A newbie renting house in SL

Hey there all, i am a newbie of 2 months and i finally decided to start a search for a home,
and after some research getthing results from these big rental companys renting for high prices, i found a real bargain from a new sim of a friend. Now i feel so great to be able to come home after some shopping and to relax and change into new clothing, and also to have a place where i can place all my free and cheap furniture that i collected from everywhere.


How long did it take you people to decide to get a place to call your own?

If anyone else is looking for a cheap place to stay, i can refer you, IM me in SL.
The owners are really cool ppl and they basically changed everything for me including the house's outlook and the door or whatever i wasn't happy with.
Really wanna share this happiness with other new ppl.

I'm glad you found somewhere to call home.

When I first started I didn't think I'd bother. Then after a couple of weeks I took a skybox above a friend's parcel. After a month there I got bored of looking at empty sky (or other people's skyboxes) so I went in search of some mainland to rent.

To start with I rented a 1024m parcel, then I upsized a couple of times and now I've got 3500m across two parcels, and considering upsizing again. My landlady is great, and I love the sims I'm in, and I know I've got a real bargain for the parcels I've got.

I found a nice waterfront/roadside mainland plot, bought the RELIC building kit and created my first home. It's a good idea to buy in a commercial/residential area in case you decide to use your plot for a store later on after you learn some more skills.

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I think it took me about a month to buy an airship which sort of...appropriated unused space I happened across. Eventually I added a Coastal Mariner and more or less stuck to the same method of rezzing at my convenience. Currently my airship lives on an island and it is the strangest thing to not only have permission to leave it there full time, but to be encouraged to leave a trail of crap behind me all over the island.

I don't think it took me long to want my own place - maybe a month or two at most.

I rented a skybox - low prims, low rent, plenty of privacy, great landlord.

Then some friends offered me the use of a 512 plot on the mainland, which was great until I started wanting more space and to really OWN it, so about a year ago I went premium and rented tier to purchase my very own 1024.

Er, and then the 1024 next to it came available and I rented more tier and bought that. And now I've sold off the combined parcel and doubled my space again to a 4096.

I'm planning to make a sort of public garden down on the ground and live in a skybox way up high. I never use my house for much of anything but unpacking things and trying things on, anyway. I just like having lots of space to fill up with interesting things. (The building platform, however, is already installed. Priorities.)

I guess everyone starts out thinking i wouldn't need a home but just can't resist the temptation after a month or two

Anyways i am just really glad i found this place. I'm around 512 parcel for 150/week with 100prims, after comparing with other places, i think this is a really good deal.

Though i still kinda have this tingling urge to own land.....i'm still resisting it for the time being, hehehehe.....

To be honest i am still so confused about the difference between renting and buying islands.

Seems like you haven't really "bought" the island if you are not premium since the land holder is not you?

And I rented a small apartment from Cristalle Karami, the most excellant landlady in SL.

I was originally without a permanent home for over a year before moving in with friends. That was enough to make me yearn for a place of my own I can tell you! Lol.
No seriously, they were great but I needed more prims.

@Shu Zemenis, this is correct - unless you pay your island tier to LL it is really just renting.

At first I rentered an apartment in a towerflat from some company. I think I visited the place maybe 2 or 3 times, it was a huge room with a primlimit of 30 or something like that.
After that I bought a small piece of mainland, a friend of mine bought a neighbouring piece, so we got married and merged our two parcels.
When she stopped playing, I eventually sold the place, and after a while was allowed to live at another friends place, where I still hang out, in exchange I occasionaly build or fix stuff for her club.

YEH I think the best way to do it is to find some friends and live with them on a nearby place, or else you won't have much reason to go back home to.

Shu where is this place you are renting, it seems really renting cheap compared to what i have seen around, can u please IM me in game? Thanks!

That is correct. The only way to "buy" estate land is to buy the whole island and be the Estate Owner, then you're still paying a monthly fee to Linden Lab. In any other case, you can consider the purchase price to be a deposit or administration fee on the rental property. The only difference is that you get full rights of control over the land itself.

The only way to buy land outright and have no monthly fee at all, is to be premium and buy no more than 512sq.m of mainland. You still have to pay your premium account fees though.

My first day i found land back then when you joined you were given money so i could afford my "first Land" 512sq mts and a friend got a small home for me

My first day i found land back then when you joined you were given money so i could afford my "first Land" 512sq mts and a friend got a small home for me

The Answer To The Question Are You Really Buying The Land. The Answer Is No If It Is From A Private Person. The Only Time You Get To Buy Land Is If You Do That From Ll.
Don't Think That You Own Land When You Don't. This Only Happens When You Buy Land On The Main Land Or From Linden Labs. Any Private Land You So Call Buy Is Not Yours And Can Cost You More To Buy It And Then Pay The Teir.

Come And Rent A 4096 With 937 Prims On A Very Quiet Island And Pay 1750 A Week With Water Fronts. You Can Put Your Own Home Down But I Have Some If You Don't.i Only Have 4 Lots Open So I Don't Think They Will Last Long. There Is Only Residential Homes Here No Clubs And Etc To Bring Down The Lag. I Also Have A Common Area For All Renters With Things To Do And Ways To Visit. I Have Some Smaller Homes For 400 A Week As Well Only 2 Left

Im Ron Spaight Or Starshine Benior For Details And A Group Tag.

