Quote Originally Posted by Silverbane View Post
Perhaps SE shouldn't refund all of the losing bidder's money. Perhaps they should only refund, say, 95% of it. Anyone who can afford to put down 5, 20, or 50 million for a chance at a house can afford to lose 5% of it.
Thinking up more and more and more punitive measures isn't a solution to this. The solution is for SE to improve the system and give something that personal users can use for the commonly stated needs - a place of their own, a place to garden, a place to put event furniture and the other stuff we really commonly see.

As it stands the system isn't working well. It's straining at the seams.

Some of the recent suggestions here are not going to help;

Taxes on existing homeowners are not a solution.
Refunding 95% of losing bids is not a solution.
Making houses personal only is not a solution.
Limiting FCs to 20 active users or they lose the house is not a solution.
Making personals glorified apartments entered in from FC doors is not a solution.
Even shifting the ward split as it stands is not a long term solution - although it will ease the pain for 2 cycles.

Certainly all of this punitive stuff needs to stop.

The only solution is for SE to sit down and work out what players want for personal housing, then implement it. And honestly, putting ones voice towards that is a lot more productive than working out new creative ways to punish other players.

Housing is a major feature for a lot of players, right now it's seriously over subscribed, and it's given very little time by the developers compared to say ... PVP.