Part 1

HOUSE PROPERTY & ITS MANAGEMENT SOME PAPERS ON THE METHODS OF MANAGEMENT INTRODUCED BY MISS OCTAVIA HILL AND ADAPTED TO MODERN CONDITIONS

[Illustration: [Logo]]

LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD. RUSKIN HOUSE, 40 MUSEUM STREET, W.C. 1

_First published in 1921_

(_All rights reserved_)

INTRODUCTION

By I. G. GIBBON, D.Sc., C.B.E., Ministry of Health.

Of standards we have heard much in connection with new housing, and, quite naturally, nearly always of material standards—of the number of houses to the acre, the size and the number of rooms, the provision of baths and the like; but of personal standards little, although persons of experience know full well that, where there are difficulties, half the trouble, at a moderate estimate, could be removed by personal action. The experiment of the ownership and management of large numbers of houses by Local Authorities is not free from the hazards of democratic control; some in full sympathy with the experiment view it not without some misgivings, and the misgivings will not be without place if adequate measures are not taken for proper management.

It is timely, therefore, that we should be reminded of the most instructive experiment made during the last century in the management of house property, the work of Octavia Hill. Her experiment in house management would probably have by now won her many more practical followers had she been less of a social worker; but had she been less of a social worker she would never have made the experiment. There may still be a few of the comparatively small number of persons who know of her work who look upon it as an attempt to insinuate a District Visitor under the disguise of a rent collector. District Visitors doubtless have their place and season; but the aim of those who would follow in the footsteps of Octavia Hill, the Women Property Managers, is to manage property on a firm business basis, to make it pay (and they have shown that they can make it pay, more so in difficult circumstances than business management of a dull routine kind), and to carry out the work with knowledge and experience, with sympathy and tact, and with as reasonable a regard to the genuine interests of the tenants as of the owner. This is their aim, and, where person and place fit, their achievement.

Octavia Hill’s influence was great in this country; but it passed beyond its borders. One of the most interesting reports issued in recent years on the management of house property has been that of the Octavia Hill Association, at Philadelphia, who report the uniform success of management on the lines laid down by Octavia Hill.[1] In Holland, also, her influence has been great; and at Amsterdam, for instance, all municipal house property, which is extensive, is managed by women who have been trained in her methods.

Footnote 1:

See _Good Housing that Pays_, by Fullerton L. Waldo. Philadelphia: The Harper Press, 1012-20 Chancellor Street. 1917.

The ideal in these matters, I think, is self-management, where the tenants in a group of houses manage their own affairs with a social regard to their own real interests, an almost impossible result at the present time unless the tenants have a substantial financial stake in the property. We are very far indeed from this solution as yet, though every effort is needed towards achieving it; and one disappointing result of the State-assisted scheme of houses is the very poor showing made by Public Utility Societies. But a large measure of self-management is not precluded from the scheme of management on Octavia Hill’s lines, as, indeed, has been demonstrated in practice.

There should be no spirit of patronage in management; if, as happens, the tenant comes to look upon the property manager as a counsellor and friend, this should grow out of the business management and as an incident to it.

Octavia Hill and her successors did not work simply by the light of nature, or believe that women, as such, had a God-given aptitude for this business, though, house management being primarily a matter for the wife and mother, it naturally opens a field for which women should be well fitted. But the same need of instruction arises whether the management be by men or by women. The pupil has to be put through a severe course of training; she has to be versed in the most important facts of the law as to rents, landlord and tenant, and sanitation; she has to be acquainted with the defects which occur in houses, and how most economically to remedy them. Above all, she has to acquire that measure of firmness, tact and sympathy without which success is not likely to be attained. A pupil who is likely to be fully successful must have a goodly measure of that personal aptitude which, though difficult to test by any system of examination, is as vitally necessary as are the essential technical qualifications.

If the manager of house property is to give of her best, she must be trusted with ample responsibility and authority. If hampered by restrictions, if limited in authority, if not granted powers for selecting and dealing with tenants and the control of repairs, if she has to refer to superior authority, whether an employer or an official or a Committee, before action can be taken, there is not much hope, even under favourable conditions, of more than a bare success. Here lies one principal danger, equally of autocracy or democracy. It is not good business or sound sense to pay a person for duties and to relieve her of the real responsibility attached to them, including the risk of dismissal for failure.

