Down with the land barons!

I recently settled down in a nice little sim which, when I bought my plot, had only 3 people living in it. Within 3 days I saw 12 lots purchased, a sign slapped up, and the prices doubled or trippled. These were land for the landless lots. All owned by the same group, Oriental something or other. As I started talking to other new land owners, I found that they too had a difficult time finding a 512m piece of land because they had all been bought and put back up on auction for double the price.

I find this to be a disturbing trend. It's hard enough to find a piece of land you like without having to pay double for it. And I think it really deters the new people who genrally don't have a whole lot of money to start with. What other effects, (if any) are people noticing?

The main effect is lots of posts in the forums along the lines of 'down with land barons'. I dunno that anyone has anything much else to say on the subject that hasnt been said in one of those

The rest of this thread will presumably either prove me wrong or tell me to stay the hell out of the land forum if I'm not interested

Well suffice to say I didn't see anything on the first 2 pages, and I didn't do a search for it. I guess the "Down with land barons" title was a little harsh. But being as I'm a newbie for the second time, (This is my second second life) I found it significantly harder to get land (most because before it was done via the land for the landless thread). Now it seems like there isn't really any choice. You either pay a large preimium to get land that should have only cost 512$ or you get there before the barons do. There isn't much choice, and it's almost to the point of being extortion.

well, Tharkis - there is a group called Land Angels that will give a 1022 sqm lot for a newbies 512 sqm lot. So if you don't like where you are, maybe you should contact one of them and see what can be done. I believe that the same group that bought and now has land for sale near you may be involved with Land Angels. So, before you condemn them, maybe a few questions would be appropriate first.

Gotta love free-market capitalism and uninformed consumers. My understanding of the "Land Angels" is that they are a group of barons who are stuck holding land they can't unload at any price. So they are trading worthless land for valuable land, under the appearance that they are doing something altruistic. These angels end up with good land that can be maked up and resold, and the hapless newbie ends up stuck with land that can't be sold. These "Angels" are taking advantage of newbies who don't understand how the market works or the relative values of the different plots of land. Now, tell me who should be condemned and who we should feel sorry for?

Note: In RL, you can easily get a listing of comp prices for recently sold property in your neighborbood. I'm think if a buyer could get a listing of comps for a sim, that might help prevent some of this kind of abuse. If they could see a 512 lot like the one they own was selling for $4000 and a 1024 lot they are being offered in trade was selling for $2000, they could make a better decision about what to do.

I am one of the Land Angels. I don't think you will ever see me referred to as a Land Baron. I have freely given away 1024 at a time when I just felt like it. I got nothing in return. I have since found Land Angels and donated 2048 snow srm. very nice and abutting Linden land.

Because I am not inworld that much it isn't a good idea to try to contact me. There are other land angels out there and they are approachable and easy to deal with.

Ya know Olmy - its pretty clear that you have no idea what you are talking about. So please do not think that what you are doing is a contribution to anyone's game betterment. *sigh*

I believe the name of the people selling the properties near me are called Oriental Dreams. And I suppose I don't understand what land is worth any more than any other land. 512m is 512m no matter how you look at it. In fact, the only thing that I can see diffrent is that some land borders on water, or hills, whereas others don't. What exactly make land unsellable? The fact that you can't mark it up to double or tripple the rates and still get rid of it? The location?

I'm looking for information, not trying to scold or start a flamewar..

Tharkis, I'm a basic member, so I'm not even in the market. But, just as any land market.. there are certain attributes that people favor which markup the prices of certai plots. So, a 512m plot next to a river should cost more than a 512m plot in the middle of nowhere. Of course, it's alot more complicated than that, but I hope you get the idea.

In which case, they are *not* owned by the person who started Land Angels, to my knowledge. Although I wouldn't be surprised if they were trying to knock off the names that person uses in order to divert public blame and suspicion from his/hersefl.

If you really think someone is buying first land plots without actualy being eligable for them, you should report it as abuse to the Lindens.

Tharkis, the land you noticed was bought by newbie who market it up and sold it with a profit to one realtor group. The realtor group then added their margin and put it for sale for going market rate. If you need help finding newbie land you are welcome message me and I can show you how the system works.

