If you were buying land would you buy mainland or island land?

Mainland or offshore? Please also tell me why you voted for each.

that's not really an either/or question. why not both for different purposes?

The most compelling reasons for purchasing an island versus mainland are that you get infinitely more control and better tools with an island, and on an island you can't be griefed by neigbouring owners.

Which really says it all in my humble opinion.

Exactly I need a "both" option

Depends on the circumstance. I bought mainland right now because I'm a newb, and that First Land has already paid for itself and the tier payment via being able to list my little store in Find.

However, if I had an opportunity to move to an island where a major business has its primary outlet, like the mall where ETD and Nyte'n'Day have their megastores, I would jump on it in a heartbeat.

I think I lean towards Island land, because of how consistent the builds are, and the enforced rules. But I also like the fantasy of moving somewhere in the mainland and having an emergent community rise up from all the neighbors working together to make something beautiful.

Technically, unless your buying your own island yourself, your not really 'buying' your own land per se. You can't go buy an island and sell it off in chunks (unless your Anshe apparently). You can however deed plots of land on a island to a group (and charge them a land fee and collect tier from them), however the island owner still technically owns the land and can boot you off it at anytime. To me, that's the biggest drawback of owning land on an island. I want to be able to buy/use/sell my land free of restrictions (except those imposed by LL), and really, mainland plots are really the only ones free to let you do that.

Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

When version 1.12 arrives, Island owners will be able to sell it off in chunks directly to the person via the land selling tool without having to deed it to a group. This will also mean that you can sell the land automatically.

And yes, it is still true that the island owners "owns" the island and can boot you off, but in the end, nobody really owns anything here except LindenLab. It doesn't really matter, as long as you have a trustworthy landlord.

Sweet! Does that then mean your be paying your teir for sale land to LL or the island owner?

The release notes regarding estate sales:


Since the island owner is still paying tier to LL, you pay your tier to the island owner. It's not going to be possible to manage automatically either (not yet, I hope). So you still have to pay a terminal or something else, depending on where it is.
This is only a good thing though, since most of the time you pay less than what you would pay to LL in tier fees

Hmm.. mabey someone can explain the advantage to this new system. The only real difference I can tell is that a parcel can be owned by an individual instead of a group, but the island owner is still on the hook for the tier fee if the land owner doesn't pay.

There's already island owners out there charging xxxL for the parcel, and then charging tier, so I'm not sure what benefit this new tool really offers except for what I mentioned in the paragraph above.

This would be far more beneficial if the island could be developed, then sold off plots with the land owners paying LL the tier instead, again like several of the Anshe sims. I'd be far more interested in that than having to 'rent' (collect teir).

Due to the fact the island owner will own a large amount of land; his/her tier fees to LL will be less. The Island owner can then charge residents a little more than the island owner pays LL but still less than an individual buying a plot of land on the island would individually pay to LL due to his/her very small amount of land owned. (If you could buy plots of land on an island and pay your own tier directly to LL like in your example.)

The more land you own, the less tier you pay per 512. You can look up the land tier charges by amount of land here on the website. Other people like it because you can set up restrictions on what is built, etc. On mainland you may buy a great parcel with a nice water view, and then someone moves in next door and puts up a massive "Impeach Bush" Billboard, lol. And many people can't afford to buy a whole island themselves...

Cheers!

The current course is towards one with a focus on estates and away from mainland. To achieve this, tools need to be made that make it easier to sell and get land offshore.
The benefits as I see them:

-More transparant way of obtaining island-land; the owner of the island can set an agreement that will pop up and a potential resident has to agree to.
-Easier to sell; now the island owner has to be physically there to deed the plot to a group. This costs time, especially in larger enterprises. To automate this is a step forward. Also, it will now show up (I think, correct me if I am wrong) in the list of land for sale, making it easier for people to find.

I hope that helped

I'm a little confused by this statement as I was unaware that the teir rates were changing as well. Would not the island's owner tier fees stay the same as they are now $195 per sim per month. Granted, the island owner can collect 'teir' from the residents, but that's always been the case so really the new system doesn't change that.

Thank you, that helped clarify things. I've been looking at possibly aquiring a private sim, any tools provided would certainly make my life easier in that regard.

Ah sorry. I don't do much land trading and only own a bit of land, so I'm not the best person to be answering this. I thought you meant that each plot of land should be charged tier fee based on how much land they have on the island. Not divide the island evenly. I'm attaching a link of the charges for tier fees. Notice the land gets cheaper as you own more of it. That's what I was talking about. So if one person owned the whole island and thus got a better deal of the land tier fees, he/she might be able to sell the land and have people pay a lower tier fee than if each person on the island with a part of the island would have to pay his/her tier fee based on thee attached rates.

But obviously that was not what you meant. Sorry.

http://secondlife.com/whatis/landpricing.php

What he meant is that you pay less tier relatively. Meaning that when you have an island, you pay less per sq.m, but more overall.

If you own 32,768 m2, it costs US$125.
If you own 65,536 m2(or more), 32,768 sq.m costs 195/2->US$97.50

Since the difference is bigger for even smaller amounts of land, the fees can be reduced somewhat over LL's own because there's enough margin for it.

mainland. I prefer to keep my land contiguous.