Land Bubble has Officially Burst, and LL Pours it On!

Some of them cut again and make more parcels available. There's an economy in it, they like to play their little game, they've tiered up at some point and might be encouraged to do so again, bigger flippers buy sims on the basis that the smaller flippers will be right in there.

If you say so. *shrug*

You made one bad post, defended it unwisely, and now have turned to ad hominem and passive-aggressive tact to feign a resignation from it.

OK. *eats some more popcorn*

Oh, I didn't realize that you and Talarus are "everyone". Maybe I should have been more specific and maned all other residents instead of saying "some people". Sorry. My bad. If I had been referring to you specifically, I would have used your names.
No one has still been able to quote where I said that tier is charged each time land is flipped, so how about we concentrate on finding that quote.

I'm not going to rehash the whole difference in our point of view. In one ear and out the other.

No I haven't. I still stand by my post. LL makes money 10 times from tier if 10 people buy a plot of land within a week.

Do you know what "ad hominem" means? It means attacking the person and not the argument.

As long as we are quoting my posts with popcorn maybe you can find that post too where I began attacking people personally, as well as the post we are looking for where I said LL makes money evey time a piece of land changes hands.

No Cristalle, I understand where you & I differed.

I also understand where Talarus and I differed. Its when things began being added to my posts that weren't there.

What? So I am not always right an you are always wrong anymore? Darn!

No one added things to your posts. We just argued from our own points of view. And it is Cristalle, not Kristalle.

No, you can always be right and I can always be wrong. However you like it. Your world, your imagination.

The typo police have spoken. Sorry for the typo. Amongst other things.


LOL

Base of L$3.4 a meter for mainland. Lowest I've ever seen it. The devaluation experiment continues...

yeah- but not on the old continent, still some absurd prices being asked for. Those low prices must be for the South & new continents.

Nah. With the exception of the rarer land terrains, such as +40/-40, or lava sand, or multicolor sand, the old continent parcels that are at absurd prices are older owners who can't bare to sell at L$3.X per meter. They paid, in some cases as much as L$50 per meter and now have lost the majority of their lands value in a matter of weeks. They are praying for a rebound, an excentric millionaire who love their parcel above all others and will pay the outrageious price, or an unsavy buyer who will not realize that what they are paying will never be recouped. Those who are keeping older continent parcels set high are either too proud and have the money to pay tier till someone does take the land, or are praying for a miracle and will drop their price to market 2 days before their next bill date. It's sad. Often these are the folks that came in and stuck with SL for years, and this is how LL repays them. It stinks, but what can you do?

I'm not seeing a devaluation experiment. It's an attempt by LL to lower prices over a long period for a specific purpose. What that purpose is is the BIG question. I have a feeling that big announcement at SL's 5th B-day party will be the answer... either that or a wiz bang new feature that nobody cares about and almost nobody will use, but LL sacreficed improving grid stability to install. One or the other.

In addition to Joy's explanation, there are some "investors" who've bought up parcels in sims where they hope somebody will be desperate for expansion--desperate enough to pay a king's ransom. This almost never works, but--a little like microparcel land extortion--probably works just often enough to keep the enterprise viable, I guess.

FWIW, there's some of this currently in one of the sims where I have a few rentals on the South, "Jeogeot" continent: three separate parcels, apparently owned by different investors, two 512s and something 2048ish, all set at more than L$20/sq.m. It's just an inland "flat green" sim, no infrastructure or anything, surrounded by more of the same where L$5/sq.m. is top asking-price. No clue how these guys got the idea that anybody was going to expand in this particular sim. I've told all the "old timer" residents on the sim that if they actually need to expand or have a friend who wants to buy in, they can just let me know and I'll shave off a chunk for them at market rates.

There's also the reason that selling isn't important as it won't reduce tier and the tier capacity isn't needed. I'm one of those, and you never know - someone might buy

It has to be that way. Either something wonderful or something farcical. Middle ground is sooooo boring.
Drama is guaranteed.


