Expensive New Continent

The textures and Linden builds are going to make this new continent a hotbed of land speculation. Personally I like the industrial builds, but this ultra-colorful beach is over the top! Would you pay extra for dazzly multicolor sand-moss? : D

Hm, I see water parcelled out into many many 512s. Looks like newbie land rush coming up...

The new textures on the rough terrain are an interesting blend of amorphous greens (like the NW Coastal clumpy stuff) and some more structured detail suggesting spreading groundcover or brush. Usually I'd expect more grey rock on rough terrain like this. Well done. : )

That would be a land baron's worst nightmare. I am glad I only hold a bit of telehub land. Now the question is when the new land gets released for sale or auction.

anwr is a bit laggy as well, so hopefully they will put telehubs up soon. That might lower values if they dont. Otherwise, I cant wait until I get my parcel there. And im not a n00b.

Just found something I'd pay extra for: Atol road texture. It's WAY better than the plain blacktop on the old continent. The new texture looks like someone set rough cobblestone pavers in their garden, and let the moss grow between them. Very attractive.

The Irishy-looking sort of cobblestone effect in Iris is exactly what will make people salivate and start a huge stampede and a land rush. Others are going to like even that odd sand just because it is different. The barons will likely not be able to buy it fast enough or get it parceled fast enough. It's curious that so much of it seems to be under water or with way too many plants (will require having to blow off prims to get space) -- it means harder work and slower parceling for barons.

The problem in pricing will come when people on the old sim face the necessity of having to liquidate to move. Some will be cautious and want to sell their land for what they paid or near to it. They will have real trouble finding buyers; they might sit tight, or they might come down a little. Many will quickly liquidate their land at 5 or 3 even for mature because they will want that new sim badly, just like they want existing new sims badly without lag and clutter and ugly builds, and are prepared to liquidate all the time. Liquidation in search of new sims is the bread-and-butter of the land baron business little studied by those who follow the land market. People get so fed up with slow FPS, griefers, bad builds, etc that they justify dumping their land for 5 or less and getting the hell out to the high country.

Land barons are already liquidating out their own person stock, and looking in every nook and cranny to set their matures to 6.5, not 9.5 where they can to get quick sales before there is a giant sucking sound -- the sound of their customers flowing out to the new continent. I see more and more mistakes being made by barons as they parcel they are in such a rush to get that land off their inventories. This is just my anecdotal experience as I fly around my own properties and others. Others are welcome to comment if they see it differently, but that's what I see.

Some individuals are likely to press "release" when they contemplate glumly sitting on their old ugly laggy boring plots on the old sims, when the gleaming new sims beckon with the promise of eternal beauty and quietude safe from griefing -- that age-old SL illusion.

Meanwhile, several landbarons have already positioned themselves to market zoned sims and will snap the sims up whole and run their zoning schemes to ensure that the new sims do stay nice.

Eventually, the novelty will pale, the usual clutter and lag will pop up (the newest city with the fanciest build had an FPS of 47 when I was there due to all the av attention), and people will ebb back to the old country, where they will find bargains awaiting for them, or their old untilled plots....

I imagine those who fall somewhere between the individual plot holder who can afford to press "release" to get the gleaming new sim, and the giant wholesaler who can allow volume and special positioning and deals to tide him over, will be the ones to be screwed. That is, they will have larger land groups with no one to buy or rent in them as the frenzy in the new sims surges. They could sell some of it, but it will be at a loss. Those that can afford to hang on and continue to serve some who will still rent and save for the new sim will probably do better. The first generation of those who came in about 6 weeks ago and saved to get into the new zoned sims are now appearing, and leaving rentals or cheap newbie land to go to their more higher-priced zoned sims.

The variables to watch will be:

-- will newbies come to the old played out sims where they know they can find real bargains? 1024s for $3000? 512s for an actual $512 but in a good location?
--or will newbies pick up that they better rush to the new land, and will the Lindens have a huge first-land dump like they just did in the last 2 weeks in the old sims?
--will long time established players who have worked hard to buy up and maintain whole or quarter or half sims remain impervious to the land rush, and hold on to what they have?
--will the midbie or wannabee barons get a real leg up now in the market because of so much new land and so much demand, and due to the older barons needing to empty out their old-sim laggy inventory and take on the administrative headaches of new zoned sims?
--will the Lindens stop rolling out land now that they have really glutted the market, well and truly?
--will the rolling out of the next new version be accompanied by serious problems like crashes and log-in freezes that lose customers?

I see another question here:

- Will LL Rent some of these parcels, not sell?

That will be one of the few ways to allow the water city part of the build to survive a land rush.

