Rave about starter homes and 20k? Loan, we need loans!

[jjsy]

EDIT: just realised that this could be an in appropriate place to post this... but I don't know exactly where it should go, could somebody point it out for me?

The "Starter Lot".... bleh
-----------------------------------------
a bunch of related issues which has been bugging me as a person who likes to create lots.

A starter lot is defined to be a lot costing less than 20k.  However, in a lot of cases, the lot creator is really faced with tough problems.  Quite often we get "starter" lots with no furnishing whatsoever to keep the  cost down.  Not that big an issue, but still quite irritating to try to starve and sleep in a bedless albeit nice house.  imho, a "starter" lot should contain at least the bare minimum for civilized living, some items listed in order of importance.

0) phone  (curse all the "starter" lots that doesn't even leave enough $$ to buy a DAMN PHONE!!!!)
1) toilet (before somebody counter this, remember the word "civilized"??)
2) bed
3) bath/shower

optional but highly recommended:
4) kitchen stuff (fridge + at least microwave)

Now I like to create lots myself, I do know the struggle between getting the architecture up in place and putting in furniture (which could be replaced very quickly later).  At the bare minimum, I would like the bare architecture in place, even if without paint and stuff.. (prob looks hell ugly).  Even so, sometimes, frustration comes in the form of "damn, just exceeded the 20k limit" by a small margin, then proceed to hunt down the whole lot to look for things to delete.... without success.......  self... talk... curse and swear at heavens (relation to self --, relation to heaven ----)

And thus, though I agree somewhat with the 20k handout being a little unrealistic at times, sorry if I say that I just CANNOT side with the proponents of that idea given the extreme limitations that I'm having already....

Advanced Financing 101
-----------------------------------------
In real life, do we really fork out the entire sum at once to buy a house??  Except for the few minority which are the exception (don't talk to me, don't tell me who you are, just go.... go...), most people will go for housing loans.  I've seen loans being done in the past (usually involving a computer or a phone hack or an atm), some being quite advanced (add payment to bills which automatically brings in repo man without the loan hack doing anything directly).  But what I feel we need is something that starter lot creators can PUT directly into the lot instead of relying on sims.

Solution?

Future money: loans.
-----------------------------------------
I don't know if this is possible: but here's what I can throw off the top of my head right now, in the whole frustration mood over "20k" issue.
First, create a "Loan" object with a NEGATIVE cost.  The negative cost is the negation of the loan that the sim family is supposed to get.  So what does this implies?  Assuming that the game adds up the cost of all the buy/build items + lot size, the "Loan" object will effective reduce the total price of the lot by its stated amount...   E,g, say a house cost 25k, add a 5k loan object (adds -5k to total cost), this will bring down the cost of the house to 20k!!   So a starter family with 20k can still afford the house, where basic amenities are assured with an appropriate loan amount.  Given that, how about loan payment?

Loan repayment:
-----------------------------------------
Since the loan object has negative cost, I assume that it will actually REDUCE the household money if sold in buy mode.  However, this can only be true if the loan value is not deprecated.  assuming that Sims2 deprecation uses multiplication instead of fixed subtraction, we would not want the actual debt to reduce on its own!!! (Although it's probably everybody's dream).  What this still doesn't solve, at least without more advanced handling, is the payment period/frequency problem.

For simplicity, let each loan scheme, characterized by the
1. total loan amount,
2. the interest,
3. the number of payments,
4. the delay to first payment
5. the frequency of subsequent payment,
6. penalty to missed payment

Basically, a person takes out a loan amount of X has to pay back total outstanding amount Y = (X + interest rate * X)
Each payment amount P = (outstanding loan amount Y / number of payments left)
First payment starts after a delay (to give sims time to get a job and earn some money) e.g. 3 days to 1 week, and continue at a regular interval.
Should a payment be missed, a fine amount is added into the outstanding total (thus increasing amount of future payments).

