Questions about land,ownership,groups,buying, selling.

Hi.

When you read this post please understand that I am ***NOT*** accusing anyone of wrong doing, the tone of my wording might hint so which is not intended. I just want to get a better grasp of what I'm doing here in SL.

My wife and I have been SL'ers for a few weeks. About a week ago we set out to buy some land so I did some reading on the main SL website. I thought I understood fairly well but apparently not. It was my understanding a "Developer" buys a private land region from LL, divides it up and sells it to buyers, while the buyers tier goes to LL for maintenance.

We found a 4096 plot of land in the Jericho region, the seller "sold" it for "Free" while I paid the 1st tier and agreed to pay the monthly maintenence tier. I understood that I was the owner of the land: About land shows me as owner. The seller told me that I am the owner of the plot.

I was under a covenant which I equated to a home owners association: IE the person owns the home but is subject to the specific rules of the community.

I made an unrelated post here in the forums and came to the undestanding I am actually leasing the property from someone, and making the actual un-named owner's tier payments while they take a little off the top? Am I correct?

After only a week we've already outgrown our lot and found an extremely attractive 8192 plot in a different region last night. It was a private seller, we paid a little less than her asking price along with 1st tier. We are EXTREMELY happy with our new land, which also has a covenant.

Again I asked the seller:
**"who actually owns the land": her answer was she. It also said so in the "about land".
**"If I buy the property from you, who is the actual owner?" "You" (Meaning me).

After I purchased the owner became me in the "About land" menu.

Can anyone please briefly explain in plain simple (If possible) terms how this works?


We now have our old plot to deal with. I'd like to sell it- it says I can in the About land menu. If worst comes to worst I plan to just abandon it hoping to avoid another tier payment. The plot next door is being sold by the same seller, likely "Free" as well- so mine probably won't sell, if not for facing West catching the sunset while the one next door faces North.

What is the best suggestion someone can give regarding our old lot?

The seller of my new lot strongly suggested I create a group. I'm also confused about groups, what are they for and why they are beneficial? When I click my avatar>Groups I fill out the first page, it gives me a 48hr warning that others must join within the period. I click OK and generate an error.


Thanks in advance.

Basically, LL does not recognise the concept of "subletting" or anything like that. So, under _all_ circumstances, if you are paying "tier" to another resident and the land concerned is not listed as being owned by you on your account page on secondlife.com, the resident you are paying has full and complete discretion as to what they do with that land. You do not really "own" that land in SL terms.

SL does allow ownership to change under a "covenant", which changes the "owner" for some technical purposes and allows you greater power of it, but in the end the _real_ owner can always take it back, kick you out or whatever they feel like. (Of course, very few landlords would behave in that sort of manner.)

Properly "owning" land means that you pay LL for the tier on it every month (and nobody else) and it is listed on your account page.

Yes, it _is_ confusing.

So basically the covenant can be thought of as a lease agreement.

Perhaps my 1st seller, selling it for "Free" recieved payment as a realtor from the owner.

My current land wasn't free, but purchased from someone. I assume they were as I am, just moved onto another plot and rather than abandoning just sold it.

If I need to abandon my old lot, does it end all obligations to that property?

Thanks again.

It is highly confusing. The basic question boils down to "who do you pay your tier/monthly money to?" If you are the _true_ owner, you will pay LL every month.

While a private island owner may consider you the owner of a plot on their island, as far as LL is concerned, they are the _true_ owner of that land and have simply granted you some privileges.

I think I'm pretty much straightened out now. LL shows me as owning nothing. (0)

Only way you truly "own" is either (1) owning a mainland plot or (2) owning a private island. Everything else (even "owning" a parcel on a private island) is not owning. Owners are people who pay money for the land directly to LL.

You never own here, all land is leased. However Linden Lab are the head landlords, if someone doesn't pay them they will lose their land. Therefore if the estate owner doesn't pay tier fees to Linden Lab, your plot will be lost, even if your payments are in order.

