Mainland tier fees lowered?

[Candide LeMay]

I've recently looked at the land usage fees page and noticed the fees are slightly lower than before. Is everybody else seeing the same? https://secondlife.com/my/account/landfees.php?lang=en-US

[Kathlen Onyx]

Looks the same to me.

[MoiraKathleen]

Maybe in the upper tiers (starting with 1/8 region)?  I haven't had an 1/8 or larger for quite a while, but I had thought the 1/8 was like 35 or 36 per month, but I could be wrong.  The lower tiers are the same as they have been for a while.     

[Sylvia Tamalyn]

Yes, it looks like the fees starting at 8,192 sq and going all the way up have decreased. Here's a chart with old prices for reference: https://secondlife.com/land/pricing

Edited November 17, 2022 by Sylvia Tamalyn

[MoiraKathleen]

3 minutes ago, Sylvia Tamalyn said:

Yes, it looks like the fees starting at 8,192 sq and going all the way up have decreased. Here's a chart with old prices for reference: https://secondlife.com/land/pricing

Thanks, that's what I thought, but wasn't sure.  It must have happened very recently.  I think during the last Lab Gab with Grumpity and Patch, Grumpity mentioned something about some tier costs being re-adjusted. 

ETA:  That puts the difference between a 4096 and an 8192 really close - only $9 more for twice the size.  I'm going to have to be extra careful to not look at parcels for sale for a couple of months...  

Edited November 17, 2022 by MoiraKathleen
added another thought

[Reed Linden]

Y'all have sharp eyes.

Behold: 

 

[Nika Talaj]

Oh!  and it looks like Premium quarterly plans are back, cool, when did that happen?

No VAT for land, excellent!  Great idea!

Also, just to be absolutely sure, Plus members will not be able to claim a Linden Home, even a 512 m2 LH parcel.  I guess one could see Plus as a stepping stone up to Premium, if a Plus member decides they like having land.

 

[Kadah Coba]

Quote

we’re lowering the price at 1/8 region (8,192 m2) and higher by over 10%.

Umm... I think either the wording on that might be a bit wrong or there was an error in the price changes. Only 1/8 and 1/4 are currently fitting that description.

Fraction	Size	Old	New	Change	% Change
1/128	512	$4	$4
1/64	1024	$7	$7
1/32	2048	$13	$13
1/16	4096	$22	$22
1/8	8192	$35	$31	$4	11.43%
¼	16384	$67	$60	$7	10.45%
½	32768	$112	$103	$9	8.04%
¾	49152	$150	$142	$8	5.33%
1	65536	$175	$166	$9	5.14%

[Candide LeMay]

1 hour ago, Nika Talaj said:

No VAT for land, excellent!  Great idea!

The way I read it it's no VAT on the membership payments (plus, premium, premium plus, plus premium plus...), but still VAT on the land/tier fees.

[Polenth Yue]

1 hour ago, Nika Talaj said:

Oh!  and it looks like Premium quarterly plans are back, cool, when did that happen?

No VAT for land, excellent!  Great idea!

Also, just to be absolutely sure, Plus members will not be able to claim a Linden Home, even a 512 m2 LH parcel.  I guess one could see Plus as a stepping stone up to Premium, if a Plus member decides they like having land.

I think the VAT has only been removed from the membership fees. My land tier still has VAT added.

[Katherine Heartsong]

As an 8192 parcel owner, I'm happy!

[Marianne Little]

5 hours ago, Candide LeMay said:

The way I read it it's no VAT on the membership payments (plus, premium, premium plus, plus premium plus...), but still VAT on the land/tier fees.

I read it that way too.

@Reed Linden?

[Qie Niangao]

7 hours ago, Kadah Coba said:

Quote

we’re lowering the price at 1/8 region (8,192 m2) and higher by over 10%.

Umm... I think either the wording on that might be a bit wrong or there was an error in the price changes. Only 1/8 and 1/4 are currently fitting that description.

Fraction	Size	Old	New	Change	% Change
1/128	512	$4	$4
1/64	1024	$7	$7
1/32	2048	$13	$13
1/16	4096	$22	$22
1/8	8192	$35	$31	$4	11.43%
¼	16384	$67	$60	$7	10.45%
½	32768	$112	$103	$9	8.04%
¾	49152	$150	$142	$8	5.33%
1	65536	$175	$166	$9	5.14%

Yeah, it's disappointing. Also, at some point (when you're already at a full region, maybe), it reveals that the next step is 1¼ regions (81,920 sq.m.) for $208, which used to be $219, for a 5.29% reduction.

It's nothing new, but that region-and-a-quarter pricing remains a huge disincentive because the step from 1 to 1¼ costs $42, whereas the step from ¾ to 1 costs only $24. Even from ½ to ¾ costs less, at $39.

What I think is going on there is that they're aiming for a constant average cost per area ($1.30 / 512m²) for the total amount owned, same as for a full region, but that's sure not how it feels, having to pay 175% as much for that next incremental ¼ region compared to the previous ¼ region step.

I'd seriously consider tiering-up with the lower fees but man, that next step is a bitter pill. If they instead held constant the incremental cost per area at $24 per ¼ region, that next step to 1¼ would total $190/month, which "feels" about right to me, but would lower that average cost to only $1.19 / 512m² for the total area.

[Kadah Coba]

47 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

Yeah, it's disappointing. Also, at some point (when you're already at a full region, maybe), it reveals that the next step is 1¼ regions (81,920 sq.m.) for $208, which used to be $219, for a 5.29% reduction.

