High rents were another primary contribution. Many of the ambitious newcomers figured that they could buy a house for about the same monthly amounts required for rent. In many instances they thriftily contrived to make the property pay for itself. Two- and three-flat buildings would furnish a family with a home while providing a considerable revenue from the rented flats. When old-fashioned houses too large for one family were bought, lodgers and boarders were often taken. Frequently wife and children added to the family income so that they might own a home.
A real estate dealer in Hyde Park said: "The Negro has purchased 90 per cent of the property where he lives, and 75 per cent of these are 'high-class colored men.'" This estimate is too high, but it shows the impression made by the large number of Negro home buyers.
An inquiry in two blocks on Prairie and Forest avenues disclosed that 40 per cent of the Negroes living on Prairie Avenue were property owners, in the intervening block on Thirty-seventh Street over 90 per cent were owners, while on Forest Avenue the Negro property owners were few.
In 1920 the School of Civics canvassed a small area occupied by Negroes in the district west of State Street, a district where, because of their low economic status, they would not be expected to buy. Of 331 families, thirty, or 10 per cent, were owners, and all but one had been owners for from four to twenty years, so that they had not been influenced by the migration.
Of the impression made by the home-buying migrants a very intelligent Negro real estate dealer said, referring to the Chicago Negroes:
I will dare say that 90 per cent or even a greater number did not own their property. They rented. It seems there has been a different spirit instilled into the northern colored man. We bow to the southern man because he is a home owner. The northern man was satisfied to rent. I was born in Chicago and felt the same as others do.
The present trend was indicated in these statements of two well-informed white real estate dealers on the South Side: "The colored people are demanding homes and the tendency is to buy"; and that Negroes were continuing to buy homes in the district between Thirty-ninth and Forty-seventh streets, Cottage Grove Avenue and State Street, more sales being made to Negroes in that particular location than in any other. And this has been during a period of acute and general housing famine in every large city.
Methods of purchase.—When Negroes first began to buy dwellings during the migration years, the average price was $4,000 to $5,000, and the initial payment, usually $500, ranged from $300 to $1,000. The time for payment was ordinarily three years, though some contracts were for five years. Later on Negroes began to buy houses or apartment buildings running as high as $8,000 or $10,000, and the payments were increased proportionately.
That the Negro assumed a heavy load, sometimes more than he could reasonably be expected to carry, was the opinion of several careful observers. While the surplus from his wages might be expected to cover the monthly payments, money for taxes, repairs, and insurance would have to come from the wages of wife or children, or from lodgers.
In April, 1920, when work at high wages was abundant, a well-informed Negro real estate dealer said that any Negro family head could then assume payments of from $40 to $55 a month on purchased property. But many Negroes made contracts calling for monthly payments of $65 to $75.