Current Going Price for Mainland?

[Czari Zenovka]

I have decided to sell two parcels on mainland.  One is 1024 sqm and the other is 512 sqm.  They are adjacent so if one person wanted them, it would be 1536 sqm.

The last time I sold land about 2 years ago, I ended up selling to a landbot at around 3.2 per sqm.  From looking at the online land classifieds, the lowest is 0.5! OUCH!  I experimented with the 1024 earlier and kept lowering the price to see when the landbots would descend but got to 0.9 before I stopped and contacted a land buyer.  While waiting to see what his offer is, has anyone sold land recently, what is a price point that people will buy, did you have to wait some time before selling (I need to sell quickly), etc.

These parcels are on a water sim bordered by two Linden oceans, but are not on the water, although the oceans are easily accessible.**  I don't think landbots take that into consideration.

Any suggestions, ideas, comments, etc. are appreciated.  Thank you. :)

 

**Correction - The parcels are part of the water sim but not on the two edges facing the Linden oceans.

[Clarissa Lowell]

Buying land is a somewhat emotional experience for some, and if they like or want it enough they will buy it.

In general the prices seem to be 1-2 Linden a meter. 

There are resellers who will buy your land anywhere no questions asked. I dont know why more people who abandon land don't contact such people first. There are signs with their information along many of the roads in Second Life.

Typically they also pay 1-2 Lindens a meter.

A good photo can help sell the parcel at a better price. Also put the main feature in the title of the listing. Most people scan the headlines without clicking to see each parcel listed.

I recently sold a parcel just under 700 square meters for 1500 Lindens but it fronted Linden park and Linden route 2. That is kind of unusual. It must have appealed to someone because it suddenly just sold. It was on market a week or two.

[Pussycat Catnap]

Its worth about 0.5L/sqm unless its worth more.

More is a factor of location and the neighbors. Do the neighbors want it bad, does someone want to live next to one of those neighbors? Does one of the neighbors have a blighted build (in which case your land is worth even -less- as no human will buy it and you're stuck pricing for a bot)?

If you have water or a road it might be worth more. But some roads are poorly designed and lower land values. Others triger adfarmers and blighty builds (see the sim Fietzo where I lived until early 2010 - my old lot has since been taken over by 3 separate adfarmers - each having their own individual placing so they can stay in ToS - but the effect is the land around it is not likely to sell to anyone with any sense).

Water and infohubs tend tend to be the best predictors of value increase. Land with water that is protected and has a view that cannot be blighted is premium in value - but even unprotected water can boost the price if the lot is the one that has control over destruction of the water (see Pruni - all along the north side of the road the landowners there can raise or lower their land to create a very deep river, and some have destroyed theirs, whereas last time I looked several month ago others had not yet done so - buying the land on the north side of that road would let you have water and road land if you liked hills).

Hills... Land that cannot be made flat is worth more than land that can, and both are worth more than land that -is- falt. But flat land sells better... This is just a weird thing: very few people like "Protected hills" but the ones who do won't stand for anything else... Protected hills are the most expensive lots in all of mainland - they're very rare, and you could easily get to know most of the people who own or want one. Half the owners of them though... got them through I don't know what means... and will rez giant megaprim blocks to make the lots flat... so by contrast protected hill next to an owner of such a hill piece that doesn't actually like the hill has a lower value as a hill lover will consider that flat square to be blight.

 

And the exceptions to the 0.5 rule go on and on...

 

 

 

[Czari Zenovka]

Thank you both for your replies.  I totally agree, Clarissa, that people who like particular types of land (ie. in my case I prefer water sims) will pay more just because of that.  If I wanted to pay a month or two more of tier, I could likely get a better price.

For me, visual impediments at ground level has never been a factor since I have always lived in the sky, but I realize it does have an impact on land value.

I received a reply from a land buyer from whom I have purchased land on the sim on which I live.  The neighbor on one side of my parcels has his home (I'm supposing) within a big, black box.  The land buyer said unfortunately that lowers the price but has offered 0.97 per parcel, which is more than the landbots as I got to 0.9 and hadn't triggered landbots yet.  (Interestingly a 1024 parcel in the middle of the same sim has been listed for 24.0 per sqm....for a looong time.  Three 512 parcels are priced at 13,500L each, but they do face one of the protected Linden oceans; however, they've also been for sale a long time.

