So I have a few questions for people who download lots.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
f) other comments you might have

I know that tastes vary, even when pickin a lot as it would depend on if you're pickin it for a particular sim or just find one that strikes your fancy. Over the years of playin Sims 2 I've seen some really neat lookin lots, however I rarely downloaded them. As I've recently upload a few lots, and lookin to upload more, I was just curious as to what others were interested in. What is it about a lot that will makes you want to download it and use it in game?

When I build a house I will generally make it so that a CAS created couple has all the basics to start with upon moving in. The amount given to CAS sims used to be a standard 20,000 no matter the number of CAS created sims. Then that changed in one of the later EP's so that a single CAS sim gets 20,000 and then every sim after that is an additional 5,000. So for me, a starter house is 25,000 as rarely create a single CAS sim.

I enjoy building the houses, tryin to figure out various layouts that are playable and yet still look good. I usually go for functionality over looks/ decor to keep the price with the budget. The deco stuff usually comes later when they have more money, or roll wants for the luxury items. I strongly dislike traffic jams so will more often than not walkin areas are 2 tiles wide. Bedrooms are almost always 4x4 tiles or slightly larger. If I do make a smaller bedroom it will be a 4th bedroom. I like to be able to put a double bed in any room without a problem. Rarely do I put dressers, again those might come later. In the kitchen it's always the 10 hunger white stove, sometimes I'll go for the white or black one that is just under that, I think it's an 8 hunger. The fridge is always the middle fridge, no mini, no worn. When it comes to tables geesh, the lowest I go on those is the, umm the square latice lookin one.

I've finally learned how to successfully make a nice basement, though I don't do that often due to the price difference in cost of foundation or no foundation. I've tried, and failed miserably many a time, but I've not given up tryin, on bein able to build a garage basement as well as mid-level stairs without using ones like Inge's.

Sooo ...

I usually prefer furnished or partly furnished, and functional rooms without too much clutter. I like to get an idea of the house outlay, and furnishing helps. Just not too much - I like to put my own touch on the decoration, and it's such a bother to delete everything. I love a bit of landscaping, too.

My preference for CC is 'minimal' for home lots, because I like to personalize without having to remove a ton of CC I don't want there, but for official buildings (schools, hospitals, shops, street views, and similar) I prefer them with lots of CC.

Rooms should be large enough to not create problems when taking pictures. It's so annoying if bedrooms are 3x3 or bathrooms are 2x2, because I can't even get in a camera sideways. I rarely download houses with a lotsize smaller than 3x3, mainly because they tend to be so tiny I can't use them for anything.

Price isn't something I worry about, so anything goes. If the house is pretty and suits my needs, I'll motherlode their economy to afford the house and a full set of new clutter to go with it, if that's what it takes. I tend to download typical family houses with 3-5 bedrooms, because that's what I like. Usually 2-storey ones, without a basement.

I am very picky. I have a collection of 4-5 houses I keep coming back to, but wish I had more. Most houses are either too small, have odd room layouts, or lack some kind of "I need this!" factor.

As for foundation - either use it or don't use it, and don't make it do strange things. Same for using building methods that screw up walls. I do have a favorite house where the foundation does weird things to the garage (and the walls in it), but because I love the house so much, I've decided to overlook it. In general, if I have to click more than neccessary to go to a floor, it bothers me enough to either abandon the house, or to remodel the annoying part if possible. I don't mind clever building if it does not make more mess than strictly needed, though. I've never been that kind of a fancy builder myself, and keep things simple enough.

Personally speaking, I don't want CC picked by anybody else, I don't want furnishings, and I don't want to ooh and ahh - I want a practical starter house in a floorplan I wouldn't have come up with or some building trick I can't do that I can plunk down and move a starting family into.

Once in awhile I want something bigger for an established family that's moving for some reason, but again, I don't want it furnished (they're bringing their own furniture). A concern and a repeated problem in these houses is waste space - people will go for some stunning visual effect in cameraman mode that I can't see when playing with walls down and which creates waste space and is often visually jarring - like big columns made by making boxes of ordinary walls. Dear heaven, I hate those! Just use a game column so it won't make an ugly hole in the view!

I personally am quickly driven wiggy by houses that are partly on a foundation and partly not, like with the attached garage. It means I'm constantly having to change levels in order to see/click things indoors. I like foundations, though, and they don't cost that much more if you don't build them solid. Most real houses have foundations around the edges and crawlspace underneath, or are on pier-and-beam.

I can't use basements because I can't see into them without upsetting my balance sensors. But that's a highly personal thing. I think people who can make basements work at all are very clever and if they didn't screw up my balance I'd download them, because those suckers are hard to make!