After working out the math, how do we actually enforce payment?  I think the loan idea I say in a mod is quite good in that it rides on the bills system.  If it is possible, simply issue each payment as a separate bill, and then we don't even have to handle missed payments.  The inbuilt bills+repo-man will take care of that.

The Ideal Outcome
-----------------------------------------
Sims family can now buy houses beyond their initial budget, balanced by a harder life in the future serving the loan (did anybody notice how familiar sims 2 has become as reflections of our own lives...).  So those people who think 20k is too much can opt to have initial amount of money lowered with no need to build cheap ugly temporary houses.  Just open the non-inhabited lot you want to buy, plonk down one/ few appropriate loan objects such that the cost of the lot (should be more aptly named the down payment now) will be within the budget of the family in question.  This can also make a lot of houses which misses the "starter" limit of 20k by a hair margin to make it to the category without compromising basic amenities.

The Real Situation?
-----------------------------------------
How possible is this within the current system?

[Maxwell]

Sounds like you're looking for Inge's mortgage shrubs (amongst other, similar objects): http://www.simlogical.com/sl/Sims2Pages/Sims2_MovingHouse.htm

The interest scheme doesn't work quite like you've described, but I imagine you'll find it satisfactory enough.

EDIT: just realised that this could be an in appropriate place to post this... but I don't know exactly where it should go, could somebody point it out for me?

A thread like this probably belongs in the Podium. Peasantry is really more for posting stuff you've hacked yourself.

[bekka]

Could also use Moniques computer, an updated version that is posted in Peasantry.

[Zazazu]

That's what I do. I have the Mayor "donate" the amount of the loan into the big simoleon hole in the sky. Then another sim takes out a loan. The interest is a bank fee to me. All households also pay a 10% income tax weekly to fund creation of community lots, given to the mayor but put in a savings account.

[Quinctia]

I've started to use the mortgage shrubs as a general rule to get all the available lots in a neighborhood under 20k.  That way, I can move in whomever I choose, easy-peasy.  If they've got the cash, they can sell some of the shrubs...if they want to furnish more/remodel, they can get a larger mortgage with more shrubs.

However, I've also been trying my hands at building some actual starter homes.  And I'm getting better at it.  I'm avoiding things that annoy ME in starters I've downloaded in the past.  I'm making houses on foundations, with separated spaces (e.g., no open loft bedrooms, actual living and kitchen space, room for a tub in the bathroom).  Because not all of my families are going to be living in giant houses filled with expensive everything, nor should they.

[Gus Smedstad]

Cheapest reasonable home I've manage to make was a $10K single-wide trailer.  Patterned after some actual trailer floorplans I found online.  It's enough for a couple to live in, but starts to get too cramped if they have any kids.

I use "No $20K handouts," which means that my Sims graduating from college often have only $4-5K.  Actually, they could have $10K or more if I pushed them hard enough, but I find everyone graduating Summa Cum Laude really boring, so I play with rules that only has the real over-acheivers doing that.

The first couple of times I did that, I started the Sim in a one-room shanty.  No seperate bathroom even, the toilet's out in the open, like a prison cell or a frontier house or something.  That was kind of amusing, but after a while I got sick of how unpleasant those shacks were, so I started using the mortgage shrubs so they could at least afford the trailer.

I've done apartments as well, but I've never been happy with the results because there's no way to keep the finances of the different sims separate.

 - Gus

[Zazazu]

I use "No $20K handouts," which means that my Sims graduating from college often have only $4-5K. 

My sims now get nothing or very, very little when coming out of college. College costs 20k (or 2,500 a semester). Initial scholarships are taken off the total, but money for the subsequent semesters has to come from somewhere. So if the parents don't have enough, the kids have to give up their grants. Actually, I've been thinking about just making them give up the grants across-the-board (in life, when have you ever been giving a grant for education and then used it to get a place after college? You can't.). Then mom & dad can give them some money to get started, or they can take out a loan, or they move back in with the parents.

