| Administrative History | The Aberdeen Property Investment Company was established in 1851. The Company was incorporated under the Building Societies Act 1874 on 17 February 1875, when its name was changed to Aberdeen Property Investment Building Society. The Society's stated purpose was "to raise a fund by means of subscriptions of members, for the purpose of making advances to the members of the Society upon security of freehold or leasehold estate, or other real or heritable property in Scotland by way of mortgage."
The Society was governed by a board of between 6 and 12 members elected as Directors by other members at the Society's annual general meeting. The directors met monthly, and had the power to appoint a manager and secretary, treasurer, solicitor, surveyor, and auditors, to handle the Society's affairs.
Members were allocated a number of shares in the Society and paid monthly, quarterly or annual subscriptions until their total subscriptions, plus accrued interest, reached £25 per share. Members were permitted to apply for an advance on their shareholding, in other words to borrow money from the Society, in order to purchase or build a property. A higher rate of interest was levied on these loans than was paid on members' subscriptions. The directors were also permitted to invest funds not advanced to members, and to borrow money on behalf of the Society; such loans to the Society were termed deposits.
Society membership grew from 257 shareholders in 1851 to a peak of 1,326 in 1880/81 and then fell back to around 1,000 until the mid 1890s. Numbers rose thereafter to 1,554 shareholders in 1904/05, then dropped slightly, rising again in the 1930s to a peak of 2,569 members in 1939. Membership dropped steadily after the Second World War to around 860 members in 1961, when the Society was taken over by the Leeds Permanent Building Society.
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