I like fully furnished community lots, versus partly or unfurnished residential lots.
CC should only be there if it is essential to the look of the lot. Therefore, I am much more tolerant to BG lots having CC than I am to all-EP lots having CC! (Indeed, before Ultimate Collection, I would not have had all eps, so lots that were BG compatible were among my favorites.)
If I have a starter home, I'd much prefer for a balance. The bare minimum of furniture, but some nice landscaping... not enough to stretch the budget to its limits! For out-of-CAS sims, it is better to have some leeway so that maybe they can buy a simple skill object for work.
For fully furnished, in general, what looks the nicest, and the better quality, the better. Lowest cost should only be for budgeted houses, like starter homes.
In general, I like "Ohhh ahhh" houses. I can build regular street houses myself! What I CAN'T do are fancy builder techniques and clever layouts and gorgeous decorating and landscaping. If I'm downloading, that's the sort of lot I'm taking!
(Unless I'm just being lazy and downloading a bunch of nice starter homes; then I just looking for variety and am too lazy to build it myself.)

Unfurnished with no CC and as few EP/SP required, I would prefer no EP/SP and just the base game myself.

As a downloaded I prefer cc free lots, however if the lot needs cc for a specific purpose/really needs it than that is okay. For example it requires some see through tile. I dislike cc that is just there for deco purposes when the game already has something good enough. For example they used a basic cc wood floor when the game already comes with wood floor, If I want a cc wood floor I can always look through the ones I have downloaded.

For the most part I despise cc terrain paint. This has issues. First and foremost if removed it can cause the entire lot to flash blue making it useless unless the cc terrain is kept. I would say 90% of terrain paint that I have got with lots I don't want as it is generally not good enough. I'm a cc snob, I don't want anything blurry or crunchy including overly large textures on terrain paint. There are a few good sets of terrain around and I already have them. So unless it really needs a terrain and that terrain is of high quality don't use it. I never use terrain paint on any lot I upload because of the potential blue flashing issue.

For the most part I am after lots that are different with specific purpose to a community. I wanted a knight barrack dorm for my medieval hood and could not find one so I had to build it myself. I uploaded it in case anyone else was in need of one. I've been wanting a well made police academy dorm for ages now as well. I want small shops of specific kinds. Generally I am not after regular houses. A house needs something that makes it stand out or is in some other way useful. Often I look, can't find, so I build it myself and upload it to here. I did that with my council housing set. I wanted something 10,000 and under and could not find what i wanted- built it myself. Then I have the occasional impulse download.. Recently on tumbler I saw a really cute house boat house-I downloaded it as well as most of the cc it used. Uncommon for me, but it fit my hood (beach) the cc all looked good (I had some of it already) and it was just really cute and different.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
Fully furnished; having to put everything into a house is fun sometimes, but it's not something I want to do every single time. If I really hate the furnishings, I can change them later.

b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
It doesn't matter

c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Fully furnished inside; the landscaping can come later; in the start, what I need is the essentials

d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
If the person moving in is just an ordinary person, I get lowest cost to give the appearance of someone saving money. If it's a rich sim or someone who comes from wealth, they'd theoretically not be restricted by price, so they'd get better rated stuff

e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
I like both; when I first started downloading lots, I did so in order to get mansions for my rich sims, but later, I downloaded ordinary street houses to give more variety.

f) other comments you might have
I've never really been big on building houses myself; I tried to do some building in my early days in TS2 but they always came out looking strange or unsatisfying. It was simpler just to use the houses I downloaded or the ones Maxis provided as a base and then edit from there if I wanted to make a change, and even that's something I rarely do anymore.

When I do download lots, which is not often (especially these days), it will depend on the lot and what I want it for, of course. But generally with residential lots, I really prefer unfurnished because if they are furnished, I will go through the lot and strip out all the furnishings anyway. What I'm usually interested in is the appearance of the lot from the outside and what it will look like in my neighbourhood. But for playing, I like to have sims decorate their own homes and earn the money to do so, so they buy empty homes with perhaps a bathroom and maybe bits of the kitchen present but nothing else.

It's different with community lots (which is an even rarer download for me) since what I want to do with those generally is explore someone else's creation of a place.

A) Fully furnished. I might download a lot even if it's not furnished, but only if it has a really nice exterior.