At present, I think I'll sell the 1024 to the land buyer as that was an impulse purchase mistake on my part and I just don't want to pay any more tier on it.  I *may* hang onto the 512 for awhile longer and do a bit of advertising on it.

I appreciate the input and I feel a lot better that 0.5L/sqm seems to be the *norm*.  I knew land prices were low now, but in checking land prices all over SL when I happen to be in a new sim, I'm amazed that some people can either apparently sit on the land for the price they want or haven't heard that mainland prices have tanked.

[Peewee Musytari]

Check the price per sqm that other plots on the same sim or nearby sims with the same sort of set up, are being sold for. That is usually the best guide for the value of land in your own neighbourhood.  Landbots are at around 0.8 at the moment, but thats because the buyers wouldn`t make a profit reselling if they paid any more.

If you need a quick sale to avoid the next tier fee, then you will likely end up selling for less than market value unless you are lucky enough to get a buyer looking for exactly what you have at the right time.

[Pussycat Catnap]

 

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Peewee Musytari wrote:

Check the price per sqm that other plots on the same sim or nearby sims with the same sort of set up, are being sold for. That is usually the best guide for the value of land in your own neighbourhood.

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Actually I find that to be a bad indicator. If you can find lots on a sim for sale at a given price, they're for sale still because they're overpriced...

 

[Peewee Musytari]

 

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Pussycat Catnap wrote:

 

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Peewee Musytari wrote:

Check the price per sqm that other plots on the same sim or nearby sims with the same sort of set up, are being sold for. That is usually the best guide for the value of land in your own neighbourhood.

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Actually I find that to be a bad indicator. If you can find lots on a sim for sale at a given price, they're for sale still because they're overpriced...

 

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Normally I find you get most in a similar price range and then some nut that has land for sale at a very unrealistic price. I agree its a not always the best guide, especially if there aren`t enough for sale to compare, but if you look around at average prices for say "fairly flat grass plots, one step back from the ocean with good views" it is better than trying to compare from the total land search for plots of the same size, where you are comparing to steep rocky crags or snow plots etc.

 

[Czari Zenovka]

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

 

Normally I find you get most in a similar price range and then some nut that has land for sale at a very unrealistic price. I agree its a not always the best guide, especially if there aren`t enough for sale to compare, but if you look around at average prices for say "fairly flat grass plots, one step back from the ocean with good views" it is better than trying to compare from the total land search for plots of the same size, where you are comparing to steep rocky crags or snow plots etc.

 

I fall into the "some nut that has land for sale at a very unrealistic price" category on my sim.  I mentioned above that the only other land on my sim is a 1024 going for 24.0 sqm and three 512's all next to each other for 26.0 sqm.  The 512's face a Linden ocean on one side and over time these parcels have sold, resold, been joined into one larger parcel, re-subdivided, etc. (I have lived on this sim for over three years.)  I checked out those 512's at one time, but even though they do face a Linden ocean, they are so close to the land on the sim located perpendicular to it that it is not an unobstructed view.

I can't figure out the reasoning for the unrealistic price on the 1024 at 24.0 sqm.  It is smack in the middle of the sim.  Currently the neighboring parcels have nice builds on them, but that could always change.  The parcel itself has a big rock on it with a lighthouse perched on the rock and then waves all around it which would look nice on the edge of a sim, but looks a bit odd in the middle of homes.  Underwater the owner has done a really nice job of making an underwater "retreat" with lovely sea coral, foliage, fish, etc.  BUT, the parcel price does *not* include the objects on it.

During the three years I've been on this sim, at any given time at least 1/4 if not more of the sim was for sale and even during years when land prices were higher, the average price was 4L - 7L per sqm, sometimes closer to 3.5.  Over the past year, except for the above-mentioned over-priced parcels, there has been nothing for sale on the sim.  I grabbed the 1024 when it came up for sale because I was so suprised to see a parcel for sale at all, plus being adjacent to mine I had planned to be able to expand my home a bit.  I made this decision at about 6 am after staying up all night and not thinking real clearly. :smileyindifferent:  The tier isn't much, but I have decided not to renew my Premium account when it comes due in a couple of weeks and I, like many, am trying to economize RL. SL expenditures with USD is currently in my "luxury" category.

