Market fixing in Entropia Apartments

I have been watching the apartment market in Entropia and visited the building in three cities.

I noticed that 50% of the deeds are either owned by an avatar just holding onto them or MA owns then.

You can tell this by the estate named Marco or Mucus something or other.


I also watched to see what the price was and noticed that many are dumping the CND ones due to the storage containers now allowed.
I also notice alot of sales of planet size ones as well.
In many cases the sellers where the same for multipule apartments.

I also noticed that the buyer in every case was the same Serkan Draken Serpentis.

I dont mind someone investing money in order to make a ped as thats what its all about.

However it sucks that so many Apartments are just that fake investments.
It would be alot more fun for everyone that bought the apartments to have other soc members near by or other players and cities full of people for a change.


But what is happening instead is that (some uknown avatar buys them up)

Could that avatar be an MA employee ?
Could it be someone with a second avatar which isnt allowed ?
In real life when you own so many apartments you need to pay rent on them and so you want to flip it asap.

I think its time to make rent madatory 10 ped a month no matter what if someone doesnt sign in for a year then its 120 peds when they want to use it. If they still havent paid then after 250 peds behind it goes back into the Ah for all to bid on and anything in the place gets TT.


The reason I say this is that it adds to the gaming experaince to have an apartment for some. For others its a non needed distraction and still others an investement.

Or is there something fishy going on with the Apartments insider trading anyone ?????

Although Marcus Callender the estate broker is listed as the owner, the deeds are in fact owned by participants who never claimed the appartments etc.

Since these are not MA/FPC owned avatars, but random participants who bought appartments by the dozen as investments, no, MA/FPC has nothing to do with this, and also can't do anything about it, other than perhaps make more appartments which will get bought by investors so there are not enough apprtments available so MA/FPC needs to make more appartments which will get bought by investors, ad infinitum.

Also, rent will not work, because as has been said many times before, appartments and all other items are bought, not rented. That means you don't pay rent on anything, you pay for usage.

Wody said:

Although Marcus Callender the estate broker is listed as the owner, the deeds are in fact owned by participants who never claimed the appartments etc.

Since these are not MA/FPC owned avatars, but random participants who bought appartments by the dozen as investments, no, MA/FPC has nothing to do with this, and also can't do anything about it, other than perhaps make more appartments which will get bought by investors so there are not enough apprtments available so MA/FPC needs to make more appartments which will get bought by investors, ad infinitum.

Also, rent will not work, because as has been said many times before, appartments and all other items are bought, not rented. That means you don't pay rent on anything, you pay for usage.

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yup, its basicly accecpt the current price of apartments or go without

The people who originally bought up all the remaining apartments have been stuck with them for years now, gradually letting them back onto the market and often getting less than the price they originally paid. It was a stupid 'investment' then, and if this Draken guy is doing the same thing now then it's still a stupid 'investment' imo.

You obviously missed the "OMG the Chinese are joining EU and they all will want apartments so lets buy all of them from auction so we can be uber rich" event.

MA has no need to have some avatar holding them. They did that themselves when they took all the unsold apartments off of the auction some time back. This created somewhat of an artificial market on the ones that did exist. They were going for around 250PED before they removed them and about doubled to 500PED and stayed there for a standard apartment in some random tower somewhere. But still it did`nt raise prices much. Of course some people made PED on the ones they held and people are still trying to "invest" in them. But unless there is a real need for apartments other than status and cosmetic there won`t be much of a vibrant market for them.

The CND apartments at least had a use until they put storage up there. I will continue to hold my CND apartment for pure location value. But I`ve always felt that players should all pretty much have an apartment after so long in game as a place of residence. It makes the world that much more realistic. It`s just that there really is no need for one unless you are a big hoarder and the prices keep many players from even bothering with them. 40 to 50 bucks on the low end for a non necessary item in a virtual world.

If there was a more things that could be done with an apartment, then I would use it more..

Thorn said:

MA has no need to have some avatar holding them. They did that themselves when they took all the unsold apartments off of the auction some time back.

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There are no unsold apartments. All the appartments have been purchased by non-MA/FPC avatars, like I said before.

Wody said:

There are no unsold apartments. All the appartments have been purchased by non-MA/FPC avatars, like I said before.

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How would you know this for a fact also the Chinese are not comming its old news that they have shut out MA.

