Why did landlords bother with ground leases in nineteenth century urban development? (Record no. 104954)

MARC details
000 -LEADER
fixed length control field 01989cam a2200169 4500
001 - CONTROL NUMBER
control field ##L131997
008 - FIXED-LENGTH DATA ELEMENTS--GENERAL INFORMATION
fixed length control field 051220n2000 000 0 eng u
035 ## - SYSTEM CONTROL NUMBER
System control number (Sirsi) u131997
041 0# - LANGUAGE CODE
Language code of text/sound track or separate title eng
100 1# - MAIN ENTRY--PERSONAL NAME
Personal name Ball, Michael
245 00 - TITLE STATEMENT
Title Why did landlords bother with ground leases in nineteenth century urban development?
260 ## - PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC.
Place of publication, distribution, etc. London
Name of publisher, distributor, etc. RICS
Date of publication, distribution, etc. 2000
520 ## - SUMMARY, ETC.
Summary, etc. Nineteenth century British towns and cities were either developed by landowners selling land freehold or via ground leases of varying lengths of time. In some cities, freehold prevailed and in others leaseholds of varying lengths. Explanation for the freehold/leasehold distinction has been controversial for almost 100 years and has spawned a large literature. The consensus seems to be that market power is the main determinant and that the reversionary value of the lease is the main objective of landlords when requiring leases. This paper takes a different view. Market power is a vague concept and, at any reasonable discount rate, the present value of a long 80-100 year lease at its end is small. Any such difference between leasing and freehold should anyway have been priced into the initial cost of the land and, therefore, buyer and seller should be generally indifferent between them. Existing explanations for the prevalence of leasehold, consequently, are found to be insufficient. Instead, it is argued here that landlords had three incentives to utilise leasehold: because of differences in time preferences between landowner and developer; to minimise transactions costs; and to take an option on future returns to development. These characteristics were at their greatest in areas of high land values and/or significant long-term development uncertainty, like London. This paper forms part of Chapter 8 of Michael Ball's 'Economic History of London 1800 - 1914'which was published by Routledge in 2001.
520 ## - SUMMARY, ETC.
Summary, etc. This item is no longer available.
690 ## - LOCAL SUBJECT ADDED ENTRY--TOPICAL TERM (OCLC, RLIN)
Topical term or geographic name as entry element PROPERTY LEASING
942 ## - ADDED ENTRY ELEMENTS (KOHA)
Suppress in OPAC 0
Holdings
Withdrawn status Lost status Source of classification or shelving scheme Damaged status Not for loan Home library Current library Shelving location Date acquired Total Checkouts Barcode Date last seen Copy number Price effective from Koha item type
    Dewey Decimal Classification     Virtual Virtual Online 20/12/2005   131997-1001 06/08/2019 1 06/08/2019 Book