Olmy, Land Angels is non-profit. There is no land or money distributed to members.

That's some pretty good BS. What does non-profit mean? Are you a 501(c)(3) organization? If you take in land in trades, what happens to it? Isn't it eventually sold? Who gets that money? Who audits your books?

I have no objection to people applying fair markups to land sales and earning an honest linden. And I've seen a lot of wonderful, altruistic behavior in SL, and there are a lot of people I have respect for, so I'm not trying to be a cynic here. But I've heard a lot about newbies being cheated out of their First Land for way below market prices or trades for unsellable land, and that sucks.

What if I offered you a 512 or 1024 sqm plot. One, land-locked and surrounded in all four sides by clubs. The other, in a beautiful setting. Whatever is that you like; a beach, forest, snow mountain. Which one would you take? There is the answer to your question on value. The value of something is only meaningful to the person that is willing to pay for it. One person's trash, is another's treasure, and viceversa.

Like myself, I probably paid too much for my little hideaway and current home, but to me, and for the friends that come visit, it was worth it. Beautiful view, peaceful, lag free. I would not exchange it for any other property in SL.

- T -


ps. For the record. I have bought quite a few plots from Anshe and Oriental Dreams since I started. As a matter of fact, after I sold my land for the landless plot to my neighbor, the first private for-sale lot I bought was from them. I have never felt cheated or taken advantage of by Oriental Dreams or Anshe. Their pricing has always been in par with the SL economy at the time.

To my understanding...I don't think that the land barons are snatching up the first land. Only people who have never bought land before can buy first land.

There is one single exception in history of Second Life. The very day that the First Land feature was introduced one person found exploit and started buying up First Land plots without limitation.

He offered the land he bought using this exploit to one well known land baroness and suggested to share profit.

The land baroness asked him to stop and report the bug. He refused. So she called liason and thought it was game over.

One week later the land baroness had 30 neg rates and for first time became known as the bad land baroness who screws newbies. What happened? Many details are still unknown. But some time later the land baroness learned that before she received neg rates and was lynched on forums, said exploiter and his alts or friends had decided to take revenge and was spotted in busy mall telling people stories how the evil land baroness screwed him and other newbies.

I have a question;

How are the land barons getting the newbie land?

Are they creating new AV's and paying out 9.95 a month for each 512k plot?

Then are they collecting 500 in stippend a week for each of these alt accounts?

Then are they using these Alt account to accumulate dwell?

The answer to all these questions is Yes and its a form of gaming the current system.

How man members are in these land baron groups?

Cat

I live in the same area as Tharkis, and there are a lot of plots of land for sale by land barons, but there are also some god-awful buildings being put up in our pretty community! Some inept muppet has built a large nightclub with untextured, flat black walls and it's a blot on the landscape.

I wish there was a way to gently coerce people into building structures in keeping with their surroundings ...

I resent your implications here, Cat. I consider this to be a very good thing for newbies. I am not a 'land baron' nor do I have any alts. These constant attempts by you to diminish anything connected to people that trade in land, and now, folks like me who are not trading but just going about our SL lives, are really not helping anyone understand anything. Yuo are using these threads as a means of venting yourself. Please stop it.

You don't need to bother responding that 'this does nothing for you' ... I am not trying to do anything for or against you. I would like the same treatment please.

You are what I consider at this point to be out of control. You once advised me to take a forum break. I will now suggest that you do the same. The 'self muting' was going to begin when??

Who said i was implying anything? Especialy about you? I dont understand why you would be offended by the truth. Unless you have had your head burried in the sand we all know this is one method of gaming the current dwell system.

I was responding to the thread not to anything you have done. did I mention your group? no. Unless of course your group is considered a Land baron group. then I stand by my words and you should take note.

please re read my post. I did not call you out, I did not mention your group or your name. I think you read what you wanted to and didn't hear my words.

Cat

As an officer of Land Angels.. hmmm ,,, How could I have gotten that impression?