I like the loans better than the mortgage shrubs because they force priorities. You can't take out an inordinate amount...you won't be able to afford the payments. And you have to pay it back, as it's included with your normal bills and you'll get a visit from the repo man if you let it sit.

[jjsy]

Interesting resources pointed out.  I;m taking a look at IJ's mortage shrubs.  Looks very usable except that it.. well... looks like a shrub .. (was hoping for something more reminding of the debt status like a mortage contract or something.  sounds kindof silly if a shrub starts deducting money) and that there's no grace period.  Maybe when I can draft out enough stuff I can try to bug IJ for an improvement?

For the more advanced loan, I agree that the control is much better.  My only complaint is that it is sim-initiated.  Unlike mortage objects which can be pre-built into the house (a house with an housing loan plan attached)

Maybe there can be a way for loans to be initiated via objects prior to sims moving in, but let another loan system takes over?? in that the loan objects just lower the initial "downpayment" of the building and "bootstraps" whatever global loaning system there are once the sims move in?

[Count Four]

I seem to have a different play style. Making Sims more realistic isn't really my aim. I think of it in terms of "This is how things work in Simland." My sims often start with a 10k trailer, where they live until they have too many kids. Then, they get moved to a new, empty lot. Their house evolves a room at a time, as they have the money. I like this style--I get to play the career game, and have little building sessions, too.

And sometimes I get really interesting houses that I wouldn't have built that way otherwise.

[jsalemi]

Interesting resources pointed out.  I;m taking a look at IJ's mortage shrubs.  Looks very usable except that it.. well... looks like a shrub .. (was hoping for something more reminding of the debt status like a mortage contract or something.  sounds kindof silly if a shrub starts deducting money) and that there's no grace period.  Maybe when I can draft out enough stuff I can try to bug IJ for an improvement?

The mortgage shrub doesn't 'deduct money' -- it adds interest payments to the normal bills the sims get.  The cost of the 'mortgage' doesn't get deducted from the sims funds until you sell the shrub.  Kinda like an interest-only mortgage with a balloon payment.

[Zazazu]

I seem to have a different play style. Making Sims more realistic isn't really my aim. I think of it in terms of "This is how things work in Simland." My sims often start with a 10k trailer, where they live until they have too many kids. Then, they get moved to a new, empty lot. Their house evolves a room at a time, as they have the money. I like this style--I get to play the career game, and have little building sessions, too.

And sometimes I get really interesting houses that I wouldn't have built that way otherwise.

It annoys me to be able to see in my mind how I want a house to look, yet not be able to make it. Plus, I rarely add on. I've been playing Teardrop Isle lately and I have three playable lots.

• One is the beach shack, which is a...well, no bedroom/bathroom description sounds right. 5x10 top floor with kitchen/bed/"table"/tv and 4x5 bottom floor with bed/itty bath only made possible by Targa's ladder. It will never be built further. They are barely making it now, what with private school fees (no public school in the 'hood yet), loan payments, and income/property taxes. Until the next generation, taxes are at 10%/rotation  which is $2,100 a season, and the single parent fishes for a living (when he gets off his ass or isn't kicking his brother the Mayor's trash can). Oldest kid wants college, so she's going to have to work her ass off to get scholarships. Occupied by a child, teen, and adult.
• Mayor's mansion. Three story monstrosity with a fair bit of unused space as there is an atrium ceiling from the living area, and the second floor is all bathrooms and game area. One huge bedroom for seven kids on the third floor, big nursery (constant twins), master bedroom, eat-in kitchen, and living area on the first floor, with this weird reading nook above the 1st floor bath. They'd be rolling in it if it weren't for the private school fees on all those kids, plus any overages on community lot builds that aren't covered by taxes come out of the Mayor's funds. Occupied by twin toddlers, four children (two sets of twins), a teen, and two adults.
• Farm Lot. 32-plot greenhouse run mostly by my immortal sim. There is a tight but functional house towards the back, and a large pond taking up about half the lot that is crossed by a curved diagonal bridge (pain in the nether regions to make). House has three bedrooms (two tiny ones and a master), nursery, two bathrooms, and a "great" room (which isn't great, it's really small). Taxes are about $7,000, but two sims are at the top of their career levels and they only have three kids to pay private school fees for. Occupied by twin toddlers, child, two adults, and a perpetual elder.

