Do we need 'truth in advertising' for real estate sales?

[Rufferta Mainlander]

 



One of my pet peeves is looking at a real estate listing advertising "waterfront property" and finding that the property is a good distance away from any land above the water line. And then I curse the Lindens for selling all those water parcels in the first place...

This "for sale" property in Calleta is a case in point - two 512 plots surrounded by water. (I derendered the 'raft' on one parcel to make it clear). 

I know I'm probably being silly here - my own "waterfront" property actually extends a bit into the water, but at least it is mostly on land and I lowered my house as much as I could so's not to annoy the folks behind me too much..

Just ranting...

 

 

[Qie Niangao]

It's a mystery to me why people buy these things, and at a substantial premium -- but I'm not sure the deceitful advertising really contributes much to the problem. For example, there's this recent auction. Granted, that particular little parcel has a circuitous route, currently not completely blocked, to a distant connection to Blake Sea, so maybe that's the appeal, but it's ugly as sin and yet fetched over L$68 / sq.m, without anybody telling the bidders it's a "waterfront" parcel.

Then again, I guess we all need to be at least a little crazy to own any SL land.

[ChinRey]

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Qie Niangao wrote:

...

without anybody telling the bidders it's a "waterfront" parcel.

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It does now. The land flipper who won the auction describes it as Waterfront w/Sunset :smileylol:

[Rufferta Mainlander]

Thinking back, I believe the two 512 parcels used to be a 1024 with a nice lighthouse on it. It does have the advantage of actually being on navigatable water - you can sail from there along the coast and over the ANWR Channel to Purple. Another of my pet peeves is that so much of what should be a place where you could launch a boat actually isn't, either because it borders on the Great Nothing or because what looks like water is actually someone else's property. I learned the hard way.

I'm wondering if The New Avatar Experience actually includes any information on finding property, managing griefers, etc...? I think I'll put together a notecard "What the Lindens Didn't Tell You" for my Tourist Information booth....

[Prokofy Neva]

Linden Lab will not get involved in user disputes or user-to-user commercial transactions, which is a plus in that it gives us a semi-free market and a minus as you have to do a lot of caveat-emptor sort of homework.

I am very seasoned in this obviously as a rentals agent but even I have gotten burned on purchases sometimes due to clever tricks. I always take off "volume" on any land for sale as people can use various sculpties or other things to make it look like you are purchasing "land" that is prettier than it really is, or "land" that is water. I also turn on property owners view to see if the seller has put little "donuts" into the property that shows they've retained ownership, which they may then try to extort me to buy or put up an ad or something ugly until I beg to buy. And so on.

So basically the "we need" part is not something that can be (or should be) delivered by Linden Lab and it could only be delivered by a free media and open real estate registration and consumer review web site that some third party would have to operate.

[Codex Alpha]

Yes, this is false advertising - sorta.

My waterfront property expectations is that it is a edge or corner lot on the sim, facing the water.

I would not rent this plot. I prefer an edge lot or even better the corner