Saturday's Child

When Ohio Realtor John W. Galbreath offered to buy six buildings in Cleveland's downtown Terminal Tower Group for $7,800,000 last spring, Railroader Robert R. Young, who owned the majority of the stock, thought the deal was solid. But when the time came to pass the cash, Galbreath wanted to change the sale conditions. Twice Bob Young granted extensions; twice Galbreath asked for new terms, and the contract grew to 100 pages.

Last week, after Galbreath had presented his latest conditions, Bob Young, who likes his deals simple, had had enough. Young announced he was selling the buildings to someone else for $200,000 more.

The new buyers included Hotelman Abraham Sonnabend, who operates Boston's Shelton, Puritan and Somerset, Chicago's Edgewater Beach, and three other hotels. Also in the group: the Sixty Trust, one of the maze of tax-free trusts set up by Royal Little of Textron, Inc.

The new buyers plan to hold the Terminal buildings, which were built in the '20s by the empire-building Van Sweringen brothers for $100 million, as a long-term investment. Some day, they may construct the three additional buildings which were in the original plan. This time Bob Young left no loopholes; he collected part of the purchase money last week, set a deadline of 30 days for the rest.

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