Why Removing Houses from inactive is NOT a solution.

[Dyvid]

No. It's simple numbers. There are a finite number of housing plots. This number is MUCH smaller than the population on any server. Only a tiny fraction of a server's population will ever get to own a house.

You say that "occasionally" a plot opens up on your server. While that is technically better than the situation on higher pop servers, it is still far worse than what we should have. I mean, I can roll up a character in Rift or WildStar and have a housing plot of my own within a few hours of playing, that I can then customize to my heart's content. The only limit is how much gold I possess (well, and the 1,000 inside/1,000 outside item limit - soon to be 2500!) and I guess my own creativity. This is the kind of system we deserve in FFXIV, an ostensibly high quality, successful MMO.

It's the system we have and the devs are doing everything to squeeze every last ounce of server space for it. I'm not going to pretend to understand the infrastructure of FFXIV or how they run instance. What you are asking for though is complete remodel "Housing" design from the ground up which would completely tear down the old system and require a lot of time to make a new one. Right now we need to focus on short term goals and that's reclaim housing plots. I do think SE should allow players to sell back their plot to a NPC and refund gil to players who lose their house in reclamation.

Long term SE should increase the amount of FC chambers and introduce player apartments that require monthly rent. They also need to fix the BS that FC can own multiple plots. Hopefully with the EU servers coming up this will help spread the wealth and reduce the taxing on current server loads. Which means they can relocate empty space toward housing improvements.