I said all that to say I do agree that comparing parcels within a sim is a better indicator than a dissimilar parcel on another sim.  Unfortunately on my sim I didn't have a good comparison.  I did sell the 1024 for $1,000 to the land buyer.  I will be interested to watch what he prices it at and how long it takes to sell.  I may go month to month on Premium to see if I can get a better price on the 512.

Another question - Do land buyers tend to offer approximately the same amount for a given parcel.

Many thanks again for your responses and input.

 

 

[Peewee Musytari]

When I used to deal land as a buisness then yes, I would know roughly what I could expect to sell a snow plot or a flat green plot for and the amount I was willing to pay was obviously a reflection of that, because being stuck with a plot that doesn`t sell can end up eating any profit away in tier fees and is just bad buisness. There are other factors that would make me pay more or less for a particular plot, some sims have obviously good neighbourhoods where everyone cares how the place looks and there are very few parcels for sale as opposed to horrendous neighbouring builds, sims with certain things on them, places that were crowded with avatars & caused lag or stopped you being able to TP in easily because it was always full.

When you are dealing with buyers looking for a home & not a quick turnaround, they will usually pay more to get a plot that is exactly what they are looking for, just like RL.

[Chaos Mohr]

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Peewee Musytari wrote:

  Landbots are at around 0.8 at the moment, but thats because the buyers wouldn`t make a profit reselling if they paid any more.

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Landbots are around .44 / meter right now for anything other that Adult land or special sims (landbots generally run 10-15% the bottom of the market - if they were at .8, there would be nothing lower than that on the market unless they had all filled up their tier - bottom of land market has been at .5 since the weekend and the bottom has dropped about 40% since the new 'Abandoned' land fiasco policy was implemented - with approx 200 parcels of 'Abandoned' land set at 1L$/meter, the chances of selling any land that isn't waterfront or special (adult, bay city, beta land), or sold to a neighbor is slim if it is priced above 1L$/meter - if a land dealer is offering .97/m and it is just basically regular land, then I would take it - heck send them to me as I have a bunch of land I would sell them at that price

[Peewee Musytari]

Thanks Chaos and wow, they`ll be set for free land soon lol

[Chaos Mohr]

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Peewee Musytari wrote:

Thanks Chaos and wow, they`ll be set for free land soon lol

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It is probably LL's intention to drive the market as low as possible, they stopped making any real money on Mainland when due to their own mismanagement, they overloaded the mainland market by overproducing sims for auction. I remember the days when new mainland sims could fetch $3000 USD and up at auction. Now it seems that all LL wants is the tier fees, not realizing that something of no value is much too easily discarded. When land was in the 6-7 L$/meter range there was very little abandoned land and that price was the 'target' range for LL at that time. I have watched the land market and tracked it daily for the past four years, and between the landbots, the ad cutters, and LL's poor policies, the mainland has become a pale shadow of what it used to be and sadly it seems that it may be too far gone to ever recover into a semblence of what Second Life was hoped to be. ;(

[Knowl Paine]

As Chaos has mentioned changes to the Abandoned Land have effected Land Sales

http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Land/Announcing-an-Easier-Way-to-Purchase-Abandoned-Mainland-Property/ba-p/829263

 

The use of the word "unblockable" should not be allowed in land sales. The Second Life Terms of Service does Not make any written or expressed guarantee that Land owned by a Resident or Lands adjacent to that Resident land will Remain Unchanged and obstruction free for the Duration of a Residents Membership.

At one time all the land on the west end of the 1st Bay City was sold as "unblockable". Having to distinguish between the 1st and 2nd Bay City is a good reason for the Developers of SL to Stop this Cookie Cutter Production line. (Have an original idea)

With all that said, Land can be valued by it's location. It is unlikely that LL will remove a large Linden owned Lake anytime soon. The Road will likely stay for a very long time. Neighbors who build to compliment other Builds in the Region. Region Performance.

Edit the Terrain and add some plants, include objects with the Sale. An experienced Residents will know to return items they don't want. A New Residents may find the Items helpful in getting started in SL.