This current generation has twelve children (gah!). Even if I kill one off, which I think I will, that's 8 more households. My building fetish is definitely going to be sated.

[Ellatrue]

I think it would be more realistic to have the sims start off with something more like 10,000, and then have to use the mortgage shrubs. You can actually build something pretty decent for under 20k, if you have the building skills.

My main objection with the game is actually with how quickly the house depreciates. Once you move them into their starter home, they are pretty much stuck there because of how much the home drops in value.

[jolrei]

My main objection with the game is actually with how quickly the house depreciates. Once you move them into their starter home, they are pretty much stuck there because of how much the home drops in value.

That's a good point.  Even with the current downturn in real estate markets in the US and Canada, latest projections I have heard is that the housing market is merely "slowing down" not crashing, and houses are still appreciating in value, not depreciating.  Only on the sims can you end up invariably losing money on your house.

[Zazazu]

A partial solution is to use the magic wand before you move the sim in. I've somehow lost that (again) since installing FreeTime. I always use it on student apartments. A couple hundred bucks makes a huge difference.

[Kyna]

The main problem I have with starter houses is that I hate having to move my sims once they're in a lot.

I'm not particularly fond of building, furnishing or decorating lots.  If I put sims in a starter lot then I'm going to have to either build on to it to accommodate offspring, or move them on to a bigger lot.  When I do move them out, I need to refurnish the starter lot so it can be reused (yes, I know I could mess about with replacing the lot file, or use Inge's stay things shrub).

It just seems simpler to start out the sim in a house that's big enough for their later needs, rather than messing about with moving them later.  This is one reason why I like multi-generational houses with 2 master bedrooms, a couple of bedrooms for the kids and a nursery.  One of the offspring can return to the family home post-graduation, take up residence in the 2nd master bedroom, and I know it will be big enough for their family.

[gethane]

It just seems simpler to start out the sim in a house that's big enough for their later needs, rather than messing about with moving them later.  This is one reason why I like multi-generational houses with 2 master bedrooms, a couple of bedrooms for the kids and a nursery.  One of the offspring can return to the family home post-graduation, take up residence in the 2nd master bedroom, and I know it will be big enough for their family.

this is my preference as well. I've got a couple of houses at my site that meets this criteria, if you are interested
http://prismbaby.com/sims/house_aurora/auroraroad.html
http://gethanesims.prismbaby.com/index.php?pg=./lots/WalkerHouse/WalkerHouse

[Ambular]

EDIT: just realised that this could be an in appropriate place to post this... but I don't know exactly where it should go, could somebody point it out for me?

The "Starter Lot".... bleh
-----------------------------------------
a bunch of related issues which has been bugging me as a person who likes to create lots.

A starter lot is defined to be a lot costing less than 20k.  However, in a lot of cases, the lot creator is really faced with tough problems.  Quite often we get "starter" lots with no furnishing whatsoever to keep the  cost down.  Not that big an issue, but still quite irritating to try to starve and sleep in a bedless albeit nice house.  imho, a "starter" lot should contain at least the bare minimum for civilized living, some items listed in order of importance.

0) phone  (curse all the "starter" lots that doesn't even leave enough $$ to buy a DAMN PHONE!!!!)
1) toilet (before somebody counter this, remember the word "civilized"??)
2) bed
3) bath/shower

optional but highly recommended:
4) kitchen stuff (fridge + at least microwave)

http://ambular.djssims.com/index.php?category=1&subcat=6

The three trailer homes there are my attempt at getting around the issues you describe.  I used a combination of Pescado's Magic Wand item, some building tricks including using unlocked foundation walls in place of the regular kind, and a few cloned Maxis walls and floors set at a value of zero to get them all in under $20,000 at a more or less reasonable size, while including all the basic necessities plus a few small extras on each lot.

