Furniture market waaay too slow.

Jeremy · September 2017

Vimora wrote: »

One would think people that always rush to buy those super expansive homes, like the Linchal Grand Manor, will also want to furnish them. But nope, that's not the case. People always complain that the new purple plans are painfully rare. They go for 250-500k or more. So what I did was I bought one that hasn't been seen before by MM or TTC and tried to craft and sell it to see how profitable it is. It's the Dres divider, you know the one you see in every NPC home in Morrowind. One would think it sells like candy.

Turns out I was mistaken, because it takes days to sell just 1 or 2. I am trying on one of the biggest guilds in Rawl'kha at the standard 10k price per piece these purples tend to go for. I will need to sell 60 to break even on the 250k recipe price, which will probably not happen in less than 100+ days.

I really do not get it.

It's probably a demand issue.

Once you decorate your house there really isn't a reason to buy more furniture, nor is there really a good reason to furnish multiple homes.

Hopefully in the future they will add storage options or allow you to loot your own houses (like you can NPC homes) to give more incentives to buy and furnish more homes. But I for one would certainly rather buy a book shelf for 10k than spend 500k to buy the plans to make it. And I do.

ComboBreaker88 · September 2017

The biggest problem with crafting is that it's too easy. So people think, I'll just do it myself. Which means that selling crafted items is almost a waste of time. Especially when the market is flooded with crafters

MLGProPlayer · September 2017

Vimora wrote: »

One would think people that always rush to buy those super expansive homes, like the Linchal Grand Manor, will also want to furnish them. But nope, that's not the case. People always complain that the new purple plans are painfully rare. They go for 250-500k or more. So what I did was I bought one that hasn't been seen before by MM or TTC and tried to craft and sell it to see how profitable it is. It's the Dres divider, you know the one you see in every NPC home in Morrowind. One would think it sells like candy.

Turns out I was mistaken, because it takes days to sell just 1 or 2. I am trying on one of the biggest guilds in Rawl'kha at the standard 10k price per piece these purples tend to go for. I will need to sell 60 to break even on the 250k recipe price, which will probably not happen in less than 100+ days.

I really do not get it.

Yeah, it's a strange market. Most of the actual furniture from those purple recipes are sold at 10-15k, despite their recipes going for 250-500k like you said. And the sales are slow. You need to undercut in order to sell, and even then, it takes 1-2 weeks to clear inventory.

I think it's because most people are already finished with decorating their homes (they bought and decorated a base game home they are happy with). I don't imagine too many people bought Morrowind homes (I did, but only to steal their wells/stables). And I think a lot of people caved and got crown store furniture due to the rarity of some of these blueprints.

By the way, you aren't the first one to sell the Dres divider. I managed to snatch one at a Wayrest trader about a month or two ago for 15k. Haven't seen it before or since though. I think I found it before anyone with TTC scanned it.

Waffennacht · September 2017

I would buy a recipe long before I bought the item

Vimora · September 2017

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Vimora wrote: »

One would think people that always rush to buy those super expansive homes, like the Linchal Grand Manor, will also want to furnish them. But nope, that's not the case. People always complain that the new purple plans are painfully rare. They go for 250-500k or more. So what I did was I bought one that hasn't been seen before by MM or TTC and tried to craft and sell it to see how profitable it is. It's the Dres divider, you know the one you see in every NPC home in Morrowind. One would think it sells like candy.

Turns out I was mistaken, because it takes days to sell just 1 or 2. I am trying on one of the biggest guilds in Rawl'kha at the standard 10k price per piece these purples tend to go for. I will need to sell 60 to break even on the 250k recipe price, which will probably not happen in less than 100+ days.

I really do not get it.

Yeah, it's a strange market. Most of the actual furniture from those purple recipes are sold at 10-15k, despite their recipes going for 250-500k like you said. And the sales are slow. You need to undercut in order to sell, and even then, it takes 1-2 weeks to clear inventory.

I think it's because most people are already finished with decorating their homes (they bought and decorated a base game home they are happy with). I don't imagine too many people bought Morrowind homes (I did, but only to steal their wells/stables). And I think a lot of people caved and got crown store furniture due to the rarity of some of these blueprints.

By the way, you aren't the first one to sell that divider. I managed to snatch one at a Wayrest trader about a month or two ago for 15k. Haven't seen it before or since though.