In Italy when you own an aprtment you pay taxes (very few actually). When you own a second apartment you pay taxes too (actually a lot more) if you own many apartments you pay a lot of taxes..........
but i guess MA cannot iper tax our big investors................

Magic Minder said:

How would you know this for a fact also the Chinese are not comming its old news that they have shut out MA.

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I know that the appartments are not owned by MA/FPC, because I contacted somebody who then was able to talk to Marcus personally and confirmed this.

Dr.D.C. said:

In Italy when you own an aprtment you pay taxes (very few actually).

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And on Calypso, you don't pay taxes, you pay for usage. So no, you can not make people pay more tax per appartment.

Wody said:

I know that the appartments are not owned by MA/FPC, because I contacted somebody who then was able to talk to Marcus personally and confirmed this.




And on Calypso, you don't pay taxes, you pay for usage. So no, you can not make people pay more tax per appartment.

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Your only confirming the problem but not providing a solution at this point and its true its not your responsabilty to.

Also I know people that havent been in game for over three years and there names are still on Apartments what about them I know of three Imagen how many more I dont know ....

Magic Minder said:

Also I know people that havent been in game for over three years and there names are still on Apartments what about them I know of three Imagen how many more I dont know ....

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If those accounts wil be deemed inactive, then their appartments will be sold on the market again when they revert back to Marcus, just like it says in the terms of use. So there is no problem here, except that not being in game, is not the same as not having an active account, since you could also sign into the website. The catch here, is that this recently changed, but if you never logged into 10.0, you never accepted the changed terms of use, so that doesn't apply.

Wody said:

And on Calypso, you don't pay taxes, you pay for usage. So no, you can not make people pay more tax per appartment.

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Entropia is dynamic. Don t say that IT CANNOT BE POSSIBLE, everythings is possible. Example, better to tax a little bit more the few ones that owns 30 apartments, shops etcetc and decrease the auction fees for lower MV (the largest number of offer). But like i said, a well defined feature of the game is to not boring the big investors.

Dr.D.C. said:

Entropia is dynamic. Don t say that IT CANNOT BE POSSIBLE, everythings is possible. Example, better to tax a little bit more the few ones that owns 30 apartments, shops etcetc and decrease the auction fees for lower MV (the largest number of offer). But like i said, a well defined feature of the game is to not boring the big investors.

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Change is not always bad
Best post so far that i have read here good job !!!

Also, rent will not work, because as has been said many times before, appartments and all other items are bought, not rented.

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I don't understand why you say that rent will not work? All that MA have to do is say:
"We will decrease the rent from 10 PED to 3 PED per month but instead of only paying when you feel like it you will pay each month."
It's no more difficult than that.

davidgr1200 said:

I don't understand why you say that rent will not work? All that MA have to do is say:
"We will decrease the rent from 10 PED to 3 PED per month but instead of only paying when you feel like it you will pay each month."
It's no more difficult than that.

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Any while we are at it they should add rent for each weapon, armor, and bP you have purchased too and force you to pay that monthly rent or take those items away.

I purchased my apartment the same way I purchased my armor and weapons If I choose not to use my 2875 for 3 months because I am skilling something different, or leave my phantom sitting for 2 months because I am skilling evade with tants, or not use my apartment for 2 months because I am spending my time in my girlfriends apartment then I should be able to do so. All th RL comparisons are worthless because this is not RL. I bought an apartment with the understanding that I owned it and if I want to enter it I need to pay a monthly fee, if the fee is not paid I can not enter it. Don't change the rules in the middle unless you are going to put forced usage rules on all items.

davidgr1200 said:

I don't understand why you say that rent will not work? All that MA have to do is say:
"We will decrease the rent from 10 PED to 3 PED per month but instead of only paying when you feel like it you will pay each month."
It's no more difficult than that.

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Question is, if that would really change anything significant ?
If you would be forced to pay really each month, it could mean that some appartments could be cycled earlier to auction.
But what about those that knowingly would be away from EU for several months ?
Or what happens when you have an accident and are unable to pay the rent ?

The moment when you can pay in advance to circumvent any loss, any change in the current system will simply bring absolutely no change at all.
If somebody wants to buy a few appartements as an "investment" he will simply pay a few months usage fee if he is forced to and add those up to the price.

Leave it as it is, there are enough estates for sale on auction if one really wants one.
Maybe not enough to get exactly the wanted one , but appartments are not like some low level armours or guns. Like in RL it takes some time searching to find exactly the one wanted.