 

 

If you're a Land Dealer, this is a Boom, Parcels so sweet and at unbelievable prices. You rarely find 8,000m in that location for 8,000L :smileywink:

The Dealers are not going to give the land away.  

[Czari Zenovka]

Chaos Mohr wrote:

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Landbots are around .44 / meter right now for anything other that Adult land or special sims (landbots generally run 10-15% the bottom of the market - if they were at .8, there would be nothing lower than that on the market unless they had all filled up their tier - bottom of land market has been at .5 since the weekend and the bottom has dropped about 40% since the new 'Abandoned' land fiasco policy was implemented - with approx 200 parcels of 'Abandoned' land set at 1L$/meter, the chances of selling any land that isn't waterfront or special (adult, bay city, beta land), or sold to a neighbor is slim if it is priced above 1L$/meter - if a land dealer is offering .97/m and it is just basically regular land, then I would take it - heck send them to me as I have a bunch of land I would sell them at that price

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I'm feeling a LOT better now at the price the land buyer paid for my 1024.  He has it marked for resale at 3.5 sqm. (Did I already say that in a previous post?  Sorry...just woke up and not thinking as clearly yet. :smileyindifferent: )

What is "beta land?"  I just read the new abandoned land policy.  It used to take forever to get abandoned land back on the market...this should be interesting.

(And if you want the name of the land buyer who purchased my land for a bit over 0.97 sqm...let me know. )

[Czari Zenovka]

Chaos Mohr wrote:

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It is probably LL's intention to drive the market as low as possible, they stopped making any real money on Mainland when due to their own mismanagement, they overloaded the mainland market by overproducing sims for auction. I remember the days when new mainland sims could fetch $3000 USD and up at auction

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There is another outside factor in the land prices besides LL - the competition of at least one (and there are others as well; I'm just familiar with this one) relatively new virtual world (not going to name it for a number of reasons).  Just in my little circle of friends and acquaintances and especially among the merchants in the group, a great majority have, at minimum, set up their business "over there" as well as keeping it in SL and several have left SL altogether, preferring the new world.  I spent a bit of time there when it had its first "boom" influx from SL in April 2010 just prior to SL changing the TOS re: taking items out of world that were not 100% made by the owner (ie. no taking full perm items - textures, sculpties, etc. that a builder purchased)  out of SL.  I also met many people who were coming into a virtual world for the first time...there; when SL used to be the only game in town.

I personally still prefer SL for a lot of reasons.  The other world is still basically beta or even pre-beta, no real graphics engine and a lot of funky things that drive me nuts, but the big draw for merchants and those who enjoy owning a lot of land is the attraction of complete sims beginning at $60.00 USD with a bazillion prims.  Many of my friends/merchants closed stores in SL entirely and are over there or spend most of their time there.  That put a LOT of land on the SL market in one fell swoop last year with more being dumped as other people decide to make their main virtual home there.

Add in the RL economy, at least in the U.S., plus the LL decisions mentioned and no wonder land prices are at the lowest I've seen for 4 years.  (My rez day was May 1 :smileyhappy:)

[Pussycat Catnap]

if you're thinking Blue Mars I wouldn't take them so seriously anymore - they seem to have been blundering through their beta for just a bit too long now. First it couldn't run on any system cheaper than those in NORAD, now it wants to run as a tomogachi app in one of those supermarket quarter machines... and it still has AV's locked into a 'California surfer' Amer-asian mix look.

But if there's somebody else now, that would warrant concern. The idea behind a competitor to SL should in theory be very easy, but as yet it hasn't happened. Even if it does, it'll face the innertia problem. Everyone's already over here with all their loot. So the customer base has to be 'enough people not currently using VW's to make those of us currently in them insignificant'.

(And I'm not talking about my Jetta either. )

 

[Czari Zenovka]

 

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Pussycat Catnap wrote:

if you're thinking Blue Mars I wouldn't take them so seriously anymore...

...But if there's somebody else now, that would warrant concern. The idea behind a competitor to SL should in theory be very easy, but as yet it hasn't happened. Even if it does, it'll face the innertia problem. Everyone's already over here with all their loot. So the customer base has to be 'enough people not currently using VW's to make those of us currently in them insignificant'

.

(And I'm not talking about my Jetta either.