In dealing with slum property the lessons of Octavia Hill’s work are exceedingly encouraging. Weary years must pass before there can be extensive demolition and rebuilding of slum areas. Are we therefore to lie resigned and allow these grievous sores to fester in our cities and towns?

In properly qualified management we have one at least of the keys to a temporary, if not a permanent, solution of the problem; and in this way we may effectively deal with the real evil. The ordinary method of clearance and rebuilding has often resulted too much in the shifting of the evil to another quarter, though it may be, happily, in a less concentrated form.

One incidental gleam from the reading of the papers in this volume is of the great advances which have really been made in housing conditions. We are apt at times, not without reason, to gird at the slowness with which the manifest evils around us are being removed, but it is well occasionally, for a proper sense of proportion and for reform itself, to be reminded of the great improvements which have been achieved.

It is important to bear in mind that the principles of trained management apply as much to privately owned as to public property. If the owners of properties in areas which are now classed as slums would but join together and employ for the common management of their property persons trained and with aptitude for the work, it is no exaggeration to say that within a few years a great transformation would be effected in the slum problem of London and of other towns, a transformation which would not only ease the manifold burdens of public authorities, but would be less irksome to the owners of the property and of untold benefit to its occupiers.

Equally important is it to remember that the methods of management associated with Octavia Hill are as pertinent for new property as for old—indeed, in some ways more so, for prevention is better than cure. She learnt her secrets in dealing with bad property, just as the scientist wrests his secrets from the pathological. Management of house property on the general lines laid down by her, adapted and developed, and, as I believe, with increasing emphasis on co-operative self-management, will help materially not only in the minor achievement of preventing property from degenerating into slums—and this, as experience shows, may well happen even with good and well-planned property—but in the greater achievement of attaining that higher standard of contentment and of pride of home and locality which should be the aim of all those who have the interests of the country at heart.

The following are some papers written by Miss Octavia Hill in connection with her housing work.

They are republished in the hope that her methods may be widely adopted in the efforts that are now being made to improve the very defective housing conditions in our cities.

M. M. JEFFERY. EDITH NEVILLE.

CONTENTS

PAGE INTRODUCTION. By I. G. Gibbon, D.Sc., C.B.E., Ministry of Health 5

SELECTIONS FROM OCTAVIA HILL’S WRITINGS I. MANAGEMENT OF HOUSES FOR THE POOR 15 II. COTTAGE PROPERTY IN LONDON 20 III. BLANK COURT 31 IV. THE INFLUENCE OF MODEL DWELLINGS UPON CHARACTER 39 V. SMALL HOUSES IN LONDON 50 VI. LETTERS TO FELLOW-WORKERS 52

OTHER PAPERS VII. WOMEN MANAGERS—A CROWN ESTATE 72 VIII. MANAGEMENT OF MUNICIPAL HOUSES IN AMSTERDAM 78 IX. REPORT ON HOUSE PROPERTY MANAGEMENT BY A SUB-COMMITTEE OF THE WOMEN’S SECTION OF THE GARDEN CITIES AND TOWN PLANNING ASSOCIATION 83

House Property and its Management

I MANAGEMENT OF HOUSES FOR THE POOR (1899)

Thirty-four years ago, when I first began to manage houses inhabited by working people, London was in a very different state from what it is now, and it is useful and interesting to review the changes, their effects, and their bearing on the special work we are considering to-day.

(1) The standard of comfort was far lower then than now. In Marylebone, where I began work, nearly every family rented but one room; now there are hundreds of two- and three-roomed tenements. There were no cooking-ranges in the rooms; water was hardly ever carried up higher than the parlours. There were hardly any amusements open to the people; there was no underground railway, no trams, few cheap omnibuses; there were no free libraries, no Education Act, no Board schools. Wages were very decidedly lower, hours of work were longer. The bright oil-lamps did not exist. Food was not so cheap or so various. Flowers were never sold in the streets to the poor. The people stood in those days far more in need of cheer and of help.

