Selling down Mainland: How to do it responsibly?

I've decided to tier down over the next couple of days. It's not really that urgent, but I'm just so frustrated with the nerfed adfarm policy that I want to get some of this behind me.

So, a couple of days ago I sent a note to the neighbors and larger landholders in one sim where I have land, describing what I was planning to sell, and offering them (what I thought at the time to be) a "special deal" of L$1500 for each 512 chunk they or their friends wanted. Nobody has shown interest so far--noon Friday was to be the cut-off--but that's not too surprising, even if it was a good deal: most people are at full-tier now.

But in the meantime, just in the past couple of days, I've noticed the base price of Mainland sliding even further. I'm not speculating on why--there are plenty of possible reasons, and I don't really suppose everybody is giving up on the adfarm policy as I am. But it makes me wonder what to do now.

I'm not interested in how much L$s I can generate from selling the land. If I thought it would be safe, I might just abandon it to the Governor, but god only knows what might happen to it then. And besides, I'm not selling off the junk--this is stuff from which LL should be able to keep collecting tier. But with the base price of Mainland now so much lower than the auction price, and falling precipitously over just the past two days, the economics seem different: maybe the Governor is the safest place to park this stuff now.

(I'm too damned stubborn to sell off the stuff with abandoned ad and extant extortion microparcels in and around it. I've given up on LL ever having the balls to actually do anything about the problem, but I'll be damned if I'll let some new owner be tempted to feather the nests of those a$$hats. But I digress.)

We see in other sims that the chopping continues, completely unabated by the new adfarm policy. I don't want to dump land into the market in a way that could lead to it being used for that obscene practice. I also wouldn't wish that on my neighbors--nor my worst enemy.

So, how can I best unload this stuff with minimum risk of it turning into yet another useless, gerrymandered scam-o-rama?

If you really couldn't care about getting 1 or 2L per metre, then why not just abandon to the Gov?
It could sit unauctioned for months, putting off the day when a micro-cutter could buy it at rock-bottom auction price.

The worst case is that it gets bought by a parasite at a low price.
Abandoning puts a delay on the possibility of that happening.

if the worst comes to the worst give it to someone you trust.

wait, next week you can show your prices are really cheap comparing it to Nautilus auctions?

I was going to suggest giving it to someone you know, but Dekka beat me to it.

There's another view. If the neighbors aren't interested enough to even reply (I know they may have not logged in yet) when you explained the reason you are selling, then let it go to the Gov. If it gets bought and abused, you at least did your best for the neighbors. It's not your responsibility to continue paying pay tier just to keep their view blight free. But maybe give them longer to see the IMs.

Puppet is sad that you are giving up and selling! But I understand - it's frustrating that the land cutting and extortion pricing continue as usual. Clearly LL is going to go by the letter of the law, not the 'spirit' of it, as was previously implied.

It's too bad the neighbors aren't interested. But then again, I've chosen against tiering up to buy neighboring land in the current economy, so I can't blame them.

You could try posting it for sale on the land forum as a 'contact me if interested for direct sale' kind of thing, and check out whoever responds. But you probably wouldn't get many inquiries from that. Maybe as a last-ditch effort before abandoning.

Abandoning to the Guv would likely delay bad things from happening to the lot, since it seems to take quite a while for the abandoned lots to go to auction. However, it seems all the auction plots are bought by land flippers. But who knows, someone responsible could end up with it someday.

Talk to Sarah Nerd or Elanthius or one of the other more reputable land dealers. At least you would get something for the land rather than abandoning it.

And you would be reasonably sure it wouldn't get cut up into micro-plots, at least, not for a while anyway.

I literally gave away about 8000m in Alice region to friends just a few months ago.

As far as responsibility - if you've allowed your neighbours to make an offer for your land, you've done your duty.

Unless you think it's fair that residents have to pay to keep their neighbour's views indefinitely.

If someone is going to do something skanky with the land you give up, it's not your fault. Yes it's decent to find a good home for the land, but I wouldn't make a career out of it. Some amount of responsibility is in the hands of mainland estate management to ensure the mainland doesn't degrade.

I heard of one person who donated their land to artists for artistic ventures. You could do something like that, or find a charity that could use it for education or fund-raising.

The problem in giving it to someone who would not have bought it is the continuing tier.

There are currently about 90 1024 parcels on offer at L$3 /m or under.
A 1024 at L$3/m is about US$11-ish.
If they can't afford US$11 once-off, what are the chances of them affording the tier for a year or two?
If they had a group owning the land, and rented tier from someone like the Ninjas, it would cost them nearly US$6 a month, every month.

Sent you an IM, one piece I could use as storage for my servers Not much but it fits my free tier as premium.

I would send your neighbors an im with all the details also...that way they can read it in email and come in world to check it out. Lately if i crash on login, i dont get the notecards etc. So i would do both and cover all your bases.

Yeesh, if your goal is to "protect" it or whatever then don't sell it to me. I'm obviously just going to flip it on to the first available buyer who could be anyone.

I like the idea of abandoning the land. It'll sit in abandoned status for months and when it finally hits the auction queue prices are generally inflated and land goes to people who are serious about land so it's more likely someone who wants it will get it.

On the other hand, I don't know how much land you own but it sounds like a significant amount so think again about just giving it away because I bet it's a pretty large chunk of change you'll be abandoning.

It sounds to me like you've done everything. Give the neighbors a chance to buy, and a decent deal.

Once you sell, it's kinda out of your hands. So unless you know who you're selling it to , and trust them. There isn't a lot to be done.