I didn't actually think I would be the first or only seller. That would be absurd. I even checked TTC before I bought the recipe and it seems there are 1 or 2 other active sellers who offer it for 15-16k. Now that, I think, is a rip-off. It is over 200% profit.

Wreuntzylla · September 2017

I don't think it has anything to do with people wanting to make their own. The fact of the early and ongoing markets supports that theory.

You have to separate the two activities. Completionism and furnishing homes.

People will pay unbelievable amounts for something nobody would ever use or display in their house. From an irl perspective, every once in a while I watch a car auction show. Some of the ugliest cars I have ever seen sell for millions of dollars. People buy them either to complete a collection or because they are very rare. What you won't see is that same person choosing to drive that car around town. Out comes the lambro or viper.

Rare recipes can be like that ugly car. I want it, and will pay skadoodles for it, but I can't give away the resulting furniture. On the flip side, some of the most common furnishing recipes make items that people still buy fairly quickly, especially to do with carpets or lighting.

To complicate the picture, there is simply no furniture sink to maintain a market. ZoS decided to make most furniture unbound. Even the luxury items are freely tradeable. In a real economy, you have the new item market and the used item market (sorry, pre-owned...). Further, things are made so cheaply that most things will never make it to the used market. This is by design and I recall a design of experiments that was made by a lightbulb company that determines how fast a lightbulb can fail before consumers became annoyed.

ZoS knows this to be true. While people may think that crown store furniture is account bound to avoid $ to gold conversion, in reality, it potentially makes every account a customer.

Jeremy · September 2017

Wreuntzylla wrote: »

To complicate the picture, there is simply no furniture sink to maintain a market.

I think that's the real problem right there.

s7732425ub17_ESO · September 2017

Furniture is not bind on use. This plays a HUGE factor in their pricing. The supply will always ever be increasing, and value is only generated from the rarity of the item.

Also, not that many players do player housing. It's very expensive, and most players of this game really do not have the money to devote to this.

Magdalina · September 2017

Vimora wrote: »

Another example just came to mind that happened a few days ago. I found this really awesome-looking Nord carpet recipe that looked like the hide of a bear (head included), so I couldn't resist, I bought it for 100k. Dumb, I know. But I thought it looks unique enough, I can make some money with this.

I crafted one, next thing I know MMgives me something like this: 3 sales in 12 days, 3850g. I was shocked, that's about the mat cost of the item (being purple). So I just spent 100k on something that probably won't give me a cent return.

And I know what you're thinking. Why would crafters deserve profit? It's not like crafing is harder than pressing a button.
It takes time to find the pretty rare crafting mats at appropiate prices

It takes space to store them.

It takes trader space to post them.

It took time to level up my craft, plus many skill points to make it work.

I don't even know what I want to say, but this is frustrating.

Well to be fair...this frustration could've easily been avoided. Since you used MM you appear to be on PC, so instead of buying the 2-3 times overpriced recipe you could've

1)looked it up on ttc and find it for much cheaper

2)used same ttc or mm to gauge the actual prices of the furniture itself

3)thought about the supply/demand for a bit. Who would possibly buy a furniture like this? Someone who
a)is actually interested in housing(that's far not everyone)
b)wants this furniture in their house(which is pretty specific though imo kinda cool)
c)doesn't already have it: keep in mind that furniture, unlike, say, tempers is a one-time buy. Sure someone might want a dozen bearrugs for their house but once they place them they will have no need to buy any ever again.
d)is not yet over the furniture limit for their house(which is a slight issue)
e)can't make the furniture themselves(which it's not THAT a rare recipe and a lot of people have already gotten it one way or the other, I think I myself have gotten it from Hlaalu's random furniture boxes before they increased the price)
f)would prefer buying a furniture instead of buying a recipe(personally I also prefer buying a recipe if I can find it for a reasonable price, to buying furniture itself)

...that's quite a long list, isn't it? Add to it that those who do want to buy it may or may not buy it off you since there appear to be plenty on the market, and you'll realize that while you may yet sell it, it definitely won't be fast and it probably won't be very profitable.

