A Better Way for Houses Up For Grabs

[Jojoya]

I see a lot of suggestions get tossed around for housing but seems like people are opposed to most of them

Because most of them don't actually fix anything. They just exchange one set of problems for a different set.

What we need is something that fixes the problem.

[tdb]

Everything has problems, it's just that different people value different things.
- The current ward system is hard to scale as player count increases
- If the amount of wards is made high enough, everyone will move to medium or large houses, resulting in ghost wards with a lot of empty small plots
- Instanced housing doesn't have neighbors
- Vacated plots being immediately available for purchase allows flipping
- The current timer system requires insane time investment to get your first house on a crowded server
- In a lottery system a player is unable to obtain advantage over others

[ItMe]

- If the amount of wards is made high enough, everyone will move to medium or large houses, resulting in ghost wards with a lot of empty small plots

Maybe to some extent, but people won't just gravitate to the larger option. Each size is good for it's own thing.
You can't make a cozy cottage out of a large and not everyone wants to make a mansion.

[tdb]

Maybe to some extent, but people won't just gravitate to the larger option. Each size is good for it's own thing.
You can't make a cozy cottage out of a large and not everyone wants to make a mansion.

Possibly. But seeing how fast the larges and mediums got grabbed in the ward expansion compared to smalls, I strongly suspect that the distribution of plot sizes does not match players' desires for them.

[ItMe]

Possibly. But seeing how fast the larges and mediums got grabbed in the ward expansion compared to smalls, I strongly suspect that the distribution of plot sizes does not match players' desires for them.

I agree 100%.
The distribution doesn't match demand.
But people won't run towards available larges the way water runs downhill.

[Sindele]

The notion that house flippers are a scourge to be stopped is why we now have a bunch of houses being held by people that don't want them, hoping to relocate into their dream plots and neglecting the houses they do have, while house sales still happen at significant increase from the prices they used to command. It also means that you can't just be diligent with your ward scanning and get lucky - every find is one you're going to have to contest, often against bots and the very same flippers and rich people you're afraid of. *It's already a lottery*, and one more biased against you than you think.

The people using houses as a money-making apparatus aren't stopped by the difference between 3m and 30m, and the flippers are only stopped from cutting small profits at the very direct cost of you now having *literally zero option* to get a personal house other than playing the placard luck game or engaging in Housing Savage when new wards are released.

[Jojoya]

The notion that house flippers are a scourge to be stopped is why we now have a bunch of houses being held by people that don't want them

Flippers are a scourge that needs to be stopped because all they do is buy up what's available for personal profit instead of allowing those houses to go directly to players that would use them.

No one is being prevented from giving up a house they don't want. You simply clear the furnishings from the house, remove the estate hall then relinquish the plot.

If they aren't relinquishing it, then clearly they want it for some reason and generally that something comes down to wanting gil for giving it up. After all, there's no cost for keeping it.

Nothing will stop the flippers as long as there is a limited number of houses that's less than the number of players and FCs that wish to own them. That is why SE needs to improve the housing system so supply of houses will always meet demand and that means focusing on an instanced system that's more comprehensive than just apartments. The existing wards can remain but stop throwing more resources into creating more wards when that's not solving the problem.

[Sauteed]

Because most of them don't actually fix anything. They just exchange one set of problems for a different set.

What we need is something that fixes the problem.

Hi. Instead of cutting off the rest of the post please include where I said exactly this.

[Catstab]

If the timer was removed we'd be back at the rich players buying up all the empty plots they can find and selling them for profit. The timer makes that impossible to do reliably. A lottery would as well, but it would also allow people to plan their schedules. Do you have an alternative solution for stumping house flippers?

I have a solution, I posted it in my own thread

When housing launched, a small cost 40 million, a medium 150 million, a large 500 million. These prices aren't suited to being flipped and they also gouge the profits of shell FC workshop farmers. The price being so high also reduces demand since a smaller percentage of the playerbase qualifies for housing.

People complained the price was high, I've heard that Yoshi P responded 'If I lower the price, wealthy players might buy up everything' but people still pushed. So prices were cut down by 90%. Now anyone who could have afforded a house can afford 10 houses. With a 3m pricetag, anyone who is progressing in the MSQ can afford a house. And we have ~4300 personal houses per server.

[Mavrias]

just do a 24- hour long bidding system. A house starts at the regular base price and for 24 hours anyone looking to purchase their first house or relocate from their own plot can make a bid on it as many times as they like until the period is over. The highest bid at the end gets the plot, everyone else's gil is refunded.

Boom, fair, no RNG and no one has to wait by a placard all day if they don't want to.