)

 

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No, neither of the two virtual worlds you mentioned.  I guess it's ok to name other worlds on this forum (or our posts will be pulled if it isn't). I was referring to InWorldz.  It went from 1,000 residents to 4,000 in about two weeks after the April 2010 LL change of TOS I mentioned and has been increasing ever since.  I wander over to visit friends maybe once every two months or so...population is over 10,000 now...maybe more.  Still not the numbers LL has, but the merchants with whom I talk seem to love it (and some "big name" merchants are there - most still have their businesses in SL as well). New residents and/or those new to virtual worlds seem to love it as well.

One of the things it currently offers is a more personal welcome to newly arriving residents.  At least one and usually several Greeters (I think they may be called something else) are at the "rez in" point to greet new people.  They immediately help the avatar "denoobify" and take him to the freebie shops nearby. Not sure how long this personal touch will be able to last as the population grows, but many mention the overall "friendliness" and "personal touch" as attributes they enjoy in IW.  It just isn't "me" for some reason, besides the lack of a graphics engine and scripts/animations sometimes working/sometimes not.  I was even given a shop free of charge by a very nice man who owns two sims when I first went over.  However, most of my items are scripted and didn't "translate" well, plus I'm not one that can keep a lot of plates in the air at one time.

That's the only other virtual world I've seen besides SL (unless I count a few weeks when Active World first began...I was in the free Beta for that and didn't like it).  A friend told me there is a new virtual world called Avination that he enjoys and is growing quickly as well.  A quick glance at their website indicated a sim price beginning at $60.00 USD as well.

As for me...I'll stay in SL with my accumulated inventory, friends, and activities I enjoy.

[Clarissa Lowell]

 

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Czari Zenovka wrote: I'm amazed that some people can either apparently sit on the land for the price they want or haven't heard that mainland prices have tanked.

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I see 4 million Linden prices on 512 parcels and am reminded of the phrase "hope springs eternal."

 

[Polenth Yue]

 

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Pussycat Catnap wrote:

 

Actually I find that to be a bad indicator. If you can find lots on a sim for sale at a given price, they're for sale still because they're overpriced...

 

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There's one piece in my sim priced at L$ 976.6 per sq meter. Fortunately, no one's taken that price as the area standard, but it shows how out of line with reality prices can be.

 

[Phil Deakins]

I've always assumed that those extremely high land prices are for two reasons. One is that the seller is paying for the tier and doesn't need it for anything else, and someone might eventually buy the land, so it doesn't hurt to set the price high and simply wait. The other is that a 0 (zero) might accidentally not be noticed and 50000, for instance, might be accidentally read as 5000 and the land bought. The numbers on the map are not particularly clear sometimes. Whatever the reason for them, the sellers must have enough unneeded tier for it so it's not costing anything to leave the land at such emormously high prices.

[Mags Indigo]

I potter about InWorldz a bit and even rented land there for a while. Apart from it's 'beta' type status and it's ongoing problems with scripts,  I do believe that one of the things contributing to its poor performance is the 'bazillion' prim allowance and to a lesser extent the common use of huge megaprims. Sometimes the restrictions we complain most about on SL are actually the things that help deliver decent performance - comparatively.

My take on really high land prices - sometimes people use it as 'publicity' for a business even if the business isn't actually located on the parcel for sale. But there may be some sort of advertising like a build or some other items that the owner has left about hoping that people will be curious enough to check out.

Sometimes of course people just like to see what offers they will get - or the reaction of others.

[SinfulPrince]

Perspective of someone actually new and looking: It would seem that developers/land entrepeneurs go for the off-mainlain areas where they are free to develope the space to suit their ambitions. While you might indeed find such a person scouring the mainland sales I wouldn't think the offers from them would be all that high because of overall low prices on the mainland. Exceptions of course being a scenario where the majority of an area are already owned by me  and I just need the last few parcels.  As a "run of the mill " player though, never would I pay much for anything on the mainland (and thats where I'm looking around) because of the pre-existing things around it.  Walking in, looking around , I see a bunch of "junk"; bunches of monstrously sized things hanging overhead or nearby my "prospective" new home , mile long bill boards closeby, a huge business (using up bunches of prims for the entire sim) and I don't want to live there. Commercial builds "on top of" your residential space is a "no go". So you pretty well don't see any area as all that desirable.  Second life is not "new"  at this point, the novelty has faded , and with it the readlily available influx  of buyers for goods OR land. Then add in RL availabilities of monies in a time when no one has it and it's an "of course" to not be able to sell it.