B) No CC. If it has CC it has to be outstanding or the CC is a dealbreaker for me. And I'll only bend my no-CC-rule if the CC is actually necessary, not just "I like this bed better than the maxis beds". Stuff you can't achieve with Maxis items. The creators who are really good at building CC free have such great creative ways to achieve what they want by manipulating the existing objects and using cheats like quartertile placement and no snap to grid. For example, one house I downloaded used the wine shelf from Seasons (I think?) to simulate kitchen cupboards, by placing it with the flasks into the wall and having the back as the front.

C) I would take a nicely landscaped outside every time. I do use furnished houses as they are if I like the house, and I prefer houses to come furnished because I enjoy seeing other peoples styles, but usually I'll re-furnish to suit the Sim moving in. I almost never modify the yard though. I'm not very good at landscaping, so if I had to choose I'd rather have a house that looks nice outside that I can furnish to my liking.

D) Whatever suits the house. A cheap end house should have cheap stuff, a mansion should have pricier stuff.

E) I like both, but I'm more likely to actually use an every day street house that looks really nice.

F) While asking what people want is great, in the end you should create what you enjoy creating. Some builders use tons of CC, some don't, there's a market for most things. Don't fret too much about preferences.
Otherwise my general comment on lot uploading is that I wish more people created community lots, especially community lots intended to be used with OFB. I'd also love to see more residential lots that are intended as vacation homes in the Maxis vacation hoods.

Thanks for all the comments. It helps me when I decide if the house I made might make a good upload one.


Oh I'm not fretting :D, just sorta curious and as I just said, it helps me to know if somethin I made that I like if someone else might like it too.

Some of my houses I know are not up to MTS's required standards and so will never be uploaded her, but they suit my needs and tastes.

I occasionally download lots because I find them more interesting than what I can do on my own. I prefer unfurnished or lightly furnished (I'll probably end up selling most of the furniture anyway) and want no CC at all.

What I'm generally looking for is very inexpensive houses for my poor broke Sims, especially houses with lots of bedrooms. The ones I've downloaded are so good that I soon can't remember which homes I downloaded and which came with the game... but probably the best designed ones were downloads.

My council houses are some of the cheapest you will find. https://www.modthesims.info/d/504400 Poor broke sims is who I built them for.

I look for different things - lovely design, something the right size for a specific spot, a nice beach lot, sort of depends. I'm afraid I usually gut whatever I download anyway so the exterior and the possible placement options are the most important. I don't care if it has the usual cc since I'll toss what I don't want and keep what I do - no big deal. I really love downloading a fabulous fully decorated lot even if it's not remotely playable because I love to see how the creator did it, and because that's frequently the best way to find cc not generally available or long lost. Price makes no difference. I build my own and enjoy it so I rarely download lots. There are some beautiful creations out there, though.

That is great -- thank you! I usually like to move them out of apartments once they start having kids, and I prefer that no two Sims live in the same type of house. So this is helpful.

The landscaping and interior color scheme, hands down. While I prefer a lot that is fully furnished, if you can inspire me to download a house because I am excited to decorate it, then kudos. It's not that I don't LIKE to decorate, it's just... sometimes time is of the essence and I just want to plop a house down and get going. However, I have seen houses with no furnishings and I'm like... I have to have this house, I know just how to decorate it. So I do! (I would LOVE to see more homes offered in a both furnished and non-furnished state, so that there is a choice.)

I download a no CC house almost exclusively. I'd say 99% of the time.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
Fully funished, the more the merrier.
b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
Tons and tons and tons of CC. Again, the more the merrier
c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Starter home, fully furnished on the inside. I don't like the outside to be as decorated.
d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
Depends on the theme of the house I am going for.
e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
Again, depends on the theme of the neighborhood and the price range of the house. I just love CC and fully furnished and decorated houses.
f) other comments you might have
I don't tend to download a lot of houses that have "shopping lists" included. I don't tend to download huge mansions either. I usually don't like houses that have more than 3 or 4 bedrooms.

Furnished or un depending.


CC as long as they have links to any meshes needed or are all maxis recolors. (Does that even count?)
any sized lots because I fill my worlds in neighborhoods

cheep starter homes in one medium sized homes that are neither cheep nor expensive in another houses that are expensive but obtainable with a little saving and luck in another and homes that my sims dream of owning but know they never will unless I abuse family funds/motherload in another.

same with apartments/duplexes though I haven't played any yet they just look nice on the map. ehehe. (No offense builders )

But I use the more than 8 sims mods a lot so I guess I'm kinda the exception.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
Semi-furnished with plumbing and fridge/stove. Kind of like buying a new home, your house will probably have a fridge but you need to bring your own beds, appliances, etc.