The bare land itself will fall to the normal changes, and likely most of the grass and trees will go away. *shrug* But the water-stilt city looks too nice and too big a build that they'd allow it to just be returned or deleted...

A note from LL as to what their plans are with this would be nice.

The real question is how fast the land gets 'scrubbed' by landowners returning linden objects. I say a few days from actual sale after auction - first buyer of the land besides the wholesaler, that is.

Its a shame, but inevitable. Take your pictures now.

Prokofy et al : LL releases land to auction at a predefined rate. The amount of land available on the new continent is not going to flood the market in one big gulp. It will take MONTHS for people to really colonize this new continent.
Also, v1.6 allows builds to be sold with the land, simultaneously. They can still return it afterwards, of course, but if you're a noob and you're getting a free house, why would you?

Eggy, LL may release land to auction at a predefined rate -- a formula only they know based on statistics only they have about newbies joining and their first-land and other buying patterns (known to them only). But even if predefined, it still means unpredictable to us. They don't release it at a steady and predictable rate and that is what can make it chaotic, unpredictable, and cause panicky rushes and crashes.

We have no idea if they will flood or not, really, seeing that some weeks they release a few sims, other weeks whole bunches; some weeks they release entire sims available as a sim; other weeks they chop them up; some weeks they had 8 first-lands; now other weeks 100 first-lands. Maybe someone with computer simulators and massive amounts of computer programming can plot algorithms or whatnot to predict Linden land release behaviour, but for the rest of us, there is only uneasy speculation.

We all realize that 1.6 has the ability to weld objects to land. But what we don't know is whether these Linden builds are going to be perma-welded on land that stays Linden -- as has been noted already -- will they rent? Or *gasp* will they zone? Will they have some feature where you can right-click and *rent from the Lindens* or "own" as you can in Anshe's or Nexus' zoned areas (or mine for that matter), where you pay a flat purchase price but not really own the land permanently, then pay tier in Lindens or on Paypal or something? We don't know that yet, do we?

I can't overestimate the value of a Linden build. People will pay double -- triple -- fourple -- the ordinary market price just to set themselves down next to even the ugliest Linden road in the most inappropriate place, even with a railroad bridge that some find truly ugly and out of place especially when no trains come. But people do this because Linden means safe, predictable (unlike the land market itself lol) and the main thing -- free of idiot builds, griefing, viewblockers, and ugly that surprises (at leats its known, predictable ugly). I used to flee from Linden roads, telehubs, and railrays because they seemed completely out of place in a fantasy world. Now I hunger for them because they mean SAFETY. Knowing that their land around their built structures has that hugely valuable market value, I wonder if the Lindens will allow their products to fly off land then.

I do agree about the plants -- there are just way too many and people will flush them off, sad but true. They take up prims, after all.

"fourple?"

Ah! Quadruple-lucky friend!

You are the lucky winner of today's contest to see who is really reading and paying attention to every word in Prokofy's long-winded verbacious ranting posts!

Come and collect your FREE 512-square from the exotic, exciting, flat PG sim of Pickerel!

(Oh, dear, what's *second* prize??)

I think alot of people will sit tight and not move, unless they tier up to buy more land on the new continent. But new sims have been rolling out every month for quite a while now. As Prok pointed out, older and middle aged players have built up their areas and starting from scratch in a new sim is a sketchy proposition.

I'm always excited to see new land, but now that I've invested time and effort into my surroundings, I don't feel like budging. I like the sims where I have land, the neighbours, and the builds. Even Lash and Talen's run down crack house next to me in Boardman. YOU BUMS!

Considering what you have in the established sims, Ingrid, I completely understand. I'm too new to have experienced the snow sim rollout, but experienced players have described the initial high-priced buying enthusiasm. Why should the new continent be any different? New continent land is going to be expensive, thus likely to be chopped up into a multitude of small plots. That leads to a chaotic clash of styles as many many landowners jammed into one area all start building.


Maxx Monde:

Unfortunately this is good advice. Returning all Linden plants seems to be the norm among small plot builders. Boardman is a good example of what people do right when they are willing to situate their houses in adequate space with well-thought-out landscaping.

So yes I'm exploring, and taking pics. : ) Here's a Linden maintenance request for the new continent. It's right by the well-designed falls at Zephyr 51, 247. These falls DON'T have angular rocks. Great! But we get flattened half-spheres instead. They look like mushroom caps. One got away, and lodged itself in a nearby treetop. No I didn't rez this thing -- my av is highlighting it so it shows up. (Tree foliage disappears with the viewpoint this close to the object).

At first I thought that sand was a marble texture and you were just playing with us. I was very sad when I realized you weren't.

