Journal of Architectural and Planning Research
9:4 (Winter, 1992)	322

The terraced rows of Birmingham and Baltimore proved emblematic of leasehold towns.
Separate street level entrances assured that each dwelling unit could be individually subleased.
Tenement buildings with a single entrance for several apartment flats were rare.

Although the buildings of Birmingham and Baltimore were much alike, the investment markets
for ground rents were much different. Birmingham ground rents were rarely bought and sold.
Most were retained by their aristocratic creators. By contrast, in Baltimore ground rents were
highly negotiable. In a financial world devoid of gilt-edged bonds, these passive investments
were the next best thing.

Birmingham's ground rents survived the nineteenth century unscathed. The first and last use of
ninety-nine year leases was to preserve the "chain of destiny'' through which the aristocracy
entrenched its dominant position in society. By keeping wealth intact, and by settling all of the
income on the eldest male son in each generation, the family was aggrandized (Broderick,
1881: 133).

In Baltimore, on the other hand, primogeniture was a "sprig of feudalism" which had never
"taken root in the new soil" (Mayer, 1883: 24). When the politically dominant debtor class
found itself saddled with a perpetual debt in a time of declining interest rates, they obtained
legislative relief which guaranteed all future leaseholders a prepayment privilege. Redeemable
ground rents no longer provided the investors with a hedge against deflation.

EPILOGUE

In the two cities during the twentieth century, ninety-nine year leases had a different destiny. In
Birmingham and other English leasehold towns, they flourish yet to this day. It was not until
1945 that Parliament made strictly settled land freely alienable; it was not until 1967 that Parlia-
ment provided leaseholders a guaranteed right to purchase their freehold at fair market value.
(Law of Property Act, 1925; Leasehold Reform Act, 1967).

Moreover, the custom of primogeniture remains strong enough, and the price of urban proper-
ty dear enough, to keep many prime leaseholds in place. For example, Gerald Grosvenor, the
Duke of Westminster, remains the richest man in England. The foundation of his wealth is the
ground rents he and his ancestors have received on the 300-acre Mayfair estate in London
since 1677. Likewise in Birmingham, the current Lord Calthorpe continues to collect rents on
his Edgbaston estate (Sunday Times Magazine, 1989).

Baltimore's ground rents, on the other hand, are an endangered species. Twentieth century
forces push them toward extinction. Inflation has rendered the pre-1884 rents insignificant;
since the leases are perpetual, the freeholders have had no opportunity to raise the rents. Right
to redemption on post-1884 rents, based on a 6% capitalization, has given leaseholders an in-
centive to play the money market; whenever the prevailing interest rate has been less than 6%,
leaseholders have availed themselves of the opportunity to pay off their ground rents for less
than the capitalized amount of their indebtedness. No longer useful, with extinguishment some-
times profitable, ground rents have been dumped on the tenurial trash heap.