fyi, scam alert

Again, this is for the new players. When you "buy" or rent land on a private island ("estate", it is very important to read the land covenants, if there is one. There usually is one. You right click on the bare ground (not covered with a sidewalk, etc), click About Land, and then click the Covenant tab. Usually the owner of the land will tell you whether 1) resales of land are allowed and 2) if subletting of the land is allowed. Subletting simply means that you lease your rented land to another person. Some owners allow resales and subletting. Some do not. I do not. My contracts are always with the original renter, never with a "resales buyer" or with a "sub-lessee".

If you rented or bought private island land from someone who sold or rented it to you against the Land Covenants, there is a good chance you will lose your land, unless you contact the land owner to make other arrangements. Caveat emptor, not everyone is honest and forthright when it comes to private islands. Read the Land Covenants. Protect yourself. Make sure you know who the rightful owner of a private island is.

Ok, I had to read your post twice to understand. My "guess" is that the Covenant owner is THE owner of the PI. Once I rent my PI parcels to someone, they display as the "owner" although I am still the owner. The covenants tab for my parcels display me as the owner.

Hmmm, in the context of your original post this is less confusing how? So now we have a plot that can show TWO owners for one piece of land? Makes me think that renting on a PI can be more confusing than it is worth.

Max, who is actually sticking with the mainland...

When a tenant rents by "buying" via the Buy button on the parcel, it makes him or her the owner. Now, as we all know, to really own that parcel, you really have to own the entire PI. Other owners handle this by using rent boxes. I just find that, in general, the buy button works better for me. By each tenant "buying" their parcel, they get the full land controls without me having to fuss any further. 99% of the time there's no problems. The other 1% is the less than honest original renter.

There is no scam - this is the way the crazy land system works. There are two ways of renting here, and you need to know how it works. Renting without purchasing the parcel gives you far less power than if you have the parcel. The only scammers are the people trying to pass it off as mainland, or those that try to obscure the covenant terms or write overly stringent covenants.

Sorry, you're wrong in this case. Nuff said.

Thanks for the heads up

How completely unresponsive. It's not a scam if you actually read what is put in front of you. It is only a scam if it is fraudulent. Ignorance is not fraud. Misdirection is fraud. If you don't understand, it doesn't make it a scam.

Now, some island owners confuse the concept and market their island as "land sales" - but this is true only to the degree that LL considers you the owner of the parcel, although not the owner of the estate, who has the right to reclaim a sold parcel. Plus, as owner, your powers over the parcel are greatly increased. This is how the game works. If you don't like it, tough cookies. But that is how it is. It's not misdirection until someone tries to pass it off as something else. If the covenant depicts the land as mainland or something like that, then you have the right to scream fraud. Until you find actual fraud, it is not a scam. End of story.

The SL sim considers you the owner as far as parcel abilities go, but LL will not recognize ownership of a private sim parcel by anyone other than the sim owner..

I'm not sure why you think that? I never paid for either of my two private sim parcels, and both are deeded to a group I own.

For renters of pi parcels, it really depends on the group you join and what privileges the group owner has allowed to the members. I think it important you check that before shelling out any lindens. Otoh, you might be able to twist your sim owner's arm a bit and get some power like media control, terraforming, or griefer control, etc, if it is not already part of the list of delegated powers.

As Kitty said, it is even better if you own the group and the owner deeded the parcel to your group.

Although the island owner is the ultimate holder of the bill, when the parcel title is transferred, it will show up in "My Land", although it will not count toward LL's billing tier. I guess that is the same thing as you said and we are talking about the same thing.

When I say renting without purchasing, I'm talking about paying someone else into a little box, without using "buy land" or "buy for group." People do that too. They are not given the title to the parcel.

Cristalle, I really think you should go back and read the original post before going on. This thread is about something completely different from what you are talking about.

Or at least it was.

Mileage varies, but I think the majority of private island rental parcels get deeded to a group owned by the renter, as Kitty said. If the renter defaults, the estate owner always has the ability to reclaim the parcel. It would be impractical for the renter to control unwanted objects/scripts/etc on their parcel otherwise, and it would be hugely impractical for the island owner to control prim usage on the island as a whole.

Mainland rental is a different story, the parcel is never deeded to the renter or his/her group, as there is no way for the original owner to reclaim it.

Exactly. Which is why residents should never buy covenant land: It adds the layer of a third-party between the resident "purchasing" the land and Linden Lab. Yes, some landlords are uber-wonderful and some landlords are non-uber-wonderful, but the whole situation can be avoided by purchasing mainland parcels. It removes the third-party (the landlord) from the equation.

Mainland is best for some. Others prefer private estates for various reasons. To say one is better than the other is to assume a homogenous group of land buyers. Mainland is transacted simply, yes. But private estates offer significant value. This may include a more flexible tier structure (payable in multiple currencies), no premium account requirement, zoning regulations that keep unwanted elements out of a sim, etc. Decided what's best for you, not what's best for everyone. Good luck!