The housing system has a lot of issues, but if you want to play the market game you gotta do it informed

platonicidealgirlfriend · September 2017

There's a lot of discourse in this thread that is ignoring the fundamental cause of OP'S problem; every Dres divider listening I've seen is right around 6.9k each, and in fact very, very few purple furnishings are selling for anywhere near 10k at this point, although all are still maintaining prices a couple thousand above their approximate craft price.

Vimora · September 2017

Magdalina wrote: »

Vimora wrote: »

Another example just came to mind that happened a few days ago. I found this really awesome-looking Nord carpet recipe that looked like the hide of a bear (head included), so I couldn't resist, I bought it for 100k. Dumb, I know. But I thought it looks unique enough, I can make some money with this.

I crafted one, next thing I know MMgives me something like this: 3 sales in 12 days, 3850g. I was shocked, that's about the mat cost of the item (being purple). So I just spent 100k on something that probably won't give me a cent return.

And I know what you're thinking. Why would crafters deserve profit? It's not like crafing is harder than pressing a button.
It takes time to find the pretty rare crafting mats at appropiate prices

It takes space to store them.

It takes trader space to post them.

It took time to level up my craft, plus many skill points to make it work.

I don't even know what I want to say, but this is frustrating.

Well to be fair...this frustration could've easily been avoided. Since you used MM you appear to be on PC, so instead of buying the 2-3 times overpriced recipe you could've

1)looked it up on ttc and find it for much cheaper

2)used same ttc or mm to gauge the actual prices of the furniture itself

3)thought about the supply/demand for a bit. Who would possibly buy a furniture like this? Someone who
a)is actually interested in housing(that's far not everyone)
b)wants this furniture in their house(which is pretty specific though imo kinda cool)
c)doesn't already have it: keep in mind that furniture, unlike, say, tempers is a one-time buy. Sure someone might want a dozen bearrugs for their house but once they place them they will have no need to buy any ever again.
d)is not yet over the furniture limit for their house(which is a slight issue)
e)can't make the furniture themselves(which it's not THAT a rare recipe and a lot of people have already gotten it one way or the other, I think I myself have gotten it from Hlaalu's random furniture boxes before they increased the price)
f)would prefer buying a furniture instead of buying a recipe(personally I also prefer buying a recipe if I can find it for a reasonable price, to buying furniture itself)

...that's quite a long list, isn't it? Add to it that those who do want to buy it may or may not buy it off you since there appear to be plenty on the market, and you'll realize that while you may yet sell it, it definitely won't be fast and it probably won't be very profitable.

The housing system has a lot of issues, but if you want to play the market game you gotta do it informed

I'm a lot wiser now, thanks to the insightful posts here. :P

PS4_ZeColmeia · September 2017

I think in general there are those that really, really, really wanted to have a fully furnished house to show off. They've pretty much already done it.

There are those that will furnish after they get the functional stuff in it. This is me and I'm a 9 trait crafter. My approach is that until I have all of my tables in my house, I don't even care what it looks like or how nice it is. Also, because I play other content I don't have the time invest doing my house furnishings until I am further caught up on motifs. This basically puts me in the purpetual delay, delay, delay on doing my house. Because of this, I just have the wait and see approach because I figure I will have collected a majority of recipies for furniture in the course of playing. As such, why invest now?

There is another 2 groups I'll lump together because I think they are the majority: (1) those that will buy the house furnished, and (2) those that don't care about housing at all.

There is just soooooo much content in ESO, bad RNG, and low caps on housing that I feel most people are otherwise occupied. I think this trait bench is going to help free people up for housing over the next 6 months. I think that if houses were more functional (ie i could retrieve and turn in daily writs, placed bankers/merchants/fences functioned like their full counter parts in the city, higher item counts for functional items, and content that was useable like having farming activities to raise your own reagents) people would spend more time in their houses and then want to invest more in them. Without those, people don't use them enough to make them needed and therefore don't want to spend money on something they could use elsewhere in the game.

DMuehlhausen · September 2017

The people saying they buy the more expensive plan...this is why characters should be limited to 2 maybe 3 crafting trees.

Sure you could other characters, but restricting it makes sense and helps the market. Most people aren't going to be logging in and off to craft and move items around. They will just by the items they need thus helping the economy.

PS4_ZeColmeia · September 2017

Oh yeah, and until there is storage in houses for things like housing items that you don't have a place for yet and display containers for item sets (which could be a cool way of equipping loadouts for BG if you wanted to make them really functional) houses don't serve a real purpose if you don't have attunable crafting stations, the trait change station, or mundus stones placed in them.