EDT: Oh, and not to change the subject, but what are these ad farmers, or extortionists, or whatever doing? (I'm not up on land, being a non-premium, and still fairly new)

Jerboa, the basic idea behind "ad farming" is this: Pretend I'm an ad farmer (God forbid!) I buy up a 512 parcel and divide it into 16 m parcels. I put a giant cube advertisement for "XXX Hot Barely Legal Teens!!!!" on each 16 m parcel, then set the parcel to sell at an extortionist price, say L$1600, or L$100/m, which is WAY over the average L$/m price of land sales. My neighbors, angry and frustrated at looking at my ugly "XXX Hot Barely Legal Teens!!!" spinning cube advertisements, buy all the plots. I'm lots richer, and I use that money to buy even more large parcels, so that I can subdivide and conquer. It sucks rocks, and LL announced to great hoopla a few months ago that they were going to basically get rid of ad farming altogether by insisting on some major rules. But, typical of LL, they have failed to follow through on their stated mission, and let the project die a horrible, abandoned puppy death.

To Qie: I'd donate it or give it to Sarah Nerd; she will be able to move it faster than you. I'd be wary of abandoning the land to the Gov, unless you can be absolutely sure that autoreturn is on. I've seen Gov Linden land that looks worse than a sandbox because of all the crap left there.

Didn't LL say that they were going to be addressing microparcels next? Or has something changed?

When did the adfarm policies get nerfed? I missed it. Things look a lot nicer in a lot of places, when I see something near me that is a violation I AR it and it goes away.

Off topic but ad farm policies aren't nerfed. The ad farm policy has pretty much resolved (for now at least) the ad farm problem.

What it hasn't addressed is the ability for people to cut land into whatever shape they want and sell it for whatever price they want. Which is what is upsetting some people.

HeLlo NeIgHboUr

YoU DoNT knOw M3, BuT I am HolDINg ur REgiOn H0sTaGE

BUy mY l4nD NAO or suff3R t3H coNseQuEnceZ

SiGn3D

Q13


... I think that ought to be sufficient?

grin

Thanks for the suggestions.

Elanthius, I do understand your business, and understand that I couldn't hold you accountable in any way for whatever happened after sale. And I'm not supposing that I could blame any buyer for what happens. I just don't want to make it any easier for the scumbags to screw over the Mainland than it already is, thanks to LL's lackadaisical approach to "management" of their Mainland estate.

And I agree that the neighbors are responsible for their own fates. But once they turn it down, it's not about the neighbors, it's about the scammers: I just don't want to play into their hands.

Back when Mainland prices seemed to have some floor, it was generally thought that abandoning land was a Very Bad Thing because it meant the adfarmers might get it for cheap. Now, practically none of the L$ auctions are getting any bids, so it seemed as if that would keep the stuff off the market until demand came back. As I was thinking about that logic, however, I remembered from the last Jack office hour that he said they'd be looking into lowering the opening auction bid to reflect the current market. So that's not necessarily safe, either.

As for whether adfarm policies are nerfed: Well, they cleaned up some of the towers, but they won't remove blatant violations when I AR them. So I'd say that enforcement of the adfarm policy is nerfed, even as a pure adfarm policy. And the same old adfarmers own the same old parcels, so we know damned well what's waiting in the wings. But yes, the problem on which no progress has been made whatsoever--that is in fact expanding apace--is the dicing of Mainland for the purposes of extortion.

Glad you asked this, Qie. I need to tier down in the next month or two and wasn't sure the best way to go about it either. The land for sale on my sim (lots of it) is up for really high prices - which is probably why it's not moving very well, either.

I got rid of most of my parcel of mainland last month (I wasn't using it anymore). I sold off some to some neighbors. I was selling for a reasonable price, but didn't sell as much as I had hoped.
When it came to sell or pay next months tier I sold off to the land bots. I found the max they would pay is 1800L per 512sqM.

better than abandonment

/me whimpers in fear and horror!

Save the puppies!!!

Qie, before abandoning the land (which still seems like a good option if you don't care about the money), you could also ask around in groups in world to see if anyone knows any newbies who recently went premium and want a free 512 lot. Every so often one of the poor lost souls posts here looking for their 'free' 512, not realizing that just the tier is free and they have to buy the parcel. Why not make someone's dream come true?

Of course, this assumes that said newbie won't turn around and flip the lot for a profit.

I've been waiting for the price to drop on all the 16m/32m former adplots around my land, but it never happens. I wonder how the owners manage to pay tier for the plots now?

It seems to me that when you have 512m plots for sale at 2,000L next to 3,999L 64m plots neither will sell, which seems to be happening in my area.

Just sent out a notecard to the neighbor on one of my parcels that is adjacent to his plot offering first right of refusal. Will be interesting to see the response.

I find this ironic... I just tiered up because i was happy with the way adfarms have been handled this month.

While I was shopping for land, for the most part I didn't see much in super low prices. I bought 2 512's next to one of my stores for 6.6 M^2 (BTW the same price as when i first bought land on that sim in Sep 07) Most of the land I saw that was real cheap.. also was really crappy land, granite, giant ugly buildings right up to the property lines, bots/campers on the sim, glow hell, oddball sizes (real narrow and long for example) and one ad cutter donut. If the land was nice I got the feeling people were just dumping it for quick sale, saw a few that had "please buy this damn land and take it off my hands" type of things in their descriptions.

That being said, I did end up buying 2 1024 next to my other shop for 3.3 M^2. My neighbor seems to of closed up shop and is dumping the land so it sells before their next tier day. (BTW #2 When I got my land on the sim in July.. I watched 8 land flippers drive the price from 7k to 12k in the matter of hours... I just thought that was funny )

Give it to the neighbours, if you are going to abandon it, some neighbours might tier up to gain 512m. I recently sold off my land in one sim to a neighbour at $2 a metre, she went from owning 512m to owning 6000m over the course of a few months and I got the same price I would have got dumping it to the bots. She's wrapped and really building stuff on it.