I think that's the best way to look at it, Ciaran. The "buy price" is really buying the option to rent the land against rent payments -- either tier to LL or a private island landlord, or island payments from a private island landlord to LL.

LL is the base "Leaser", I can undestand that for what is required to maintain, upgrade servers as well as R&D, and still maintain profit.

Just an idea:
Perhaps LL could intall a kind of rating systm for sim owners: It would provide a certain level of security for the leasee while maintianing more incentive for owners to keep a good pay history.

Of course it wouldn't effect those owners who seemingly suddenly just abandon their land, but I'd think twice about setting up my home in an area owned by someone with a bad history. A win-win for everyone.

Probably a dumb idea just thought I'd toss it out there.

Well it's certainly true that if you are renting, you need to know a bit about the landlord, if they are reputable and so forth. There are quite a few SL landlords on the forums here who are quite reliable and reputable, and of course there's always Anshe, who has a very low risk of simply walking away as well.

Not sure about this as small landlords could be at the whim of malicious practices but a means to see how many sims an estate owner holds might be useful. Anshe, Desmond, Prok, Sarah Nerd all own plenty of land and are highly unlikely to go missing overnight.

rented/leased.

if you want to buy/own, you need mainland.

if there is a covenant, it's not mainland. if it's L$0 or barely higher, and the tier is to someone other than LL, it's not mainland.

you can only own mainland, and/or a private island.

on a private island, you pay LL to own it, not some other person.

I have a friend who recently "bought" an Island, however she is paying a landlord the monthly tier, therefore she is effectively leasing it. There was an existing house on the island which she now owns and is able to edit. However the only benefit I can see is that instead of paying 2200 a week for rent, she now pays about 1800 a week tier fees and has the ability to edit anything on the Island. I am assuming she would be able to sale it if she wanted to, would she?

Depends on the region and the covenant. Did she pay an upfront fee?

Regarding Groups:

One reason to create a group is to give group members certain abilities on your rented parcel. I'm actually surprised that the land owner didn't request that YOU join HIS rental group.

You can disallow creation/entry of objects by all SL Residents other than those in the group. you can disallow changes in terrain, media streams, etc etc to all SL Residents other than group members. Groups are handy to use in land management. Like I said, your landlord should probably have his/her own rental group for his renters, and you should join it and be sure of your allowed abilities.

To create a group, you will pay a L$100 fee, and someone else MUST join that group within 48 hours, or the group will disappear and you won't be able to use that name again (lame, yeah.) Some people actually create alternate accounts (aka "alt" in order to maintain groups. (A group must consist of at least 2 accounts. If all but one member of the group leave that group, it will cease to exist after 48 hours.)

Once you've created your group, you can SET (do NOT deed) the parcel to the group. If you deed the parcel to the group, then any future sale of the parcel will result in all group members receiving equal shares of the sale L$.

If the covenant allows resales, sure, but all she is selling is the right to rent from the island owner. The island owner always has the right to reclaim the land at any time and for no reason or compensation. That's why it's important to have a reputable estate owner if you are going to "buy" land on a private island (which is really buying the right to rent the land from the estate owner).

yes she did, she paid $L19000

It kind of seems pointless to me, you're probably better off renting?

Well I hope she can resell then. Generally the only advantages of buying estate with an upfront fee like that is that you can sell and you generally pay less tier, so the total cost of ownership should be cheaper.

Some people also believe if you pay more upfront you'll find a more commited community and there are examples of this around.

However, with the SL land market being such a raving boom and bust economy and estate prices likely to go lower, it's not the advantage it once seemed.

I dont see why owning more land makes you less likely to go poof over night at all.? I have one sim...ie rented homes for over 16 months...ive seen a few people with multiple sims go poof...i dont think how much you own has anything to do with it. What i DO think carries some weight is the opinion of others that have rented from that landlord before. Its easy to find out...check rent boxes, check who is leasing a parcel , contact them...people LOVE to talk