b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
I like CC, and it takes a special kind of home carefully decorated to tempt me to download it with all the CC. However, there is such a thing as too much cc that may turn me off from downloading a home. No CC is always nice, I will just add my own stuff when I place it.

c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Nicely landscaped outside always.

d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
I don't mind. My sims take out bank loans from me.

e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
Hmm, I go for the former because I can make an everyday street house. if something is creative and catches my eye I will use it. Especially if I have a family in mind for it. I think Triciamanly makes some of the most gorgeous houses that are street houses but all look so unique and personable.


f) other comments you might have
I have a mix of self-made, and user-made lots in my hoods. I do also like finding dorms/apartments and some business lots uploaded by those in the community. Downloading lots gives my game a fresh look and it's exciting using other people's lots with my sims.

I like that you made this topic, because I detest building, and therefore I heavily rely on downloading lots made by others. Furnishing isn't my forte either, but it's okay - still, I prefer someone else to do it for me, because they usually do a so much better job

a) I definitely prefer furnished ones, for reasons mentioned above, but also so I can see the intention of every room. Sometimes that's pretty obvious, but if I only see a bunch of rooms it can be confusing. It doesn't always have to be completely furnished, but I do like it if I can load a lot and just start playing.
b) No CC lots are definitely easier, but I don't mind a bit of CC. As long as it isn't an enormous list, especially when all of those things are really not that necessary.
c) I don't know, it's a good question... I suck at landscaping so I think furnishing is one I can more easily do myself. Although I gotta say that the inside of the house is often more important to me than the landscape, so it's tricky. I think I would prefer just a tiny bit of both.
d) Totally depends on the type of house, but all in all, it doesn't matter that much to me. It doesn't take that long for me to switch up the toilet or the fridge if I want to.
e) Both. They're both useful for very different Sims.
f) I wish there were more lots that aren't starter homes, but aren't big expensive houses as well. Maybe it's me, but I don't see that many houses in the price range 20.000-60.000. I would like to see more of those.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
Usually furnished, I like custom content and I when I download I want to grab the designers look

b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
I like lots with just a few peices of CC, after 12 years I find I often duplicate and often download lots with older cc than I already got. I hate lots that insist you go to 20 other websites, many of which have gone out of business a decade or so ago. Those types of downloads I totally avoid. But i don't mind, those that include a poster or curtain I aint got, or a roof trim or some windows as I rarely download building CC.

c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Nicely furnished outside is always a nightmare. It may look good but usually it's a system hog and makes your game slow. The bushes, trees and whatnots also cause pathing problems, require extensive CC downloading and include large trees that get in the way of game play so you just end up deleting them. I like mostly maxis, with a couple of cc standout items and a landscape that simple and low on items.

d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
Depends on the house. I don't download fancy mansion, with expensive items, that are too large to navigate and include crazy items that just make the bills crazy and force you to motherlode. I will download starter homes for $20,000 or less that just include the basics. I will also download the price range of about $40,000 with more up class items and a couple of CC pieces.

e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
Nope the don't fit in my world. They are too big to play, they slow down the computer, it takes ages for sims to walk anywhere and kids and dogs get lost cause their bedrooms are too far away. I don't feel close to sims in such big houses, not even the one's I build myself. I miss all the small interactions, or have to keep spinning the camera around and getting dizzy.

Only time I download such a large lot is if it's business related. I need a big warehouse so crime can occur without me noticing. A small football stadium or a museum just feels cheap and tiny.

f) other comments you might have
I'm finding it hard to find the next level up from a starter house. I would like some 20,00 - 30,000 lots which are suitable for a new growing family with usually a dog, or toys or some other crap that families usually pick up. I have one creator that does this, but I'd like to find a couple more. I'm currently looking at creators who make familiy houses for under 40,000 in a downtown style.

I find it difficult to play with very small houses, the pathfinding gets on my nerves and there's no where to display the junk that they buy in Open for Business.

My basic norm is playability above all. Starting with a proper entrance and a back door so that Sims can move in and out with the minimum effort.

Some CC is totally acceptable (I love new walls, floors and plants) but some furniture has to be Maxis - simply because many custom objects are base game only and I find a bed that the dog cannot sleep on totally useless.(If I really love a house, I will simply replace the bed/ sofas/ comfy chairs/ dining chairs, baths - which means I really, really have to love it). However, desks, curtains, etc are acceptable, as long as I do not have to spend hours on locating and downloading the mesh.