(2) The knowledge of sanitary matters had penetrated hardly at all; gross ignorance prevailed. There were, moreover, few, if any, Convalescent Homes, no country holiday arrangements. The Building Acts took cognizance of very few of the requirements for health, and hardly any sanitary measures were enforcible—fewer were enforced. Few hospitals for infectious diseases existed. Many excellent appliances for drainage were not invented.

(3) There was not one-tenth part of the sympathy and interest in the welfare of the people which permeates all classes now.

From these and many other causes a London court in 1864 was a far more degraded and desolate place than it can be now, even in the remotest and forlornest region, and in taking charge of it one had to do a variety of things oneself, where now one finds the intelligent and willing co-operation of many other agencies.

Again, there were next to no “model” dwellings and little power of cheap locomotion, so that a court in those days was subject to little change of population; the same families clung to it, lived, married and died in it. Cheap locomotion and facilities in reading have brought the different parts of London into much closer communication.

Many of these facts made the necessity for preserving and regulating the old courts and houses far more important than is the case now. The old courts are rapidly disappearing, and numerous blocks of buildings with modern appliances are now scattered over most neighbourhoods. But in 1864 tenants were neither routed out of foul and close courts nor would they have been received into the rare and select model dwellings. Moreover, in the rough courts they were little meddled with, and could pursue in ignorance their insanitary habits further than would be possible now.

It was very natural, therefore, that my first efforts should have been directed to rough courts and the inhabitants as I found them there. Steady and gradual improvement of the people of the houses, without selection of the former or sudden reconstruction of the latter, was our first duty, and my little book on _Homes of the London Poor_ tells the history of that early work. But if there is one duty more incumbent on us than another in such efforts, it is to be quick to see where advance is possible, how higher standards can be realized, and how much old forms may be rightly superseded. With certain exceptions in regard to small old houses, our work of late years has been increasingly in new houses and with chosen tenants.

The principles, however, are the same, and there is one great fact which the changing form has only brought out more and more clearly, and that is that the conduct of houses or blocks, old or new, so as to secure health and comfort and homelike feeling, depends on management. One can see any day excellent buildings execrably managed, and one may see tumble-down old places of wretched construction both healthier and far more homelike because well managed. And I may confidently say that the distinctive feature of our work has been that of devoting our full strength to management. It will be realized at once how much more this implies than “rent collecting.” An ordinary clerk will go from door to door for rents; that is a very different matter from managing houses. We have tried, so far as possible, to enlist ladies, who would have an idea of how—by diligent attention to all business which devolves on a landlord, by wise rule with regard to all duties which a tenant should fulfil, by sympathetic and just decisions with a view to the common good—a high standard of management could be attained: repairs promptly and efficiently attended to, references carefully taken up, cleaning sedulously supervised, overcrowding put an end to, the blessing of ready-money payments enforced, accounts strictly kept, and, above all, tenants so sorted as to be helpful to one another.

II COTTAGE PROPERTY IN LONDON (1866)

Two years ago I first had an opportunity of carrying out the plan I had long contemplated, that of obtaining possession of houses to be let in weekly tenements to the poor. That the spiritual elevation of a large class depended to a considerable extent on sanitary reform was, I considered, proved, but I was equally certain that sanitary improvement itself depended upon educational work among grown-up people; that they must be urged to rouse themselves from the lethargy and indolent habits into which they have fallen, and freed from all that hinders them from doing so. I further believed that any lady who would help them to obtain things, the need of which they felt themselves, and would sympathize with them in their desire for such, would soon find them eager to learn her view of what was best for them; that whether this was so or not, her duty was to keep alive their own best hopes and intentions, which come at rare intervals, but fade too often for want of encouragement.

