be all right; but Canadians expect their
investments to repay capital cost in ten years, and they do not buy for
profits to posterity but for profits in a lifetime.

Similarly of many of the r_an_ches bought at five dollars an acre by
Americans and resold as r_awn_ches at twenty-five dollars to forty
dollars to Englishmen. If the Englishmen will be satisfied with two
and three per cent., where the American demands and makes twelve to
twenty per cent.--the investment may make satisfactory returns; but it
is hard to conceive of enormous tracts two and three hundred miles from
a railroad bought for fruit lands at twenty-five dollars an acre.
Fruit without a market is worse than waste. It is loss. When
questioned, these English investors explain how raw fruit lands that
sold at twenty-five dollars an acre a few years ago in the United
States to-day sell for five hundred dollars and one thousand dollars an
acre. The point they miss is--that these top values are the result of
exceptional conditions; of millionaires turning a region into a
playground as in the walnut and citrus groves of California; or of
nearness to market and water transportation; or of peculiarly finely
organized marketing unions. If the rich estates of England like to
take these risks, it is their affair; but they must not blame Canada if
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