The Great Seattle Lot-and-Cottage Gamble
In the summer of 1888, developers launched a high-stakes, city-wide lottery to sell residential lots, promising ten lucky buyers a move-in ready home.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Jackson and Rainier Streets Addition is one of the largest, best located and most desirable tracts ever placed upon the market, consisting of 110 choice residence lots, located in the growing direction of the city, and only 17 minutes ride from the Postoffice. Fare, 5 cents. An unprecedented offer! Ten elegantly finished, modern design cottages, ranging in value from $500 to $1,000 each, to be given away with the property. Every purchaser secures a lot, and ten out of the whole number secure houses with the lots. Uniform price of lots, $200 each. The greatest building enterprise ever inaugurated in Seattle, affording to each purchaser the full value of the original investment, and a small fortune in every ten of the whole number. The drawing for lots and houses will take place on August 15th, 1888. A boy or girl is selected by the purchasers of lots, who will proceed to draw the cards from the box—first a name and then a number. These will be compared under the supervision of three prominent citizens. Warranty deeds will be made for lots as rapidly as the remittances are known.
“The greatest building enterprise ever inaugurated in Seattle, affording to each purchaser the full value of the original investment, and a small fortune in every ten of the whole number.”
This 1888 promotion captures the frenetic early days of Seattle's real estate speculation, where developers used lotteries and grand promises to spur growth in the 'outlying' hills. It serves as a stark reminder that Seattle's current housing affordability crisis is rooted in a long history of viewing land as a speculative commodity rather than a civic necessity.
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