Nope, no joke, I think it's most like a coral beach, we have WAY more then enough sand beaches on the main continent as it is. I think this Mongolian style continent is a fantastic new additions to the semi-played out beaches that we are used too. Also dont forget that 1.6 has the "sell land with contents" options, so you will most likely see the stilt homes/buildinds being sold with the land. Though I dont know how long I expect them to stand after they are sold.

- Sam

That's why I think LL may be in better position to declare some of that as protected, like they did some snow sims, and open it to the occasional event or perhaps allow an adjunct to the Anzere build/community.

*shrug* The only major thing of interest here to me would be the land textures. If new and existing private islands had access to those, it could be most interesting in the future.

What might happen is that some people buying this land would prefer to remove the Linden structures (if they are anything like most buyers dealing with what is put on their land) but they might keep them, and we might see a secondary market developing in second-hand Linden structures from the new continent, sold to the less fortunate in the old continent and adapted for use there.

Oh, I'm going to be a terrible bore and say I already have weatherbeaten boardwalks and docks and stilt houses in my communities, and I even have Tiki huts LOL. Apparently I'm not the first to think of them, though in my fevered brain I like to think the Lindens maybe copied this idea at least in part from me and others who made boardwalks and Tiki. They are nice. They are fun to hang out in. If you can't TP to the new continent, IM me and I will TP you to my versions LOL.

Seriously, I dn't see why the Lindens don't just make a normal announcement explaining what they will do with these structures and new sims, where and how they will be sold, etc.

I can see it now: some enterprising newb with a Linden connection is going to start selling TPs to the new continent for $100 a TP lol.

The first auction land has appeared in Cecropia. Here we go ... !

*Renames old continent Necropia.*

*Steps aside while stampede goes out to new continent.*

*Watches prices plummet on old continent and picks up a few grand bargains.*

*Waits 30 days patiently, paying tier and renting to newbies and appreciative oldbies.*

*Stays away from new continent auctions which will be horribly overpriced.*

*Rents some great land on the old continent to people disillusioned with new crapped-up laggy continent.*

Land-ho!

Charlotte:

Update: And Cecropia is sold -- for surprisingly low prices. There's still first land unsold in more than one sim. Even some of the resale land is as reasonable in price as the mainland. Guess we don't get a repeat of the snow sim rollout after all.

It's great news for those of us who like to fly around exploring. I watched the moths' flight behavior as they flitted between the lights. Those are good moths. Are they listening for commands on some channel? How do I get moths to like me?

Then the train appeared. : ) Nigel was hiding his train experiments in Obscure, but two of us found him anyhow.

So it hasn't come a Cecropia then

*groan*

Cecropia is PG and it never sells very well, even in the old continent, it's down to $3 or less in many places there and even barons reprice it only 4-5.

What's interesting is that the first Mature-rated sim has now got two hours left on the block and it is only bidding at about $3/m which is very low for an auction at this stage in mature, and especially for the new continent which we're thinking might be speculated. But it might be that a number of people are waiting for the clock to run out and see where the shoe drops:

Euryalus 001 (192,3 - 9728 m2 L$31,000 2h 11m

But take a look at the Columbia parcels including a small one and you'll see it's up at $9/m at the auction already, which is usually a mark-up in-world price, not auction price.

You can see that the Linden's strategy may have been to first low-ball the auction to test the waters by putting up their "worst" land, i.e. the PG closer to the first landing points from Purple which are already cluttered up with the usual cheap low-prim pre-fabs and halting experiments.

Next, they put up not-so-great and not-so-waterfront land valued in Lindens, not dollars. But coming up now is prime waterfront with dollar-value, so let's see how it does by the end of the day.

First-land resales are moving fairly briskly and at very inflated prices by contrast to the new continent. I judge this market not by how many are left, but how many have been sold which is faster than for other new sims.

There's nothing left right now in the second-hand/first-land market at any "reasonable" price -- just a few parcels wherel newbies are optimistically marking up to 25/meter or Anshe is more reasonably marking up to $5999, but for 512s all by themselves with no company, which end-users aren't going to get, and certainly no newbies.

When first-landers sell here for $3000-$5000 in PG or M they are being snapped up and resold and changing hands a number of times and resting at about $4000 or PG and $6000 for M which is like the cost of telehub in the old continent.

To be sure, the first-land is sitting there roasting in the sun. But that's because it is difficult to reach the new continent. Distances are 1000 or so between some of the areas for sale, and there are no telehubs. Just getting to the new continent is difficult for some because of the sim seams. And despite all the hype we're aware of, I still come across both old and new people who never heard of the new continent. When the telehubs are built these problems will ease.