The only land I would judge as being "oh so desirable " would be distanced from another build by at least a couple meters , and if not watered (cuz it c an't all be water -I'm reasonable)  then at least a few trees and greenery should be in the mix. Thats not what you see on the mainland . You see it in private regions where  the arrangement of whats where has been very regulated.  The mainland then becomes a place for people "willing to try to work around a bunch of eye-sore type builds,  without any ambiance (a well placed clump of trees and a rock even) , in order to find cheapness."

 

[Josephina Bonetto]

I see a lot of desirable mainland, it just requires more innovation and inventiveness.  And I used to own a private region so have experienced both types of land.

When buying mainland you need to choose wisely and have a variety of options in terms of dealing with neighbours "taste" in architecture.  However, my 512 sq m of mainland elsewhere (I own 1/4 region in Trueblood and 512 in Levkoy) has neighbours who are mostly sympathetic to the environment, except for minor annoyances further down the parcel chain.

Mainland living is not for everyone, but I think it is great, I like the design challenges as any developer who likes a challenge would.  Quality of land fluctuates hugely as does price.

[Marianne McCann]

 

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Josephina Bonetto wrote:

Mainland living is not for everyone, but I think it is great, I like the design challenges as any developer who likes a challenge would.  Quality of land fluctuates hugely as does price.

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100 x that.

It's Second Life. You know,t hat whole "Your World, Your Imagination" cliche. It does not take any imagination to flat terrace a bunch of 1024m parcels and call it a day. 

It does take some imagination to make something beautiful, particularly in some of the more difficult spaces (the side of mountains, for example).  It's heck to try to keep to a theme, like in Nautilus or Bay City. 

But do these things, and help your neighbors do the same, and you've got gold.

[Czari Zenovka]

MARI!!!!  So great to see you again!!!!

As you know, I love Mainland as well and have lived on it for my entire four years in SL.  (Just celebrated my 4th Rezday on May 1.  It sure doesn't seem that long!) I'm partial to water sims and have lived on my current sim for the last 3 1/2 years.  My experience with Mainland is a bit different because I prefer to live in the sky so whatever is below me, although I would like it to look nice, doesn't overly bother me.

To Sinful - Mainland is interesting.  There are the areas you mentioned that are a bunch of cluttered junk, but then other places that have the look of a regulated Estate.  In addition to places like Bay City and Nautilus, some of the original Mainland sims are wonderful.  Mari can help me out with some of the names - I'm thinking of places like Blumfield (one of my personal favorites), Boardman and others on the Old Continent.  They are neighborhoods with streets, sidewalks, etc.  Now there is some expensive Mainland property, if any is ever available.  I check Blumfield every so often but have never been able to afford even a 512 there.

The other thing about Mainland is that on many sims it is ever changing.  When I first moved to my sim the entire ground level looked like one huge flea market.  I'm not kidding!!  Untextured flat prims littered with...stuff.  Again, making my home in the sky, I didn't come down to see it often.  Over time, however, the sim began evolving and most of it now has some really nice builds that keep within a general theme.  There is also the flip side of having someone buy a parcel next to yours and either building or ummmm...doing something...odd.  Mari has had that happen before as well. The good part is that *usually* the really bizarre type neighbors seem to not stay long.

It basically boils down to people preferring either Mainland or Estate living.  There is one Estate in particular I always said I would love to live in, and may still, but when the opportunity arose recently, I couldn't bring myself to give up my little 512 sqm on mainland;  I suppose due to longevity on the sim, having some of the same neighbors for 3 years and nostalgia.  At present I can't afford to live there and have another home on an Estate.

Oh and Mari is a PERFECT example of using creativity to build something unique and wonderful, even with the presence of what some would have called a deterrent.  If you get a chance, check out her cute shop in Bay City.  (EDITED to remove the name of the store due to the new LL Community Standards I just read.)

I didn't know I'd get so much feedback on my original question.  I appreciate everyone who has participated.  And I love hearing input from "new eyes" like you, Sinful.   I hope you enjoy exploring SL and have a wonderful time.