It is very much a broken system, although on a server like Balmung, I would expect land to be quite difficult to obtain even if there was some mechanism of evicting inactive players.

You will probably have to wait until 3.1 to experience that much of the content billed for 3.0, as rumors claim that SE is concerned that introducing new housing wards along with all of the new areas would lead to significant server problems.

You can rightly blame the vocal minority of land-owners for complaining cacophonously when SE revealed their plans for inactivite lot purges, as they believed themselves entitled to take away content from paying, active subscriptions while retaining the luxury of unsubscribing and keeping all of the houses they purchased. The sense of entitlement there is breath-taking.

Also blame SE for backing down on their plan to evict inactive subscriptions from their homes. The customer isn't right if they're not paying.