Landscaping - this is a difficult one. For residential lots, I prefer as little as possible, because I like space for water balloon fights, military career rewards, the telescope, a fishing pond - and I do NOT like swimming pools in every backyard. I actually love big, open yards (Yes, I know I am the only one, but I do). So I'd prefer a nice lawn with a tree or two myself to a thousand flowers stuck on top of each other. This is very personal taste, and no builder can accommodate all players. Everyone's choice is influenced by personal play style. For community lots, landscape all you please!

I find the starter houses available generally too small to be of much use. So I build my own. I normally have a rather bigger lot and there will be outbuildings if necessary. Even the bigger houses do not always work for me - there are some that I like, and use often - others are just too fancy and I spend too much time going up and down in search of my Sims. I do not even like houses with more than one level as a rule. (Although I sometimes use some of these houses for elders retiring in a separate business hood - I do not play them that often and they do look nice).

I agree with Carooh about a lack of houses in the 20 000 to 60 0000 price range, but I will specify 30 000 to 40 000. There are almost no houses available for a proper family in this range, and that is very often what they can afford. Many players do not like to use motherlode for a variety of reasons.

You know, asking what kind of lot people prefer is like asking what kind of book they prefer if you plan on opening a general book shop. Better have specialty shelves for romance, fantasy, history, mystery, DIY, and so on. Customers have different tastes and want different things at different times. I might want a DIY if I want to fix a sink. If I want to understand a particular era, I might want a biography even if it's hard going. For sitting on the beach, something light and easy to get through. Hardware limitations are another thing. I don't mind a long loading time and I can deal with lag on some of my larger lots. My computer usually doesn't choke and crash, and when it does (long clothes catalog scrolling is the biggest memory gobbler), I'm willing to deal with that, too. Some players don't have options that allow them to use a lot of cc or they don't like it - playing style is like reading style again. You're not going to find something that suits everybody all the time.

The shopping lists are a problem. If a creator won't permit cc inclusion in an uploaded lot, either don't use the item or don't upload the lot. Most of your players not only find it so annoying they're not going to download the lot, many of the meshes are no longer available. Asking a creator for permission is usually not worth the effort - either you can't find them, they don't respond, or they say 'no' if they've already said 'no'. (Not a criticism of the creator.) I've uploaded a couple of lots (not here) but would never do it again. Way too much trouble.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
If it's a community lot I like the building fully furnished/decorated/done. If it's a house I prefer starter furniture (as little as possible), as my favorite part of playing is decorating.
b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
A few CC is ok. But I don't like the lots that puts 100 new wallpapers into my game. That's too messy for me!
c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Nice Landscape, so I could redo the inside myself.
d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
I do prefer if it's basic furniture (not gothic, western etc.). But I would switch eventually..
e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
Everyday street house. I like making "ordinary" families. The house has to look neat and complete though. I don't like boxes with windows.

I'd posted pretty much this same topic a couple years back... some of the ideas there might be of use for you too!

I don't download new lots now because I can't work out how to using UC, but I use to download lots all the time.

a) When you go lookin for a lot, do you generally prefer ones that are fully furnished or unfurnished?
Preferably only furnished with essentials (e.g. bathroom, simple bedroom, kitchen) - I don't like downloading a house filled with clutter or anything, because I like to make the house more appropriate for the sims living in it and their personalities.

b) If furnished, do you prefer lots with CC or no CC at all?
Only if it's wallpaper/flooring. I hate seeing a really nice house and then read the description only to discover a laundry list of mesh I have to download. If you do make something containing CC, at least include an unfurnished version of the lot.

c) If you had to choose to stay within a price range, such as for a starter home, do you prefer a fully furnished on the inside or a nicely landscaped outside?
Furnished on inside. I don't care much about landscaping, just throw a few trees down.

d) If furnished, do you prefer the items to be of the very lowest cost (stove, bed, couch, chair) or ones that have better ratings (energy, cooking)?
Lowest cost. Chances are if the family I move in have enough money, I'll replace it myself. Unless it's a mansion or something, where you expect richer sims to live, in which case it's fine.

e) Do you prefer the fancy 'ohhh ahhh' houses or the every day street house?
Originally I was going to say 'every day street house', but actually I'm not very good at furnishing big fancy houses (or making for that matter), so both would be quite nice. Every day street houses I'd have more use for, so I'd be more likely to download though.

f) other comments you might have
I like houses that are at least two bedrooms. Single bedroom houses are rendered useless in my game, because I rarely have any single sims. Usually they live ith their friends or parents until they get married, and then they usually have children or pets that take up space. A lot of 'starter homes' I like, have tiny 3x4 bedrooms that can't fit a double bed in, and although that's not as much an issue now that I have a mod where sims can sleep in inaccessible beds, it was very annoying before.