Day: February 17, 2017

On Tuesday, November 15th 2016, the Lab launched the Premium members’ Horizons community, a “retro-futuristic” mainland environment featuring 36 residential regions each with 24 parcels available for auction to Premium members, with auctions commencing on Friday, November 18th 2016, with parcels being auctioned in batches of (generally) 10.

Obviously with 864 parcels to auction, it would take some time to get through things, but Whirly Fizzle and I decided to monitor things to see how they progressed, and I gave a brief snapshot at the end of the first week of auctions, and another when the auctions reached a half-way point.  The final lots of parcels was auctioned on the 12th-14th February, and given this, I’d thought I’d round-out the updates with an overall look at things.

All L$  / USD figures are approximate and based on available data. Some approximations have been made using the average parcel price for a region if the actual bid price was missed in collating data (applies to a total of 8 parcels across 864). The US dollar figure is based on a rate of L$260 to the US dollar.

SUMMARY OF AUCTION BATCHES AND TOTALS
Batch	No. Regions	No. Parcels	Total L$	Total USD
Batch 1	10	240	8,744,976.00	33,634.52
Batch 2	8	192	4,304,186.00	16,554.56
Batch 3	8	192	3,334,978.00	12,826.84
Batch 4	10	240	4,489,691.00	17,268.03
TOTALS	36	864	20,873,831.00	80,283.95

Note: a total of 4 regions have been re-auctioned; however, two may have been re-auctioned as a result of original bidder defaulting on payment, as the parcels were apparently re-auctioned without being claimed. If the original payments were made, then a further L$59,131 / approx US $227.42 should be added to the appropriate totals.

Unsurprisingly, this batch of auctions drew the highest bid prices, due in part to the fact that two of the region – Horizons Apollo and Horizons Pandora – have genuine access to sailable open water – the open water to the west, north and east of the Horizons regions currently represent the grid edge, and is not accessible.

Both Batch 1 and Batch 2 were part of my half-way report, and since then, there has been some juggling between those parcels initially put up for sale, those initially offered for rent, and those offered for either rent for purchase.

For those interested in a more granular breakdown of auctions by batch / region, a complete set of tables is available here. The following tables provide a breakdown of parcel usage, based on original bidder’s actions with the parcels they obtained.

GENERAL STATUS OF PARCELS – ALL REGIONS, 864 PARCELS
		Parcels Obtained For
	Auctioned	Sale	Rent	Either	Comm.	Private	Unkn	Re-auct’d
Batch 1	240	100	59	13	4	17	46	1
Batch 2	192	57	55	24	7	13	35	1
Batch 3	192	101	15	37	2	11	26	0
Batch 4	240	69	57	17	5	10	82	0
TOTALS	864	327	186	91	18	51	189	2

Notes

• Comm = obtained for commercial use
• Private = obtained for residential or group use
• Unkn = those most likely obtained for sale / rent but which either have not (as yet) been offered for either / do not appear to have been made available (parcel holders did not respond to enquiries)
• The re-auctioned parcels are limited to those were a second payment for the re-auction amount can be confirmed. As noted above, two other regions re-auctioned may not have been paid for by the original bidder prior to being put back up for auction. These are currently available for rent, and have been classified in the Batch 2 rental figures.

SNAPSHOT OF PARCELS OFFERED FOR SALE BY ORIGINAL BIDDER
Total for Sale	Unsold	Commercial	Private	Offered for re-sale / rent	Withdrawn from sale
327	180	23	31	81	12

Notes:

• “Offered for re-sale / rent” indicates parcels purchased from original bidder and offered for sale / rent by purchaser
• “Withdrawn from sale” indicates parcels initially offered for sale by bidder, but then set to  “not for sale” & with no indication they are available for rent.

SNAPSHOT OF PARCELS OFFERED FOR RENT BY ORIGINAL BIDDER
Total Offered for Rent	Available for Rent	Rented Commercial	Rented Private
186	157	12	17

 

SNAPSHOT OF PARCELS OFFERED FOR SALE OR RENT BY ORIGINAL BIDDER
Total Offer for Sale / Rent	Available	Sold	Rented
91	64	10 (5 on resale)	17

Notes:

• Of the 10 sold, the 5 not up for re-sale have been sold for commercial / private use
• The 17 rented parcels represent a mix of commercial and private use

General Observations

General interest in Horizons appears low – however, this many change now the auctions have finished. Currently, most of the land sales which have occurred post-auction have been between those land resellers / renters originally bidding on the parcels, rather than onward selling to those interested in using Horizons as either a home or a business location.

Sale prices across the  regions appear to be settling into the mid-20K through mid-40K range, although some – notably those with direct open-water access  (as opposed to river / canal access) or perceived water access can carry a premium. Rentals appear to remain at low ebb. As noted previously, this could be down to a lack of direct promotion by those offering them for rent.

Of the 189 listed as “unkn”, almost all are held by those selling and / or renting parcels, so it is not unreasonable to anticipate these being made available for sale / rent if / when current offerings are sold / rented.  One of those holding such parcels did confirm they would be offered for rent, but declined to indicate when.

Those interested in Horizons parcels – whether to purchase (Premium) or rent (anyone), should tour the regions with care. A number of parcels are offered for rent / sale offering boat docking where this is not strictly accurate (e.g. the parcel doesn’t directly join water, or the water it faces is actually off-sim). The regions are also unzoned, so judging how well they may keep to the desired theme is hard to quantify. There are a number of decidedly “non-sci fi retro” buildings across the regions, but many of these are place holders, and should be seen as indicative of the overall region styling.