Great Mazaloom Simposium: Value of Land

(Year 233, Spring) This year's Great Mazaloom Simposium took place at the conference center of Hotel Lykke in Windenburg this weekend. The title was "The Value of Owned Land", and among the presenters were HRM King Tarriot, Duke Merlin von Windenburg (81) and Mrs Fanny Silverbone (73), Minister of Trades & Taxes.

Left to right: HRM King Tarriot, Duke Merlin von Windenburg, Mrs Fanny Silverbone
(Minestry of Trades & Taxes), and Henrik Kraft (Windenburg Mayor).

The Simposium is an annual arena intended for Aristocracy and Politicians. This year's focus stirred a massive interest also beyond the target group. It was a successful two days event, and several Councilors stated that they now see the ongoing land projects with new eyes. The national project has been in the works for a couple years already, including the completed Regional Reform Y233, and the expressed goal is to secure that all land is registered with both ownership and usage, and to decide on an improved national system for rented land. This won't affect most lot owners much, but will be good news to anyone fighting the bugged Landlord system.

Regional ownership

Following the Regional Reform Y233, several stately owned lots were transferred, in order to be owned by the region where the lot is located. Some of these lots serve a region, others might serve the nation. The difference mostly says who are to pay for maintenance.

All lots previously owned by Region 12 Mazaloom are now owned by Region 5 San Myshuno or Region 8 Gloom.

In the near future lots previously owned by a few of the national stock companies will have new ownership. One example is he many museums that have been seen as venues for passing on knowledge and history, and therefore used to sort under regional EDU companies. They will shortly be owned by the National Museum instead. Schools and parks are among other community services shortly to switch owners, too, but this will mainly be structural changes and not affect lot values.

Graveyards

People Chamber has decided on a new routine for graveyards (still awaiting approval from the other two chambers). Today graveyards are owned by Church of Similius, the regions, private residents as well as companies. The goal is that each of the parishes shall have a main cemetery owned by the state and operated by the Church of Similius. However, there is an agreement that all churches are owned by the Church of Similius Trust as long as the church is the stately religion, affecting cemeteries when on the same lot as the parish church. The additional smaller graveyards, serving the districts, can be owned by others. These smaller graveyards are often combined with other lot functionality as they are too small to occupy a full community lot alone.

The new routine also sets how many large graves (4x4) each cemetery/graveyard shall offer. These are space consuming and are typically bought by wealthier families for their founder.

New crypts are no longer established, but there exist 12 crypts from when Church of Similius became our stately religion, plus a few in Ravenwood serving specific fields of community.

A committee has updated the overview made by Ministry of Health & Welfare more than ten years ago. Details with options and fees can be found on Church of Similius' webpage (will get updated), and will also be published in a separate article as soon as the new routine is formally approved.

New rules for rented lots

The lecture that many attendees waited for, regarded rented lots, commercial as well as residential. While we want the routine to be as simple as possible, Minister of Trades & Taxes, Mrs Silverbone, informed on the need of a common set of rules throughout the nation. The former Landlord routine turned out to be too bugged, and is now being replaced by a simple system where rent is set based on the category commercial or residential, size of the rented areal, and whether the unit is equipped or not. This will be a "on-the-side" routine administrated manual.

There is no limit to how much land one person or company can own, but maximum 4 units will be allowed per lot.

- We return to the "locked door" principle, Mrs Silverbone said. - There will be a very few rented units still based on the Landlords routine (For Rent deal), but that routine will no longer be used for paying and receiving rent, only for splitting the units, technically. Also, for the first time we have a max rent to encourage lot owners to rather have multiple rented sections, when the lot size allows it.

The following rules might seem a bit detailed at first, but in most cases the full lot is rented by one renter, meaning the rent cap will be met and a detailed calculation is not needed. Once the rent is calculated, it won't need to be recalculated unless the rules are modified in the future.

Commercial renters: Rent is set per ground/floor tile, incl. storage room(s). Facilities shared with other renters (kitchen/toilets etc) and outdoors are not counted. The tile cost is §10 when the area is fully equipped*, §5 if only plumbing and kitchen counters are included. Renting a fully equipped 15x20 office gives the annual rent of §3,000 (15x20x10). When one company rents a full lot, all lot tiles are counted, including the outdoors. Max Commercial rent is §5,000.

Residential renters: Rent is set per ground/floor tiles of the unit. Facilities shared with other renters (common areas including outdoors) not counted. The tile cost is §5 when the area is fully equipped*, §2.5 if only plumbing and kitchen counters are included. Renting a fully equipped 15x20 residential unit gives the annual rent of §1,500 (15x20x5). When one renting a full lot, all lot tiles are counted, including the outdoors. Max Residential rent is §3,000. Rent is paid on top of regular bills.

While there can be up to 4 renters/users per lot, each lot can only have one owner. This means that ownership can not be split like the usage can.

*Equipment comes in two levels:

Fully equipped: All needed furniture are included. Renter might add furniture only when approved by owner. The idea is that renter will only add clutter and details that can be dragged from the renter's personally inventory. This will typically be deco items like photos, collectibles and more. The renter will normally not add furniture to a fully equipped unit, but is normally free to adjust swatches at no cost. Fully equipped is a common standard for smaller units or short term rentals.

Partly equipped: Only plumbing and kitchen counters are included, as well as minimum one lamp per room (normally a centered ceiling lamp). The renter will equip the unit, and when approved also plumbing, counters and lamps can be replaced, but must be left behind when moving out. Please note that units not having the minimum equipment are not allowed. Partly equipped is a common standard for larger units and long term rentals.

In addition there are special agreements, common for larger estates and usage of property owned by a Trust. Because of size these will always reach the maximum rent, and they will normally be equipped beyond the standards. Special agreement will affect rent as well as the usage, and is not covered by our standard routine.

Aristocracy and Royal Court

Following Mrs Silverbone's full hour lecture, HRM took to the podium to inform about coming adjustments to Aristocracy and the large Peerage, plus the lineup for this year's Royal Court, which always close the Simposium.

Mazaloom's Aristocracy currently contains no less than 51 Houses. In addition there are a few individuals earning status as member of Aristocracy through their career position or election. There are no changes when it comes to qualifying as a House. The House must still have minimum two members who are worthy of minimum §250,000 total.

The Royal Chamber has systemized the many Coat of Arm designs created and developed over many generations. The design is meant to be unique to each house. Unfortunately too many Houses now use the same combination of primary color and secondary color, while there exists many not yet used combinations. This is not a big problem as most of these Houses use different forms and Symbols, but it would have been better if color combinations were unique for all. Royal Chamber has decided to be more restrictive regarding a new Head of House's application for Coat of Arms. It must now be applied for 3 alternatives, and the Royal Chamber will pick the best suited.

Currently a total of 14 Houses will get some extra attention, but no actions will be taken until there is a new Head of House with a new Coat of Arm design, anyway.

The Royal Court (Winter Year 233) lineup was announced:

- The Honorable Edward von Kaching for the Gloom barony
- Paula (Ching) Altham Mester Mugger, Baroness of Emp
- Duke Charlopold de Cavalier, knighted for the High Order of the Baltazar
- Baron Vincent of Res, knighted for the High Order of the Sprout
- Mrs Agnes Crumplebottom, knighted for the High Order of the Golden Lion
- Erica (Caspar) Rab-Saxor, to be known as Baroness of Prome
- Hugo (Villareal) de Sur-Blyth, to be known as Baron de Sur-Blyth.