Debates about how Second Life should deploy land are very welcome. Please don't distract from that debate with personal accusations. If you think someone is breaking the rules in SL then send an email to [email]abuse@lindenlab.com[/email].

if someone pays the fee to own land and makes multiple accounts instead of just raising thier tier level is wasteing their time.

as a noob you can only buy 512 for cheap, any real land baron won't waste their time with such trivial amounts. It is easy to IM any land for the landless person and offer them land trades, or to buy their land for a decent price.

to use alts for ratings isn't very effective
to use alts for dwell is EXTREMELY way too time consuming to be financially viable
to use alts for land allocation is way too expensive VS land tier cost
to use alts for land for the landless purchase is unnessessary and also time consuming

to "game" the system would take the place of a full time job and would make dramaticaly less $$.

most alts exist for the sole reasons of hiding from players, and for group endeavor.

any other alts being used or attempted to be use for a cash flow is actually a waste of time and money.

Land barons are land traders, and what they do is allowed by anyone in the system with the time and cash. (as said in 100,000 threads before)

some land traders are less liked then others but don't group the land tading field all together as unscrupulous sharks when you have ill will toward a group or individual.

There is: form a group of local, like-minded landowners and create some building/zoning rules for yourselves. Recruit, by some chosen means, other people in the area to do the same.

I discussed this with Anshe in game and this is what I was told: Thier group buys your newbie land. They then give you a 1024m of snow covered PG land. I contacted her because I wanted to know what the catch is. Of course she responded that there is no catch. And supposing you wanted snow covered PG land, there's not. But I had to decline because I wanted M land. I can see now how they get away with it. They take the money that they get when they sell the land to the "Realtors" (Read: Land Barons) and then the new owners jack up the price even more (to the tune of 3-4 times the original price in some cases). Anshe's group probably doesn't make enough money to sustain itself, so I am sure they get donations of land and cash from somewhere. But I feel they are still a part of the problem in a way. While I think they are trying to do good in giving newbies a little more land to play with, they are at the same time taking land away from other newbies who want a nice little 512m M piece of land to call thier own.

I think in this case it's someone wanting to help, but not realizing the full effect it has on the economy.

I am not sure what's going on here or how Snow Angels work, but there are a few misconceptions here, I think.

First Land is priced very, very low. You can only buy it once. There are always plenty of First Land lots available for L$512. I've seen anywhere from 100 to 200 in the Find menu at any one time.

When you want to move out of your First Land lot, you should set it for sale at market prices. This may be anything from twice what you paid, up to ten times what you paid. You look at other land for sale in your Sim, work out the L$/m2 ratio, and use that to price your lot. You should first offer your land to your neighbors, as they may be only too glad to have the opportunity to expand without moving. But even if you do that, it makes good sense to still ask a decent market price, to give you the cash you'll need for your next land. Once First Land is bought, it becomes as valuable as any other land in that Sim.

I'm not sure why you're saying the "land barons" are taking the opportunity away from other new residents to own land, as no new resident should be buying land from them anyway. They should be buying First Land only. As far as trading up with Snow Angels is concerned, I offer the following plan to determine if it is worth it for you:

1) Work out how much you could get by selling your land on the open market.
2) Check the prices of 1024m2 of land in the Sims that Snow Angels are currently offering.
3) If 1) is less than 2), go with Snow Angels.
4) If 1) is greater than 2), sell your land yourself, and use the cash to buy the lot of your dreams.

If you have a really nicely positioned 512m2 in a Mature Tropical Sim, chances are that yes - it is more valuable than 1024m2 in a hard-to-sell PG Snow Sim. But only research will tell you for sure.

Before you buy or sell land, I recommend you drop by one of my Land Ownership 101 classes, usually midday on Sundays. This class offered under the SL Instructor program, will ensure you have all the information you need to progress up the land ownership ladder without being ripped off.

Ursa, if you have a notecard with details of the Snow Angel program, could you drop one on me in-game and I'll make sure my students get a copy of it during the next running of the class.

Just to emphasize - this is incorrect. Newbies who want a nice little 512m2 M piece of land to call their own should look for a First Land lot for $512. They should not be buying the land from other players at any price. First Land lots being resold usually go to neighbors for expansion - at market prices. Very rarely are they sold to someone who does not already own land in the same Sim - and if that does happen, it's often a land swap where people want to move closer to friends.