What is the rental system?

The rental system is a combination of features, first introduced in R44, that enables two primary use cases:

1. Players with unused space on a property, such as a room in a home or an entire property, can rent that space to another player thereby becoming a landlord.
2. Players without property can rent living space from another player, such as a room in a home, thereby becoming a tenant.

R44 introduced the tech that ensures a safe and secure relationship between landlords and tenants, enabling the following scenarios:

• A landlord can rent an entire property to a tenant, such that the tenant and the landlord are the only players that can place items on the property.
• A landlord can secure a room in a home to a tenant such that the tenant and landlord are the only players that can open the door to the room. The door is locked to other players.
• A tenant can place an item, such as a chest, on the property without fear of another player moving or stealing its contents. Even the landlord cannot access the item or its contents in the case of a container like a chest or a trunk.
• A landlord can establish rental agreements with players and then evict players that violate the agreement (e.g. don’t pay their rent). The landlord can send any item a tenant placed on the property to the tenant’s bank. The item will only go to the tenant’s bank; it will never go to the landlord’s or any other player’s bank.
• A tenants’ items are protected from theft or manipulation if a landlord evicts the tenant for non-payment, or if the landlord sends the entire property to storage. In the case of the landlord sending the property to storage, every tenants’ items are automatically sent to their respective banks.
• A landlord can delegate property management to a manager, where the manager can lock/unlock tenant doors and assign tenant permissions to individual doors; however, the manager is subject to the same restrictions on tenant items mentioned above.

These scenarios provide the foundation for a safe rental system in Shroud of the Avatar and subsequent releases will enhance the experience.

How can I benefit from the rental system?

The rental system offers benefits to many players whether you have property or not. Many players have property deeds with homes, but do not use all the rooms in the home. Other players have properties that are currently unused. Other players do not have a property and are currently using bank slots to store items. And even other players have property in one area of New Britannia but would like to have storage space or a satellite location in another area for trade or other reasons. Guilds are always on the lookout for strategic locations for chapter houses or trading spots, and many non-guild players have strategic properties that could meet that need.

For those and many other reasons, the rental system provides the foundation to stimulate the SOTA economy and create new partnerships between players and guilds across New Britannia. Consider the following questions:

• Do you have an unused room in your house?
• Do you have an unused property?
• Are you looking for a home?
• Are you looking for a storage location?
• Are you looking for a strategic vendor location?
• Are you looking for an alternative to buying more bank slots to store your stuff?

If you answered yes to one or more of these questions, then you will benefit from the rental system!!

How do I get started?

Landlords

Determine your goal and what you will offer. If you would like to be a landlord, what will you bring to the rental market and how will you attract renters? Do you intend to rent a room or an entire property? Location is important and so are amenities, so what will you offer to your tenants? What is your pricing model and what forms of payment will you accept? Will you cater to new or established players?

The add-on store has 2 village sized inns (require a village property or higher), which are excellent choices for rental properties, that include 15 rooms plus common areas. Several themed inns are available from Crown Merchants in-game, periodically on the add-on store, and R52 introduced the first craftable inn. Hometown has inns on display and most NPC towns and player-owned towns have inns if you’d like to tour them.

Get familiar with the tenant system. Work with another player (or alt character) to get familiar with how the tenant system works. Access the permissions from your lot marker and assign someone as a tenant. Then have that person place something and see how you can’t remove it, but you can send it to the bank. Edit a door’s permissions and lock it. Notice how other players can’t open it. Assign a property manager and see how they can manage door permissions. Send the property contents to storage and see how the tenant’s items go to their bank.

It helps to be familiar, so you can communicate how the system works to prospective tenants. Even showing them how it works is important, so they feel safe renting from you.

Use this forum to advertise your property, using the designation PTR (I have a place to rent), to differentiate your post from players that want to rent a property.

Be a trustworthy landlord. Keep your word and be accommodating (within reason) to your tenants.

How do I add a tenant to my property?

1. Add the tenant as a "tenant" on the lot permissions, using the lot marker - that will allow them to place items if your lot permissions allow it. "Kindred" lot permission is a good level to start with for a tenant.
2. [Optional] Add the tenant to a door permission if you want to give them a specific room, by r-clicking the door - you can give them the guest permission on the door and then lock the door. Then you and the tenant are the only ones that can unlock the door.

Tenants

Determine your playing style and what you want to gain from renting. Do you need a place to store things? If so, does your landlord provide storage containers or do you have to bring them? Do you plan on crafting items? If so, where is the property located relative to crafting stations? Are stations onsite or nearby? Are you a farmer? If so, how close are planting beds? Are you interested a strategic vending location? If so, can you bring a vendor, or does the landlord offer slots on a vendor? What part of New Britannia is ideal for your home or storage location and does the landlord have a room/home in that area?

