"Shoddy Work"

One of the greatest dangers of a "building boom," apart from the loss of invested capital always involved, is the rickety and shoddy type of construction erected. The speculative builder wants to finish his house and unload it on someone else for a quick and substantial profit. His attitude toward material, plans and workmanship is apt to be entirely subservient to this desire. So long as a house will look all right until someone buys it, he cares little what shape it will foe in a few years hence.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the American Construction Council, took occasion recently to score the irresponsible groups who were putting up buildings of an inferior and showy character. Predicting that many of them would be almost valueless in ten years, he pointed out how unsound as investments mortgage bonds were bound to be when secured by such construction. He attributed high rents in large measure to the high rates of insurance charged upon structures built of inferior materials.

"Faulty engineering, unreliable architects, inexperienced and incompetent contractors, inferior grades of materials, poor mechanics, inadequate and poor inspection, and other bad factors too frequently enter into building work."