Land too cheap, scam?

Yeah, that would be nice if there was something.

Maybe even some basic metrics too, like "land baron X has Y months of tier 'locked in' to reserve region Z"

The only concern is that LL would make a worse built in system than verbal agreements. That's entirely possible.

* * * * *

I've got some very classy residents, I can't say enough good things about them. But when dealing with several hundred people from *anywhere* - typical monthly losses due to nonsense make some of the 'land scam' threads pale, in $L to $L comparison. Usually it's from someone coming in new, who just plain didn't read the notecards or simply can't or won't keep their word.

If I had to guess, I'd say at very worst about 5% of residents default in this manner. And yes, I still take 'honour' reservations - I'll set someone up completely, up-front, deliver everything. The other 95 people out of 100 make it still very worthwhile, especially in terms of keeping my spirits up.

From what I've seen, most land barons just kinda tighten their belt and shush up when there are resident problems; usually you lose maybe a week or two of tier and a couple hours of your time to people who default. But we just eat it, much like credit card companies do.

There would be little point to having whiny threads from land barons saying 'don't rent to resident X!' Though if there was a forum thread for every time it happened, this forum would be deluged.

This is just a guess, but I'd imagine land barons and residents are probably pretty comparable - 95% are decent on both sides.

It's when that 5% meets the other 5% you get the friday forum drama! grin

Awww Char

Yeah, Charlene is wonderful - she has her own mini-continent, and yet still finds time to keep an eye on Caledon for me as an estate manager; how she finds all that time I'll never know.

I know she's done *incredible* things for her residents - by far gone the extra mile and kept walking for them.

I'm one of the little voices in her ear saying "don't let anyone take advantage of you..."

...but she tries too hard anyway.

DOH!

I meant 1L for the land. NOT 1L per prim.

Desmond,

I don't understand what losses a landlord can be subjected to here, unless you mean you end up with an unexpected vacancy, or lose a bunch of time setting someone up who didn't stay. I get those too occasionally. But do you mean you incur cash losses?

I use an honour system. I don't make anyone pay the up-front fee right away in brand new regions, and I give a free week of tier. I pay tens of thousands of $L for free homes, to make them available to anyone that wants them when a region is founded. I'll have people take advantage of all of that... they move in, have a great week, maybe two before I actually mention anything (I get busy)... then they literally vanish on me. O....kay! Puzzles me, but, what can ya do. If that happens on a big parcel... whoops. Ouch. Even if I have someone who can take it the next day, I'm still 'out'. It was tier.

Timewise I spend on average roughly two hours with every resident within the first month of their being around. That's a generous underestimation, but there you go. Some people are 30 seconds, but they are balanced by others that need a good part of a day.

Notecards don't really work - I've tried, people don't read 'em much. They want their questions answered at their own pace, from their own angle. Explaining everything from prims to how to form a group, why a group might be advantageous, explaining that it was autoreturn they set and NOT me that 'took their stuff', explaining how to get their main account back online via the support system... you name it. I'm sure you are very familiar with all this, if you rent land also.

And nobody can get me to admit it in forums, but I too sometimes go the extra mile for somebody, only to have it fall flat. It happens to all of us.

So yeah... it aggregates fast.

Thanks Desmond.

I don't have those cash loss risks in my business, but your explanation of the time you spend is spot on with my experience. Fortunately, most of the residents that I've spent tons of time helping are still with me. So I'd agree with your experience that it works out 95% good, far outweighing the bad ones.

A lot of valuable points on this post.

Ultimately like RL all dealings on a private estate depend on the sincerity for the Estate Owner. They have full control over the SIM. And just like in RL there are good and bad estate owners. So the #1 rule, I would use is, how long have the current renters/owners been on the SIM and what is their feelings with regards to how the estate is managed.

The second issue is related to tier and land purchase. As stated their is 2 models which are used - large down payment for purchase and low tier, or free land (0 or 1$) and higher tiers.

As a rule, a Private SIM costs 2000 USD to purchase after Tax and cost $295 USD/mth. Again after tax is is $350 USD/mth. This equate to 100,000 $L per month is required to cover your tier to SL. Ignoring the fact that most SIMs are never full utilised and that there is a 2000 USD intial investment that needs to be repaid from rent, this means at 1.53 $L per month per sqm cover variable costs. So a 4096 sqm minimally should be around 6300 $L/mth. In reality with intial investment costs and 70-80% utilisation yhis needs to be arounf 8000 $L/mth. So anything below this figure is really not substainable.

So beware of deals which are often too good. They are usually to get you in, and then tiers are increased or bonusses slowly removed as you establish your presence on the SIM.

SL for me is just a hobby, but I take my responsibility as a Estate Owner very seriously. The result is that most of my tenants either renting or owning land on my SIMs have been there several months. So this is a good indicator of a well manged sim.

If anyone has any questions please feel free to drop me a IM in World. I am always glad to help where I can.

Regards, Ernst.