Cheaty?  Perhaps, but speaking from experience, real starter places (trailers especially) typically are built on the cheap and have very little after-market value.  So it's not altogether unrealistic.

[rosenshyne]

I've done apartments as well, but I've never been happy with the results because there's no way to keep the finances of the different sims separate.

I just buy each sim objects worth their paycheck, minus whatever I decide rent is and living expenses. All extra money is then safely tucked away in their inventory, to prevent depreciation. I do the same thing with teens' paychecks and childrens' school awards.

[Gus Smedstad]

I like the loans better than the mortgage shrubs because they force priorities.

Which loans?  The Monique's Computer loans?  I haven't looked at that, so I don't know how it differs from the shrubs.

I definitely agree that college should cost money, not generate it, but I've been too lazy to come up with my own set of rules.

One advantage of multi-generation homes is that it gives you a way to kill off the elders naturally through old age without boring yourself to tears doing it.

I've done the evolving-house thing, but most recently I've played the way it usually is in real life - when you need more house, you go house hunting.  True, people do build additions, but more often they just move.

The biggest problem with the move, now that we have inventory and can move all the expensive furnishings, is that it resets everything, and restarts at Monday at 8 AM.  Which I find kind of annoying.

 - Gus

[Zazazu]

I'm talking about the computer. Inge's mortgage shrub only forces you to pay the interest. Now that can add up, as it's $10/day/$1000 loaned. Monique's computer loans force the payments, since a loan payment + interest is charged with your normal bills. Once the original payment and loan are paid, loan's over. It's really, really rough if the sims don't have a traditional job. If they do have a real job, it's not quite as bad. I'm about to test doing a $20,000 loan for the eldest of the third generation, income only coming from her..uh.."special" talents, and her sister's teen job as soon as she gets to the age where I have my teens either go to college or start their careers/slack.

My elders do still live with their children, for the most part. Well, one child. Sometimes elders in Prospect Beach go to the retirement home, but so far that only happened with a sim who started wandering off. Teardrop Isle has no elder care facilities. They have Saish (club/restaurant) and a very disappointing arcade. That's all there is for now, until taxes can cover a new lot.

The reset kind of annoys me, but I use Paladin's Season changer to at least remove that weirdness. I can ignore the day of the week being wrong.

[jjsy]

just crossed my mind... you know, with the loan system, it would be possible say for a family to moved into a lot on loan, then one sim takes the cash and makes his or her getaway... leaving the rest the of family with no cash AND debt.... imagine the extreme case, everybody moved out except a soon-to-expire elder....  whatever will happen to the debt after the poor sim finally takes the last journey?

Somehow, this makes me very, VERY creepy... *shivers*....

I found that I agree with a lot of what Kyna said.

The whole point is to avoid the trashy "temporary" period where the family is living in some shack.  Note that this is DIFFERENT from stuff like trailer (courtesy AmberDiceless) because I think trailer life can be a very interesting theme! It is "permanent" so  as to speak.  I'm talking about temporary lots where we don't like, don't have passion with and simply forced into it due to money woes.

Concerning loans, I'm leaning towards IJ's shrubs atm, it being a build/buy time item rather than an interaction mod that probably involves global scripts/data?  The forced payments thing I think COULD be possibly added to IJ's work too (I think. I could be wrong due to ignorance), the simplest will be to instead of charging interest, it can be made to pay actual amount and maybe somehow decreases its counter or something until it is fully paid back?  And I think somebody should definitely work on a nicer more "loany" mesh to replace the shrub.  Some loan contract or document that can be placed on table or placed in inventory or hanged on wall to remind the poor sims of their debts will be good (if we're really evil, make it lower environment attractiveness!!).