I laid the plan before Mr. Ruskin, who entered into it most warmly. He at once came forward with all the money necessary, and took the whole risk of the undertaking upon himself. He showed me, however, that it would be far more useful if it could be made to pay; that a working man ought to be able to pay for his own house; that the outlay upon it ought, therefore, to yield a fair percentage upon the capital invested. Thus empowered and directed, I purchased three houses in my own immediate neighbourhood. They were leasehold, subject to a small ground-rent. The unexpired term of the lease was for fifty-six years; this we purchased for £750. We spent £78 additional in making a large room at the back of my own house, where I could meet the tenants from time to time. The plan has now been in operation about a year and a half; the financial result is that the scheme has paid 5 per cent. interest on all the capital (it should be remembered that 5 per cent. interest in England on house property is equivalent to at least 8 per cent. in the United States), has repaid £48 of the capital; sets of two rooms have been let for little more than the rent of one, the houses have been kept in repair, all expenses have been met for taxes, ground-rent and insurance. In this case there is no expense for collecting rents, as I do it myself, finding it most important work; but in all the estimates I put aside the usual percentage for it, in case hereafter I may require help, and also to prove practically that it can be afforded in other cases. It should be observed that well-built houses were chosen, but they were in a dreadful state of dirt and neglect. The repairs required were mainly of a superficial and slight character; slight in regard to expense—vital as to health and comfort. The place swarmed with vermin; the papers, black with dirt, hung in long strips from the walls; the drains were stopped, the water supply out of order. All these things were put in order, but no new appliances of any kind were added, as we had determined that our tenants should wait for these until they had proved themselves capable of taking care of them. A regular sum is set aside for repairs, and this is equally divided between the three houses; if any of it remains, after breakage and damage have been repaired, at the end of the quarter, each tenant decides in turn in what way the surplus shall be spent, so as to add to the comfort of the house. This plan has worked admirably; the loss from carelessness has decreased to an amazing extent, and the lodgers prize the little comforts which they have waited for, and seem in a measure to have earned by their care, much more than those bought with more lavish expenditure. The bad debts during the whole time the plan has been in operation have only amounted to £2 11s. 3d. Extreme punctuality and diligence in collecting rents, and a strict determination that they shall be paid regularly, have accomplished this; as a proof of which it is curious to observe that £1 3s. 3d. of the bad debts accumulated during two months that I was away in the country. I have tried to remember, when it seemed hardest, that the fulfilment of their duties was the best education for the tenants in every way. It has given them a dignity and glad feeling of honourable behaviour which has much more than compensated for the apparent harshness of the rule.

Nothing has impressed me more than the people’s perception of an underlying current of sympathy through all dealings that have seemed harsh. Somehow, love and care have made themselves felt. It is also wonderful that they should prize as they do the evenness of the law that is over them. They are accustomed to alternate violence of passion and toleration of vice. They expected a greater toleration, ignorant indulgence and frequent almsgiving; but in spite of this have recognized as a blessing a rule which is very strict, but the demands of which they know, and a government which is true in word and deed. The plan of substituting a lady for a resident landlady of the same class as her tenants is not wholly gain. The lady will probably have subtler sympathy and clearer comprehension of their needs, but she cannot give the same minute supervision that a resident landlady can. Unhappily, the advantage of such a change is, however, at present unquestionable. The influence of the majority of the lower class of people who sublet to the poor is almost wholly injurious. That tenants should be given up to the dominion of those whose word is given and broken almost as a matter of course, whose habits and standards are very low, whose passions are violent, who have neither large hope nor clear sight, nor even sympathy, is very sad. It seems to me that a greater power is in the hands of landlords and landladies than of schoolteachers—power either of life or death, physical or spiritual. It is not an unimportant question who shall wield it. There are dreadful instances in which sin is really tolerated and shared; where the lodger who will drink most with his landlord is most favoured, and many a debt overlooked, to compensate for which the price of rooms is raised; and thus the steady and sober pay more rent to make up for losses caused by the unprincipled.

With the great want of rooms there is in this neighbourhood it did not seem right to expel families, however large, inhabiting one room. Whenever from any cause a room was vacant and a large family occupied an adjoining one, I have endeavoured to induce them to rent the two. To incoming tenants I do not let what seems decidedly insufficient accommodation. We have been able to let two rooms for four shillings and sixpence, whereas the tenants were in many cases paying four shillings for one. At first they considered it quite an unnecessary expenditure to pay more rent for a second room, however small the additional sum might be. They have gradually learnt to feel the comfort of having two rooms, and pay willingly for them. (It is not possible to form any comparison between the rent of rooms in London and New York, the circumstances of the two cities being so different; but the point to be observed is that, by a very small increase of rent, the amount of accommodation may be doubled.)