It could be that the lower base price is simply an intention to maintain a lower price point.
Even though the maths are clear that purchase price is overshadowed by tier, that up-front cost is a strong human factor.

512 at 3.4/m is under US$7
512 at 6.8/m is double digit.
Not for nothing do retail stores mark prices like 9.99

Where have I heard this before? "You can't win if you don't play." Vaguely familiar.

Somebody once said in these forums that the whole grid should be yellow on the map, because everything could be bought for the right price, and landowners were just lazy if they didn't set their parcels for sale at that price. I mean, sure, if I could unload the whole shootin' match for L$20/m2, I'd gladly buy up replacement land at 1/4 the price, apologize to my tenants about the abrupt change of address, disentangle everything from Lost+Found, and go on a shopping spree with the difference.

The probability of this happening, however, is not nearly high enough for me to expend the effort of the several mouseclicks required to set it for sale. The ROI for camping would have a higher expected value.

Maybeee that is because everyone there paid 14-16 a meter on average for nice land and people hate to take it in the shorts, specially not when not 2 months ago they could get 20 a meter for that exact land.


~

There is still a lot of value in the old continent. People there may not get L$25 per meter anymore, but they are still getting from the low to high teens, depending on exactly where they are. The point i'm trying to make is that while everyone feels the effects of the market floor dropping, the effects are within proportion. I paid (I admit) $L20+ per meter for some plain jane land in the old continent, not double prim land, not super duper terraforming land, not lava land, and not shermerville land (though I do own some shermerville land too but lets not even GO there as far as what I paid for it...), but anyway, this land i'm referring to in the old continent that I have is near some of the OI sims, and I have a bunch of Lindens as my neighbors. Is it still worth the L$20+ I paid? No, but I could sell it in a heartbeat at L$15 per.

Those people you refer to who paid L$50 per meter for this land, mostly knew they were *overpaying* but it was worth it to them apparantly, so is it really over paying? And, while they may never resell it at L$50 per again, they sure as hell won't be selling it for L$3 per meter either...

I have nothing against the land flipper "middlemen"

Except where they are trying to make us believe that LL's policy of releasing large amounts of land cheap as being a bad thing and trying to cause an outcry against it.

You see, for almost everyone else, for the people who actually use the land, low prices and large amounts of land are a GOOD thing (unless you are downsizing)

Reasons why its good:
1. Its cheaper to buy land
2. LL will sell more land so their profits will be higher ensuring the existence of SL.
3. Yellow and purple land on the map are your friends.
They mean you are not squashed up against your neighboors.

No, yellow and purple are definately not your friends, now they mean it is waiting for an adfarmers front company to buy it to carve off half a dozen 16m plots or every bit that's roadside, then sell the remainder off for more than they paid to some poor newb, then fill it with temp rezzing ads after he's brought it.
Yellow and Purple, mean unless a sim resident buys it quick your home sim is about to be ruined forever by adfarming cancer.
Unfortunately cheaper land means cheaper to run adfarming operations especially with disposable alts, they can buy 4 times more 16m plots and who cares if you loose a few.

Not applicable, as I don't "play". I have some land that I no longer want or need (the very first piece I bought). It's set for sale if it's wanted by anyone, but it doesn't matter if it doesn't sell as I don't need the tier it would free up.

QFT! I live near one of the Disney Parks and used to go there regularly when state residents got a good deal on 4-month passes (the off-season for tourists) but even those passes got to be too expensive to be worth the money.

And during all this price hiking on the part of Disney....no one could have foreseen our current situation with gas prices and people cutting way back on expenses - luxuries usually going first - ie. vacations that one has to drive long distances or fly.

Eisner made the price hike 20 years ago, so they had a good run of incredible profits. Now they need to look at reacting to the current economy. I'm also guessing you don't frequent the park anymore not just because it's too expensive, but also because you've seen it all and it's too crowded.