How low will land go?

Yes, it's true. The water sims in Corsica are lovely and worth a premium in my view. All protected waterfront I think should be (having said that, I did acquire a couple of protected waterfront mainland 4096s outside Corsica for ~9.0/m .. which I thought was a fair price for that kind of land).

The significance of the outlay, however, is very dependent on your RL situation. I don't see USD 50 as a significant outlay, but I do recognize that for many people USD 50 is a LOT to spend on a "video game". My sense is that a lot of people do not view "video game expenditures" as being on a par with other kinds of entertainment (like dinners, films etc.), and have a much lower threshold for video game spending than they do for other kinds of entertainment.

That's true. There is a certain point after which you ask yourself, "what am i paying for??"

Yes, but in the case of land-buying, you're just paying a *once-off* extra for a much better experience that will continue into the future.

If you're staying in SL then the accumulation of monthly tier will soon eclipse the up-front cost.
From the point where the saving has been matched by accumulated tier, you start to lose. That would be 'lose' as in paying the same tier for crap land as someone else is paying for really great land. From day one, of course, you have land that is less than the best.

Yes I agree if the land is nice it is an entertainment investment, but again it goes back to overall attitudes about spending in SL. I think the number of people who are willing to spend say USD 80 for a nice plot of land in SL is very small compared to the number of people who play SL.

By which I assume you mean compared to the number of Premium accounts.

One good thing about that is that it would help to keep prices down at a merely 'expensive' level.
If I start buying again in a few months, it would be really kewl if I still only had to pay about 15/m.
If I only had to pay 6/m, I'd take that as a very strong indicator that I should immediately dump all of my protected water at 5/m



I did wonder why protected water plots were so slow to take off in Corsica, and why it's still quite slow.
I had supposed from the flavour of questions on the forums that most people were using Search and were seeing land in terms of price per sq.m. Maybe they were never aware that the better stuff existed. For me, at least, the only way to find land is via Map. I came across a lot of people who were barely aware that LL were dumping sims on the market. They were still locked into a perception of the land market as it was at the start of the year.

Another very important factor might be a lack of confidence in SL as a long term 'entertainment investment'.

"Just curious about where You considered 15.4 a fair price right now."

Allana SIM. It was a fair price because my mark up was very small, it was the only 512m2 lot and I had a potential customer the next day, it sold on the third day to someone else while the first one was still thinking, if the price was not right nobody would be interested.

L$/m2 does not mean anything. Price depends on how much similar land (quality and size) is offered in the same region, the basic rule of supply and demand. Fair price for a good location is different from a fair price for a junk location, you can not compare apples and oranges.

We got the Allana sim protected waterfront land for the Forum Cartel hangout for considerably less. Comparing apples to apples.

My criterion for all SL spending is the current cost of a game of golf. Greens fees in my area at a good course are about $60, not including cart rental (or caddy). In most urban areas, they can run to $100 - and a lot more on "special" courses.

So, any week I spend less than about $75 (US) could be considered bargain entertainment.

"We got the Allana sim protected waterfront land for the Forum Cartel hangout for considerably less. Comparing apples to apples."

You bought much bigger parcels, there are still bigger plots over there that do not sell for less than the price I stated. The bigger the parcel the less is L/m2 price. Size availability is very important too, mine was the only one 512m2 for sale and very well located, so yes, it's still apples and oranges .

Hmm probably $0 per meter, you are only renting it after all.
Ever pay $10k to a RL Landlord for the priviledge of renting from them?

The lower the better!

Apples to oranges or pears to bananas, it all depends on the seller's desire to sell and if you manage to find a good deal out there before a land baron snaps it up and reprices it.

Parcel size doesn't matter that much - I paid less than $9L/sqm a few days ago for several 512 sized lots of protected Linden waterway land in Lilypad, and put them back together. Larger parcels of comparable land in that area were listed for much more - I just happened to find someone who either wanted a quick sale or didn't know that other people out there would be willing to pay up to $15/sqm for it.

And bananas and grapes.

I wouldn't have paid more than 9 for plots on the protected channel in Liliypad. To be honest, I wouldn't buy there at all. I'd blow the extra few L$/m for on open water boundary.
It's horses for courses. I'm heavily into open water and sailing. I'm an incurable optimist. I keep trying to convince myself that LL will eventually make sim crossing 'less exciting'.


To get to an open water sim from a channel plot in Lilypad, you have to thread your way
-through the channel in Lilypad,
-cross the little triangular NW corner of Cheswick
-through Bissorte
-cross the NE corner of Helens Pool
Then, after 4 sim-border crossings, you are in a single open water sim.
Another 2 sim-border crossings will get you to a pair of open water sims.

That being said, being on a water channel (canal) in a sim does give options for exploring over the water, and it does afford a buffer from the plots on the other side of the channel.
Plus, if the neighbours are of one mind, there are possibilities for making a really nice environment.

You don't think Corsica's sim crossings perform well?

My Corsican parcel lies on the edge of a protected open water sim (which joins more to the north and south) so I'm pretty excellently positioned for sailing and the like. Even in a really fast speedboat (the SW-150), I don't dive on sim borders. The handshake is seamless, although I'll admit the very occasional hiccup (slight jerkiness/delay during crossover).

