Quote Originally Posted by Joe777 View Post
Don't give anyone major permissions until you are absolutely certain they've earned them, if you ever grant them period.
I'll second this. Have the ranks created beforehand, trying to remove as many critical permissions as you can for the newcomers' ranks. Such as FC chest access, buying/activating/deactivating FC actions or promotion/demotion permissions. Since you don't have a house yet, don't worry too much about furniture permissions.

Starting from the rock bottom, asking your friends to help you. Have your closest friends (if they join) to help you recruit. Create a thread on your server's sub-forum and/or Reddit commenting about your new FC and advertise it with your vision/objectives (raid, pve, pvp, rp, eating lalas, etc). Local PF also helps. If you're a Mentor, you can also get in the NN and extend an invitation to the new people joining your server.