So going through a raffle idea again (yes, one of those), here's how I think it should change to address one of the problems with housing: Relos screwing over first time buyers.

So like mentioned previously, houses will keep their random timers, but they will switch to raffle system to award the house. Here's how that works:
  • Every 30 minutes after the house comes off timer, it checks if at least one person bought a ticket. If so, the new owner is chosen randomly. If no one has bought a raffle ticket, the house will refresh the raffle window. The remaining raffle window time is displayed
  • Anyone new housing owner can buy a raffle ticket as long as they are compliant with the restrictions outlined at https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes.../housing_land/
  • FCs and players are in the same raffle
  • A housing relo can only occur if they get a ticket (same costs as currently) and win the raffle
  • Anyone who doesn't get the house gets their ticket refunded
  • Players can only buy one housing ticket at a time

The main thing I'm trying to figure out a solution to is the need to first clicker, as this allows for a bit fairer way to do it and rewards those that are sticking it out. Time window may need to be adjusted as having a shorter one helps to shut out people that aren't actually there when the house comes to market. The biggest frustration I'm seeing with first time buyers is that the relos have a bit too much "power" in the current system as they are able to take priority over new buyers rather than putting both on equal footing like it is in the real world (arguably first time buyers have it a bit better as they aren't usually dependent upon selling the older property).

It probably needs work, but as Yoshi-P is considering this idea, it's probably a good idea to start figuring out how we can make it suck the least so that way we can guide the dev team with this rather than shutting down any discussion and getting something forced upon us.