Gandrhulf_Harbard · September 2017

Turelus wrote: »

I think many in the game (myself included) have this really weird thing about buying furnishings vs just buying designs and making their own.

I don't know why we're like it, but we are.

^ This.

I NEVER search Kiosks for Furnishings, only for Recipes/Designs.

I'm an OCD material gatherer, I see no pint in paying someone else to make something I can make 10 of.

All The Best

Rouven · September 2017

I can hardly be motivated to search for recipes at a trader, I really only did that before they increased the writ cost. I'm not alt-tabbing out of the game to search tamrieltradecentre for some 3h old info and do the run-around for one piece of furniture.

Is there a preview function now?

I'm not sure if these reason play a big factor of course.

Aside from that since there is no limitation in terms of specialization for me it's a matter of pride to craft it myself.

Linaleah · September 2017

DMuehlhausen wrote: »

The people saying they buy the more expensive plan...this is why characters should be limited to 2 maybe 3 crafting trees.

Sure you could other characters, but restricting it makes sense and helps the market. Most people aren't going to be logging in and off to craft and move items around. They will just by the items they need thus helping the economy.

1. given that so many recipes require multiple crafting disciplines, they would have to rework the entire system
2. in that same vein - motif issues.
3. alts. I have 4 maxed crafters even if only one of them has all the traits researched and keeps all the motifs. I still have 4 crafters. in every MMO I have ever played that had number of crafting professions limited per toon? I just created alts. and I'm far from the only one, in fact among altoholics especially crafting alcoholics, I seem to be on a slightly more moderate side

in other words, most people WILL be logging in and out to craft and move items around. they already do, in multiple games. they already do in ESO once a day for crafting writs. adding slight bit of inconvenience will NOT help the marked. instead of adding more limits, we need to add more functionality and REMOVE at least some of the limits from housing. market needs to be expanded, not made even narrower than it already is

Maryal · September 2017

When I want some piece of furniture or furnishing item for my home I prefer the recipe, but if I can't find that I will buy the item ... the problem is that I have reached my furnishing limit (even though most rooms in my home are fairly empty).

Honestly, I think if the number of housing items increased you would see an increase in the number of housing items sold.

At least for me, the reason I am not motivated to get another home to decorate is due to the big let down I felt (and still feel) when I wasn't able to finish my "creation."

Not being able to finish my house project would be like starting a game you really really enjoyed, but had to stop playing 2/3 of the way through when your computer ran out of disc space. Deleting existing data is not an option (because you need all the existing data), and unfortunately, no matter what store you went to, absolutely none sold memory upgrades.

Vimora · September 2017

Maryal wrote: »

When I want some piece of furniture or furnishing item for my home I prefer the recipe, but if I can't find that I will buy the item ... the problem is that I have reached my furnishing limit (even though most rooms in my home are fairly empty).

Honestly, I think if the number of housing items increased you would see an increase in the number of housing items sold.

At least for me, the reason I am not motivated to get another home to decorate is due to the big let down I felt (and still feel) when I wasn't able to finish my "creation."

Not being able to finish my house project would be like starting a game you really really enjoyed, but had to stop playing 2/3 of the way through when your computer ran out of disc space. Deleting existing data is not an option (because you need all the existing data), and unfortunately, no matter what store you went to, absolutely none sold memory upgrades.

I was always worried this could become a problem in my home. Amaya Lake Lodge, yard 75% done, everything else is empty = 140/300. I'm kind of taking a break from it because I sense it's gonna come to a bitter end.

Unfortunately, fluff is a device of milking. They are using item limit to drive subscription sales that doubles it. It seals its fate - never gonna get increased for "free" players.

Ardan147 · September 2017

ComboBreaker88 wrote: »

The biggest problem with crafting is that it's too easy. So people think, I'll just do it myself. Which means that selling crafted items is almost a waste of time. Especially when the market is flooded with crafters

You'd actually be surprised. I've actually managed to sell some crafted gear (Julianos) in guild stores, so apparently there are enough people out there who aren't able to craft stuff themselves. But then again, it does require a significant investment in skill points just to be able to craft them, as well as leveling the associated skill lines (and for researching traits, a lot of time, even if you put points into Metallurgy, Tailoring, etc., which without, the amount of time will be absolutely prohibitive.) And then there's the fact that crafting materials will take up a prohibitive amount of inventory/bank space if you don't have ESO+. (Also if you don't have ESO+ you might not have access to the crafting stations for a specific set, unless you're a member of a guild with a guild hall that has those stations.)

