Yes or No, and Explain, Please.

[Judah_Brandt]

The Market Board still exists. My version of "fair" would be that the price of the house isn't dictated by the player base, it's dictated by the server as it is now. Just because I bought a house from the server for 14.5 million Gil doesn't immediately make the inherent value of that piece of content shoot up. My ownership adds zero value to that plot. If I build a house, if I add a garden, if I put a bunch of couches in the house - none of that adds value as it is not transferred to another player. Your side of the argument is that just by buying the plot you should automatically be able to sell it for more. What is your reasoning? Is it because of the limitations on the housing market, therefor you can now dictate the price as opposed to what the game values and dictates that content is worth?

Players can still sell their crafted wares for whatever price they deem appropriate - that is a free market. The housing market has clear prices set per server based upon data on that server's economy (poor, medium, rich) and that is the value of the property. The demand is created because there is a shortage of that asset, but the game does not account for supply and demand, the value of a plot is static and depreciates over time as the plot is not purchased, much like the Market Board has items that players reduce the cost on over time in order to entice its sale. The problem here is that you're trying to take the static value that the game charges for a feature (housing) and holding that ransom. Since you're unaware of what that word means I will help you.

"Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner or item to extort money or property to secure their release, or it may refer to the sum of money involved."

You're saying that the player should be allowed to dictate the value of something that they literally can not dictate - The player can not increase the server-side price of a plot of land in the game. What they do is purchase the land for it's actual, defined cost, and then literally hold onto it in order to extort the player base into paying exorbitant amounts for a feature that cost them what it actually should have. If you don't understand how that's unfair I don't understand what level of comprehension you are capable of. Before you reply with an interpretation of this where you compare a static, game defined market to the player driven free one, please pause a moment to understand that they are two completely different things. You are not transferring any form of ownership for this fee. As you said before, you're exchanging an in-game action for in-game currency which is quite literally extortion since you are the sole definer of the market's value. The player has to pay whatever you ask, as you won't relinquish the plot otherwise, and that action in and of itself is far from perfect since it is entirely possible for the whole thing to blow up in your faces i.e. another player could walk up and purchase the plot thus negating any "deal" you had in place, then you're both out of Gil because not only did you just lose your "asset" but you'd have to refund the other person's Gil.

As for accounts that have been banned for illicit activity, why do you think there's an entire subreddit for these transactions. Yes, there are people who've been banned. Yes, there are people who've been warned, and yes, they absolutely deserve it.

You said it yourself "start the housing reverse auction at higher than what the property is actually worth..."

Clearly even you know it's wrong to get more than you paid for something when you add zero value to it. Leveraging a feature's scarcity against another player is toxic behavior, through and through. Notice I didn't say item, because housing isn't an item, is not part of the economy, and no matter what you say you can't magically define it that way because it isn't. It's a player-created market driven by personal greed. Fact.