Determine how long you’ll rent and how you will pay for it. Some landlords offer rooms for free for new players, but eventually you’ll have to pay. How will you do so? What is your trade? Some landlords barter for rent so think bigger than in-game gold and see what your landlord might be interested in. For example, perhaps you could farm mandrake or cotton for him/her to offset your rental payment. Will you rent for a week, a month, 3 months, longer? Some landlords offer discounts for longer rental terms.

Use this forum to advertise your desire to rent, using the designation WTR (I want to rent), to differentiate your post from players that have a place to rent.

Be a trustworthy tenant. Keep your word and pay your rent on-time. Don't make unreasonable requests from your landlord.

This is just a starting guide and will be updated as the renting system and market evolves! Feel free to suggest edits here or in PM and/or ask questions.

Enjoy!
Dereck

 

Correct me if I am wrong. The rental-system should be implemented whereby if a tenant defaults on Rent payments then just like unpaid taxes, the tenant should not be able to rent anywhere again until that rent debt has first been satisfied. What's your thoughts?

 

"do you have any references??"



But yeah, I plan to find a place to post about bad tenants. (...and good ones too seems fair)

 

That's a great question. Perhaps in the future Port will integrate automated payments, but for now landlords will have to handle consequences for late or missed payments manually.

What do you think about using a player's profile page for either positive or negative feedback as a tenant or a landlord? That's a pretty good gauge for a player's reputation for buy/sell and I can see it working for rentals too.

 

Has someone tallied all available housing for the number of rooms available?

 

Not happening, at least that's the position now. Collecting rent is totally on the owner to collect.
With the mail system now in place, gold can be mailed to the owner to pay rent. They could also place a drop box somewhere for folks to drop of other types of barter items.

 

Negative feedback will be removed when reported, only positive feedback is allowed.

 

I didn't know that. That doesn't seem fair.

Landlords Guild?

 

Are you unable to rent out rooms in basements?

 

Good question. Yes, you can rent out rooms in basements. You have to think about doors though. Some basements have rooms with doors, others don't. Some tenants want their privacy and rooms without doors don't necessarily give you that.

 

I may be doing something wrong then because I tried renting out a room with a door in a basement but the tenant was unable to place anything down. Is there a tenant/landlord tutorial that I can look up?

 

I'll update the OP with more detail on the how, but the main things to remember are:

1. Add the tenant as a "tenant" on the lot permissions, using the lot marker - that will allow them to place items if your lot permissions allow it. "Kindred" lot permission is a good level to start with for a tenant.
2. Add the tenant to the door permissions, r-clicking the door - you can give them the guest permission on the door and then lock the door. Then you and the tenant are the only ones that can unlock the door.

Whisper me in-game if you want to meet up and I can show you.

 

Thanks, I appreciate it. I'll msg you in game if I have any questions. I think I may have had the tenant as a guest instead of kindred.

 

This sounds akin to debtor's prison, albeit without confinement. Perhaps reputation can carry along, such as when a landlord selects a tenant for rent, the landlord can then see the value of the prospective tenant's debts. I also think this should be limited to region + neighboring region, to make Novia seem larger. If the room / lot is >= 2 regional borders from the tenant's source of debt, it doesnt display. Word of mouth (or lack thereof) and social reputation come into play this way.

I dont think there should be a game mechanic that physically inhibits the actions of tenant and landlord int his way though. It should be a conscious choice. The prospective tenant reserves the right to have their own story and defend their integrity - coming from NYC, some landlords are just total scumbags

 

why can't we purchase a house like everyone else? why are people allowed to buy more than one so that there is none available for new players?I just want to be able to use a recall scroll , i already gave up on owning, but a rental so i can live somewhere would be nice, i am new to the game and am not having much luck finding anything yet.

 

Hi there ladyonthelake,

if you contact any of the players who have inn rooms available in the other threads to this forum, you would probably get a response back pretty quickly. I myself have rooms which are free until end of 2018 at my inn which is located in Brittany fields (although it is rather quiet there compared to some PoTs). You could try out a few rent free places short-term to see whether you prefer to live in an NPC town or PoT.

There is also still plenty of lot availability left in the game (including in NPC towns) if you ever wanted to buy a land deed.

Good luck with finding a place to rent You can always contact me if you are interested in renting a room for free at the Dionysian Tavern and Inn.