There IS one crafted item that I do use on one of my toons that I cannot (yet) make for myself: Dubious Camoran Throne. The recipe being a special event item that only drops during the event, and being prohibitively expensive in guild stores, it is simply far more cost effective just to buy the food itself.

altemriel · September 2017

Turelus wrote: »

I think many in the game (myself included) have this really weird thing about buying furnishings vs just buying designs and making their own.

I don't know why we're like it, but we are.

for me the same, I would rather buy the blueprint and learn it by my crafter, so that I can then craft it myself for my home and them to be able to maybe to craft it and sell it too. so I guess that there are more people like that, which would rather buy the blueprint, than the actual crafted furniture piece

Trinity_Is_My_Name · September 2017

I don' t even have a house. Nor will I. For what purpose? Can't store a single item from my bank or character in it so it serves no practical purpose. I got the "free" room when it was first available and have visited it one time since. It serves no purpose at all.

If I need to use a Test Dummy I can easily visit a friend's house or guild house but then again I can count on one hand how many times in total I have gone to a house other than the Preview homes in the Crown store. If the houses had storage then I would consider plunking down some real cash or game gold for one. Until then...nah.

Axoinus · September 2017

I don't think there are that many people wanting to fork out money for cosmetic furnishings. I have 3-4 houses, and have not purchased a single furnishing or furnishing recipe from a guild store. Reason being, I'm not that into having the most expensive furniture. If I think that way, I imagine others will as well.

Also, prices come down over time. See a new expensive thing, you will eventually see the price fall. So, basic economics is another reason.

kblut · September 2017

medium to larger homes are way too expensive, and you really do not have a real benefit inside them, you can set the stations for crafting, and nothing more... maybe a training dummy too... but that is it... you can't even display all your trophies on smaller homes... so it is not a big thing.

Imza · September 2017

I'm an achievement hunter.

I have collected a good number of the recipes and when I went looking for more on my main crafter (I have 3) I even purchased the recipes from guild traders.

Most that are interested in housing are doing competitions and actively collecting the new recipes. This is because they never know what they may need for the next competition.

I have several houses which are set up for the housing achievements only, I tried to make them themed but there is only so much you can do with the all the different achievements..... These will stay as they are so that any new toons I make can get the achievements too.

When they removed the skooma bubbler from the Palace in Hew's Bane - I stopped collecting. Now if I find it - fine - otherwise I no longer care...

I'm sure that there are others out there that no longer care as well - for the same or similar reasons...

Cpt_Teemo · September 2017

Dang I've never seen a Dres Divider purple go under 500k before you got lucky

Marabornwingrion · September 2017

Shortly after Morrowind launch I found inside urn recipe for these lamps, I'm selling dozens of them everyday, it's like 90% of my earnings. Maybe your price is too high or your trader in bad spot...?

xaraan · September 2017

tbh, as much as I hate buying certain things in the crown store, if I need one fancy item that's really rare and crafters are asking too much for, i'd just spend a few crowns to buy it

the recipes are too rare IMO, and they probably want it that way so people do what I do

Vimora · September 2017

Astrid_V wrote: »

Shortly after Morrowind launch I found inside urn recipe for these lamps, I'm selling dozens of them everyday, it's like 90% of my earnings. Maybe your price is too high or your trader in bad spot...?

Tribunal Traders in Rawl'kha, PC EU. Not necessarily the worst guild, right.

Although I'm thinking of trying Belkarth for this.

Grats on your sales, though. Very nice lamp!

Vimora · September 2017

xaraan wrote: »

tbh, as much as I hate buying certain things in the crown store, if I need one fancy item that's really rare and crafters are asking too much for, i'd just spend a few crowns to buy it

the recipes are too rare IMO, and they probably want it that way so people do what I do

I actually think they are going too far with this. Bookcases with books are super rare. Flowers are only in the crown store with the exception of very few that can be bought from home furnishers. I don't know how people can work without these.