It's nothing new, but that region-and-a-quarter pricing remains a huge disincentive because the step from 1 to 1¼ costs $42, whereas the step from ¾ to 1 costs only $24. Even from ½ to ¾ costs less, at $39.

What I think is going on there is that they're aiming for a constant average cost per area ($1.30 / 512m²) for the total amount owned, same as for a full region, but that's sure not how it feels, having to pay 175% as much for that next incremental ¼ region compared to the previous ¼ region step.

I'd seriously consider tiering-up with the lower fees but man, that next step is a bitter pill. If they instead held constant the incremental cost per area at $24 per ¼ region, that next step to 1¼ would total $190/month, which "feels" about right to me, but would lower that average cost to only $1.19 / 512m² for the total area.

Yeah... tier pricing has always been kinda screwy. Linear discount across the higher tiers would better than current, though it would be preferable for that to be at least slightly better than a non-linear increasing discount. Would be nice to have incentives for increasing parcel sizes to both soaking up more of all the spare mainland and reduce region load. I've seen a number of regions that are half abandoned with the occupied parts chokers with stacked skyboxes.

[Qie Niangao]

Because I'm a spreadsheet junkie, here's what I was muttering about:

You'll notice the last column, "avg $ / 512m²", consistently decreases as the tier area increases (upwards in the table). That's cool, but the cost of incremental area is wildly non-monotonic with large peaks at 1/4 and 1.25 regions. It was that way before, too, so maybe Marketing knows there's some special appeal to those prices. Otherwise, I'd think folks would be very hesitant to enter those particular tiers.

 

[judeinsl]

This is great news indeed!

Psst.. next ban ugly privacy screens on Mainland. Ha!

[Janet Voxel]

I was actually looking to upgrade to an 8192 parcel....I like it!

[diamond Marchant]

Winners and Losers IMHO

The big winners in this new pricing are people like me... those who own more than 1/8 region (and perhaps use Premium Stacking to deal with the tier-packing problem). I am able to up my tier and get more sqm for approximately the same cost.

The losers are likely new residents (or new to land ownership) who opt for the new Plus! but cannot have a 512 Linden Home, hence, they must deal with the learning curve of acquiring mainland. My opinion is that the WHOLE POINT of Bellisseria is to make it super easy (as in one-click shopping) to establish permanence in Second Life. It is unfortunate that Plus!ers can't setup  in a Camper, Newbrooke, or Sakura home.

Edited November 18, 2022 by diamond Marchant
usual typos

[Sparkle Bunny]

Why not let Plus users have OLD Linden homes? It'd give them somewhere to hang out while they're looking for a mainland parcel, and encourages them to upgrade to Premium if they want something nicer. Kick them out after a couple of months if you're worried about the continent filling back up, but it seems a better use of resources than having so many 512 homes sitting empty.

[Teresa Firelight]

I have been jumping through hoops with many  premium alts to keep mainland land tier at $22.00 per month. Now with the price reduction spending $31.00 per month doesnt feel as bad as speding $35.00 .. I am not sure why that feels so much better, but it does... I mean it is only $4.00 USD per month difference (1/2 of 1 annual premium monthly fee equivalent) but .. well it feel like such a good deal. I can pay $31.00 per month for 8192 and get a Premium plus allowance for the other 2048 I need.... and start letting my extra annual premiums expire.

If nothing else, it will make my bookkeeping and keeping track of things easier.

I am happy with the price reduction.

Edited November 19, 2022 by Teresa Firelight
clarified a statement

[Ingrid Ingersoll]

On 11/19/2022 at 12:49 PM, Sparkle Bunny said:

Why not let Plus users have OLD Linden homes?

They're pretty dated looking at this point. 

[Sparkle Bunny]

Well, yeah. So is most of mainland. At least if I grab a Meadowbrook I'm not having to use prims up on the actual house, I'm avoiding the initial purchase price of a mainland 512, and a mostly-empty sim is seeing some use that it wouldn't otherwise have had.

My hunch is that the majority of Plus subscriptions are going to be Premiums downgrading rather than Basics upgrading, which makes it unlikely that they'll manage to sell vast quantities of abandoned land; but including an actual parcel in the package, rather than just tier, would encourage more upgrades even if the homes in question are second-rate. Since there seem to be no immediate plans to get rid of the older homes or even remove them from the land page, LL might as well let Plus members make use of them while they're deciding what (if anything) they want to do with them.

[Gabriele Graves]

LL's stated goal of Plus is to try to encourage people to mainland.  That is less likely to work if they include Linden Homes of any type.  Whether we think it will work or not, LL have decided to give this strategy a try.

[BilliJo Aldrin]

Glad this topic was posted. I was 4096 for 22 dollars a month. I saw the 8192 was dropped from 35 to 31 a month. It didn't take long to realize that for only an extra 9 dollars a month, i can double my tier, so now I'm happily building on my new parcel. Tier is still only 1 dollar a day, cheap entertainment considering how much time i spend in Second Life

😁

 

[Sparkle Bunny]

21 hours ago, Gabriele Graves said:

LL's stated goal of Plus is to try to encourage people to mainland.  That is less likely to work if they include Linden Homes of any type.  Whether we think it will work or not, LL have decided to give this strategy a try.

Ah, so they're not actually interested in getting money from new subscribers, just in minimising their losses from Premiums cutting their costs. Got it.