I went boating in open water sims on the old mainland continent the other day just to see if it was still as bad, and it was bloody awful. After being forced to relog three times, I gave up. It wasn't like that there last year .. which makes me sad.

Class Fives really are the only choice if you're buying land with the intention of using vehicles.

I've had mostly disaster-free sim crossings in Corsica. In general it's far better than in the old mainland.
However, when lag is bad and the sim handovers have 'issues', then sailing is a pain. Things are usually quieter in European mornings, so that's a favourite time.

There's more than just the server class involved here I think.
A lot of Corsica is lightly loaded. The servers are still having an easy time.
I sail in a a few groups of ocean sims, and the crossings are from open to open on basically empty sims. All the lag is network delay.

I've tried some channel threading in more populated sims, and it's not a clean an experience.
A particular problem in channel-threading are the crossings of a sim corner. You do 2 border crossings in quick succession. Your avatar and passengers have a presence in 3 separate sims within seconds.

Someone buying a property on leasehold land would pay a lot more than $10K. The SL setup is closer to a leasehold model than a freehold model.

its your loss then. i will pay considerably more $ for land on my home sim than you will get from a flipper. quick sale on my sim = 'set to 10/m for sale to nina'. and that painful negotiation could get you 12 or more per meter. why would you not want that?

And kiwi-fruit and strawberries (yum)? I've never had a problem with sim crossings (while crossing my fingers) and I like exploring, preferably in an inner tube. There are a few large landowners along the canal who have done up the waterway nicely. Personal preference, I suppose. But then again, I wouldn't have paid more than $10/sqm for any water land.

What I really don't get is the people who pay a premium for water land that doesn't connect to ANY protected water - don't they know they can get blocked in??

I bought protected waterfront in Corsica, in the Borgenite sim. I love it. It is quiet there, and the neighbors have put in attractive things. When I bought it, I bought everything near it that was cheaper than the rest of the sim. After deciding what I wanted to keep, I have put the rest back on the market to sell. See my picks, or IM me if you are interested in a water plot there. So far, I really like it there, and they are all very close to protected ocean.

And regarding prices, it's interesting to see the range there. It's been anywhere from L$10,4999 to L$200,000 for an oceanfront 512!

Princess Ivory

Back to the OP's original question, land is hanging tough with a steady base of L$6.2 per meter. I attribute the lack of it going lower to SL not releasing sims and VAT payers taking a wait and see attitude about liquidating their holdings.

Hilarious!
You can still buy an oceanfront 512 for L$7000 in Corsica - quite a few of those have been sitting there for months without moving.
I suppose that's because that's L$13.67/m - and people who use Search will never find them.

Presumably most people who would be interested in paying a premium for oceanfront have bought as much as their tier-tolerance will allow. I'm in that situation, with the tolerance heavily affected by a lack of confidence in LL's ability to sort out the Grid.
Alternatively, there are more potential buyers out there but they don't use Map and so don't know the land is available.

There is no market price for oceanfront. I've seen 512s side by side. One for 7000, the other for 11000 - and both prices sitting there unsold. Scattered around are 512s for 20,000 or more. It would be an innocent person who bought without doing a goodly amount of research first.


So the answer to "How low will land go?" is "No more than 4 metres lower".

One can't answer simply "4 metres" because one can't always guess what the baron has already done to the terrain.
Speaking of which ---- WTF? A baron buys a water sim. The ground level is maybe 10m below water level. He raises the ground to max! Hello ? Is that what they call "developing the land"? "Lovely flat sea bottom"
Maybe they bought 'Land Baron in a Box' and messing with terrain is something they do blindly by formula.

I hadn't factored in the "How desperate are my neighbors to get a few more prims without moving" factor. Sorry I sounded snippy, 15.4 just seemed unfair to me personally in an average mainland sim that wasn't full terra, rare, ect. But thats just my personal opinion so doesn't mean much. Congrats on your land sale and I'm gonna go make fruit salad with all of these apples, oranges, bananas, grapes, and whatever else was thrown in.

There's nothing "average", there are many factors that influence the price, I think I was very clear - this was the ONLY 512 m2 in the area and well located, I bought it for about the same price as it was sold and it wasn't sold to a neighbor. I never buy dirt cheap land just because it's not good enough for me, I'm picky. I don't know why some people are so mad at me (I even received a rude PM from someone), I just shared my personal experience, I'm not your competitor, hope everybody's happy now.

I actually bid $1505US on the recent Moondust (great name, not bad looking sim, too pricey though)sim butdidn't win.

I'm still considering purchasing a sim but should probably time it better so I get a good deal.

Any ideas of when a good time is going to be and how much I should expect to pay?

Also, I believe you have to pay for the sim within 24 hours, is this true?

Can I buy the Sim but then wait till the 20th(my tier date) to take a hold of it or do I have to time my purchase so I get decent value for the associated tier costs?

Thanks for any replies.

You do have to pay within 24h, but you have 7 days to physically claim the sim. So you would, at the earliest, have to pay for the sim on the 14th to claim it on the 21st (just to be safe and clear the billing period).