Well, I've been here 3 years or so now and I've never had a home in SL. I guess I just never saw the point in buying a little house and decorating it with little furniture and then, like, sitting on the furniture or whatever it is people do.

Well i guess most of the time it is so that you can have a purpose of starting to make furniture or decorations or whatever it is you want to try to make, and then secondly it can let you have a feeling of home somewhere. Although it is true that there is not much point in sitting alone at home, that is why i decided to rent a place from my friend's new sim, so that i know i can meet up with them here when i feel like hanging out.

Just so that you don't feel so alone wandering out there in the big big SL world, at least that is why i started.

This Is Very Blatant Advertising And Should Not Be Here. Or At Least The Poster Should Learn The Rules Of Capitalization.

Yes, it's confusing. There are differences between Mainland and private estates.

Mainland:
- requires a Premium account to buy.
- you can buy from a resident or at auction from LL
- you pay tier in US$ direct to Linden Lab
- you don't pay tier on your first 512 square meters
- you can also rent mainland from a resident.

Private Estate:
- does not require a premium account
- you can buy an entire island of your own from LL ($1,000 US, $295/mo. service fee) In this case, YOU own the island.
- most people "buy" part of an island from an estate owner. Even when this involves an up front "purchase" fee, you are actually still renting.
- most estates have a "covenant" that describes what you may or may not build or do there.
- the owner can evict you if you violate the covenant, or don't pay on time, or even just because he's feeling grumpy that day. Be sure to check on the owner's reputation before renting on an estate.

Private estates tend to be more quiet and peaceful, and to have consistent builds because of covenant "zoning" restrictions. Mainland is looser...there are fewer restrictions on you, but there are also no restrictions on your neighbors. I've lived in both situations, and enjoyed them both.

Within my first week on SL, I rented a small apartment and bought a 512 on mainland shortly after, for a place for myself and friends I brought here to change clothes etc. Within the next month, we began buying land on another sim, till we owned about 1/4 of the sim. Lag and adfarmers drove us and another couple to purchase 3 homesteads associated with our SL employer.

Currently, I own 2 full islands with a partner, which we lease out. Land can become quite an addiction.

Owning/renting on estate land, with the right landlord and setting has many advantages to mainland, IMHO.

I was very fortunate to have been invited to join SL by a member of a large role play community, thus I was renting an apartment within the community within a few days. It was a large studio apartment - 128 prims for 125L/week. I LOVED that apartment. Most of the other residents of the community owned their own land, castles, sims, etc. so I had a lot of privacy within the apartment.

Later on I became partnered and moved in to my partner's HUGE 3-story home. After my cozy apartment, I felt like I was rambling around in that house. Interestingly, when I had NO idea I would EVER be this man's partner, he asked me to come with him when he went shopping for the home. Ironic, eh?

We rented land for the house on a lovely mainland sim....unusually beautiful and consistent builds at ground level, although we have always lived in the sky. Unfortunately the owner of that sim sold out when VAT was introduced, so we rented on another mainland parcel with a fantastic landlord.

When I decided to try my hand at a small business, I went premium and purchased a 512 parcel...then another parcel next to it...errr, and another...and...eventually ended up with 4080 sqm on the same mainland sim where we had been renting. We basked in having so many available prims, but I never quite got my business started on that land as planned due to RL circumstances and couldn't justify nor afford the tier.

Sooooo....I started selling off parcels and eventually kept just one 512. We had enjoyed decorating the large house over the year and a half or so we lived in it, but since we really don't entertain or anything, a house now is basically a place to change, relax, and have privacy.

Then "stuff" happened and I sold the 512, the first time being "homeless" in 2 years. My SL now, however, is more centered around my little business so I use one of my shops in which to relax and change clothes.

I've recently spotted a 1024 parcel I like at a good price though, so......

For the first few months of my life, I lived with my SL family on group-owned land. After a while, I got a job allowing me to support myself, and I moved out, to a nice island with three-story townhomes. It was really nice there, and the owners were nice; but after a while, I "adopted" a daughter, and 300 prims just weren't enough anymore, so I moved to another island owned by my first sl mother. I had full land owership rights on my parcel, but it did not include a house. So I bought a cheap prefab, and started learning how to build. Two weeks later, I pulled up the prefab and built my own - and we still live in it to this day!

A few months later, the club where I worked closed, and I lost a substantial amount of my income, so I had to find someplace cheaper to live. That's when I discovered Kit Kat Island. I was able to get into a parcel which offered more prims than my previous place, and still cost a lot less! I live there to this day!

Kit Kat Island's owners are absolute angels who will bend over backward to make their tenants feel at home, and will even resize available parcels to meet your needs. Regardless of parcel size or prim count, rent is a very reasonable 2L per prim. Currently, there are a few parcels available for rent, so if any of you are looking for a nice, quiet, friendly place to call home, it is well worth your time to take a look (http://slurl.com/secondlife/Kit%20Kat%20Island/128/128/23/). Also, if you decide to move there and let them know I referred you, I will give you 50% off of any of my prefabs!