Concerning starter buildings, another possibility, (but prob not very feasilble right now) is some means for a builder to store "building add-on modules" as scripts?
So a "starter" may consist of one main building with maybe just the first two floors.  An add on, when bought at later stage may "extend" the building to third floor and modify some of the architecture maybe to include a new side building.  That way, all the buildings are still designed by the same person and have the same theme.  Another interesting dimension is to visually see significant housing improvements other than just furniture or forced the player to do his/her own DIY work which may be troublesome or "ruin" the original style.  Yeah I now, too far fetched for now... but sometimes I think, why not... even nicer if it can work with the lotadjuster to include additional land as an "upgrade".

[Rascal]

Interesting resources pointed out.  I;m taking a look at IJ's mortage shrubs.  Looks very usable except that it.. well... looks like a shrub .. (was hoping for something more reminding of the debt status like a mortage contract or something.  sounds kindof silly if a shrub starts deducting money) and that there's no grace period.  Maybe when I can draft out enough stuff I can try to bug IJ for an improvement?

I use dentedtrain's Loan Paintings & Investment bonds.   http://forums.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=122224&highlight=painting They are based on Inge's mortgage shrubs but are perhaps more in line with what you were wanting?

[pbox]

The reset kind of annoys me, but I use Paladin's Season changer to at least remove that weirdness. I can ignore the day of the week being wrong.

I always change the day of week with the LotSyncTimer, do you know that that's possible? It's under TimeWarp, after all those warnings .. but to me it looks like the day of week is more or less a cosmetical issue, particularly when they've just moved in -- changing it does not change the actual day (day 34 remains day 34 I mean), only the name -- so I don't hink there's reason to worry. In any case I've never seen any problems with it.

Concerning starter buildings, another possibility, (but prob not very feasilble right now) is some means for a builder to store "building add-on modules" as scripts?
So a "starter" may consist of one main building with maybe just the first two floors.  An add on, when bought at later stage may "extend" the building to third floor and modify some of the architecture maybe to include a new side building.  That way, all the buildings are still designed by the same person and have the same theme. 

I've done something similar with some of my earlier starters (available @ mts2, I think Newbie Road 65a/b/c is a good example) -- they're available in a few different versions, smaller and slightly expanded ones, so that people could use the big one as a kind of blueprint when they want to expand the smaller house. I have no idea whether anyone actually did that, though =).

[cwykes]

My main objection with the game is actually with how quickly the house depreciates. Once you move them into their starter home, they are pretty much stuck there because of how much the home drops in value.

That's a good point.  Even with the current downturn in real estate markets in the US and Canada, latest projections I have heard is that the housing market is merely "slowing down" not crashing, and houses are still appreciating in value, not depreciating.  Only on the sims can you end up invariably losing money on your house.

Think of it this way - It isn't the house that depreciates, it's the furnishings.  Sims are forced to buy new furniture whereas we started out with cast offs from around the family and they got the new stuff!

...  imho, a "starter" lot should contain at least the bare minimum for civilized living, some items listed in order of importance.

0) phone  (curse all the "starter" lots that doesn't even leave enough $$ to buy a DAMN PHONE!!!!)
1) toilet (before somebody counter this, remember the word "civilized"??)
2) bed
3) bath/shower

optional but highly recommended:
4) kitchen stuff (fridge + at least microwave)

OK I agree about the phone, but you could argue a bit about the other items as long as there's money to buy them.
If you put toilet, shower and fridge in a starter home, you have to sell them and rebuy them to give your sims those first few aspiration points to get them going when they move in. Same goes for a bed, bookcase, bar etc depending on sim personality.  I never buy any cooking appliances for sims until they've all earned a few cooking points.  They can live on lunch meat sandwiches for a while and chef salad when one of them has 3 asp points.  I never buy microwaves at all unless a fortune sim insists - then it goes on a corner where they can't use it.  Why include washbasins? - they just offer sims a reason to linger in the bathroom!  I get irritated by builders who never remember to put lights in the rooms!  Or put in a cooking appliance without a fire alarm!
 

http://ambular.djssims.com/index.php?category=1&subcat=6
The three trailer homes there are my attempt at getting around the issues you describe.  I used a combination of Pescado's Magic Wand item, some building tricks including using unlocked foundation walls in place of the regular kind, and a few cloned Maxis walls and floors set at a value of zero to get them all in under $20,000 at a more or less reasonable size, while including all the basic necessities plus a few small extras on each lot.