 

@Dereck Visaard - I don't quite understand the relationship between:

1. Lot Permissions: (None, Guest, Kindred, Trustee, Co-Owner)
2. Lot Tenancy Check: (None, Tenant)
3. Front Exterior Door Permissions (None, Guest, Manager)
4. Rear Exterior Door Permissions (None, Guest, Manager)

I'm running the first inn in Blood Bay, a hive of villainy and scum (myself included), and it's rather important the DOORS STAY CLOSED.

But every once in a while people can (or cannot) come in, even if they are Kindred.
But every once in a while people can (or cannot) come in, even if they have an exterior door permissions.
But every once in a while the front and rear doors have differing permissions, and sometimes they sync.
But every once in a while the lock permissions just go away.
But every once in a while the DOORS SWING OPEN.

The stakes are rather high in Blood Bay. Do we have any further information on how this all works?

 

Hi Hroth, congrats on running the inn in Blood Bay. I'm sure you'll attract quite a bit of residents...although they might not last long hehe.

For the mechanics....lot permissions governs what level of access a person has on your lot and that affects whether they can invite others to the lot and whether they can move items that you or another resident places. Many times "Kindred" access is given to a lot. Kindred residents can move any deco that was placed with kindred permissions (unless it is private) but they cannot add other residents to the lot. "Trustee" access is higher than Kindred and allows a resident to move any deco that was placed with trustee or lower permissions (unless it is private) AND they can add residents to the lot with Kindred permissions. "Co-owner" is the step up from Trustee and the same cascading rules apply. So determining that permission is step 1.

Step 2 is deciding if you want to provide you (as landlord) and your resident (as tenant) additional protections such that if the lot is unclaimed (maybe for not paying taxes) or if a noisy resident is evicted from the lot, then the items they place will be sent to THEIR bank, not YOUR bank. If you check the "tenant" box when assigning this permission, then you are assigning the resident as a tenant. They, by default, will place items in 'tenant mode' and you/they can verify that by hovering over any placed item. If it was placed as a "tenant" then it will show a green tenant marker. However, the tenant can disable that by going into their permission options and unchecking 'tenant mode.' If they do, then they are incurring the risk that if they are evicted then their stuff won't be sent to their bank and others with the same access they have or higher can move or take their items.

So that's lot permissions and tenant mode. In general, adding a resident as "Kindred" + "Tenant" is the way to go for most inn scenarios. If you end up with a noisy tenant that places stuff where they shouldn't, you (as landlord) can always sent the items in question to their bank and give them a warning. I usually put property managers as "Trustee" or higher without the tenant flag, and I only add property managers that I trust.

Now to door permissions. The tenant system also includes door locking and the ability to add a property manager to a lot. When you lock a door only you (as landlord), the player(s) listed as "Guest", and player(s) listed as "Manager" can open the door. Everyone else will get the "This door is locked..." message. At the time of this writing, SotA doesn't support batch operations on a property for locking/unlocking doors or batch assigning a "manager" to all doors on a property. You have to visit every door to update them. I hope that changes soon, but @DarkStarr didn't say anything about it in the Q2 post so it probably won't.

All that said, I believe Blood Bay housing behaves differently than non-PvP zones. I'm not sure if you can actually lock doors. I haven't verified it myself, but other players have told me so. "If" you can lock individual doors, then you should be able to implement the rules you indicated above, albeit manually by touching each door when you want to trigger things.

Hope that helps,
Dereck

 

Thanks Dereck.

I am having basic issues, such as: I lock a door (external or internal), leave, and when I return the door is unlocked or open!

I am somewhat correlating this with behavior such as teleporting or recalling or logging out while in the inn.. which happens when friendly marauders are just outside the door. (I also have to bar the windows so the same friendlies don't simply smash through the window).

Sounds like there may be multiple /bug issues here, that go beyond the rental system as designed.

My last two questions are:

1 if an external door is locked, can a marauder just not open the door (but walk through an open threshold)? Or can the marauder also be blocked from walking into the inn no matter whether the door is open or not?

2 and what happens if the lot marker door lock checkbox is not checked but the individual external door is checked, or vice versa?

So many questions, thank you for your help!

Cheers

Ben

 

If you lock a door but leave it open, then anyone that was in the instance or ports into the same instance will see the door open and be able to walk through it. Same thing applies even if you leave. If someone ports to you while you’re inside a property with a locked exterior door then they might port inside the locked door. That’s a known issue.

Make sure you close doors before leaving

If you still see issues it may be related to Blood Bay housing rules. I’ll be online later and can zone to you and we can experiment.