Like Amberdiceless I used Pescado's magic wand to build a set of <20K homes.  I wanted some retirement cottages for elders though and they don't all work as starter homes.   Because everything is fully depreciated, the sims can't actually afford to change the house to suit them and are stuck with my 'granny' choices until they earn some money.  I don't use the foundations, because a) they cost money and b) houses are easier to play when there's only one level.  They're free on TSR. http://www.thesimsresource.com/profiles/view.php?mid=427711

[Zazazu]

Think of it this way - It isn't the house that depreciates, it's the furnishings.  Sims are forced to buy new furniture whereas we started out with cast offs from around the family and they got the new stuff!

Mine sometimes take stuff from home. It depends on what resources the house has. If I want to upgrade furnishings in a house (I'm slowly doing that with the farm lot) then I'll put a dining set in one kid's inventory, an old bed in another kid's inventory, etc. In larger houses where there are more kids and everything's kind of established, they don't get anything.

...  imho, a "starter" lot should contain at least the bare minimum for civilized living, some items listed in order of importance.

0) phone  (curse all the "starter" lots that doesn't even leave enough $$ to buy a DAMN PHONE!!!!)
1) toilet (before somebody counter this, remember the word "civilized"??)
2) bed
3) bath/shower

optional but highly recommended:
4) kitchen stuff (fridge + at least microwave)

I look at it in the light of what you get when you rent an unfurnished apartment:
- toilet
- sink
- mirror
- bathtub/shower
- couple of counters
- stove
- refrigerator
- lights
You don't get a phone included in a new place. I don't even have a "real" phone. You don't get a bed, or a couch, or any of that sort of thing. You bring/buy your own. Generally, you don't get a microwave. I rented one place with an included microwave, and it was so tiny it barely held a cup of tea, and it was perhaps 2 watts. Never used it.

Like Amberdiceless I used Pescado's magic wand to build a set of <20K homes.  I wanted some retirement cottages for elders though and they don't all work as starter homes.   Because everything is fully depreciated, the sims can't actually afford to change the house to suit them and are stuck with my 'granny' choices until they earn some money.

I use this lot by Witch, with slight modifications. I first had my builder sim, who I use to carry a floorplan album so that I can reference those photos in the game, occupy it, and then moved a few of the townie elder sims into it. Whenever I do a townie aging rotation, I do it there, and the graves are moved to the graveyard and I keep about half the new elders for the retirement home. Then any playable elder I want to move in there can and takes an empty room. There's built-in drama (Elders on ACR). Having a retirement village would be nice, but it doesn't really fit in with either of my 'hoods, especially the one I'm playing now. Space is going to be a premium this generation, and it's only the third. This assumes two more community lots before gen 4 gets old enough to move out on their own. Next gen things are going to start getting bulldozed and replaced by duplexes, then in one more I'll start having to do apartments and 1xX homes.

just crossed my mind... you know, with the loan system, it would be possible say for a family to moved into a lot on loan, then one sim takes the cash and makes his or her getaway... leaving the rest the of family with no cash AND debt.... imagine the extreme case, everybody moved out except a soon-to-expire elder....  whatever will happen to the debt after the poor sim finally takes the last journey?

Somehow, this makes me very, VERY creepy... *shivers*....

Thanks for the inspiration!  I need to seed some more hatred in my 'hood. Kids are getting along a little too well, even with the Mayor's kids talking about how poor and uneducated Rose (shack-liver's eldest) is behind her back.