Docs · Land

Land and plots

How a plot is rented, what the rent is in tez, what you get, how terms renew and what happens to your work if you let it go. Every number on this page is read from the price table the island charges by.

A plot is rented, 3 months at a time: a renewable tenure, the right to build and show your work on one numbered place for a paid term. It is not ownership of land, not a token, not a share in the project and not an investment. Terms must be renewed, passing a rental on is slowed down on purpose and only allowed for built plots, and the price of tez moves. Do not rent a plot expecting a profit. Read the terms before you pay. New to all this? Start here.

Plots, sizes and cells

The mainland has 67 artist plots: 31 of 16 m, 27 of 32 m, 4 of 48 m, 5 of 80 m. A plot is square and made of 16 m cells: a 16 m plot is one cell, 32 m is 2 × 2 = 4 cells, 48 m is 9 and 80 m is 25. Cells matter because many limits are counted per cell (limits). Each plot has a street entrance, its front.

Streets, squares, the park, the beach, the promenade, the Palazzo and every other common place are never for rent.

Zones

The rent depends on a plot's size and its zone. A plot in two zones pays the higher one.

• Centre · by the Palazzo ×1.5 — the plot's centre is within 105 m of the Palazzo delle Arti
• Sea view ×1.5 — the plot looks over the sea
• Town ×1 — every other plot in the village
• Countryside ×0.75 — more than 250 m from the Palazzo and without a sea view

Prices

• The first rent is a round number: size × zone, rounded to the nearest 5 ꜩ, and never below 30 ꜩ.
• The first rent covers the first 3-month term. When it ends you renew, one term at a time, for about 20 % of the first rent (whole tez), at the price in force when you renew.
• More plots cost more: a wallet's plots are priced ×1, ×2, ×4 in the order they were rented, to rent and to renew. One wallet rents at most 3, and at most 2 that touch each other (by an edge or a corner), so nobody walls off a street.
• Network fees are paid by your wallet, on top.

What the rent includes

• The right to build and publish on that plot, for the paid term, with or without an invitation: renting makes your wallet a creator.
• The plot's publishing allowance (50 MB a cell up to 200 MB, see limits), your gallery sign by the door, your listing on the maps and in the gazette.
• It does not include: ownership, a token, any share of revenue, or rights over neighbours, the street or common land.

How paying works

1. In the plot picker (Create › Rent land) or the town map, choose a free plot and press Rent. You see the first rent, the term and the zone.
2. Read the box above the button and tick I understand that I am renting this plot for 3 months at a time. The price is held for 20 minutes.
3. Press Rent for 3 months (or Rent for a year). Your wallet pays the island's treasury directly, in one operation you approve. The tez go from your wallet to the treasury on chain; they never pass through us otherwise.
4. The island reads the operation back from the Tezos chain and records your rental once it has 2 confirmations on top of its block.

Payments are final. If a payment cannot be applied (someone else's payment for the same plot was verified first, the amount was wrong, the price changed while your wallet was open), nothing is recorded and the host returns the tez by hand. The island never sends refunds automatically. Never pay for a plot by sending tez yourself; use only the Rent button.

Terms, renewal, grace and reversion

• A term is 3 calendar months (UTC). Renew from My plots in your account, or from the plot picker. We remind you 30, 7 and 1 day before a term ends; renewing on time is still up to you.
• A renewal always starts where your paid term ends, so renewing early loses nothing. Your paid time may reach at most 5 terms beyond today.
• If a term ends without renewal, you keep the plot for a grace period of 60 days, during which you can still renew. During grace you cannot add storage.
• After grace the plot reverts to the town and is offered for rent again.
• Reminders: when you enter the town it shows a notice with Renew 30, 7 and 1 day before a term ends, when the grace starts, and 30, 7 and 1 day before the plot would return to the town, and the wallet button carries a red dot meanwhile. The builder shows the plot's paid date. In My plots, Remind me on this device sends the same reminders to your phone or computer. A reminder that does not reach you does not extend the term or the grace.
• A plot assigned by the host before rentals opened has no term until the host gives it one or its holder renews; it does not lapse meanwhile.

Paying a year at once

When you rent or renew, choose 3 months or 1 year. A year is 4 terms for the price of 3: about 25 % off the term fees. When you first rent, the first rent counts as one of the 3: 42 ꜩ for a 16 m town plot's first year, instead of 30 ꜩ + 3 × 6 ꜩ. The extra-plot factor and every other rule still apply. A year cannot be added when the plot is already paid more than one term ahead.

Extra storage

If your plot needs more than its base allowance, add extra storage under My plots, in add-ons of 25 MB for 5 ꜩ each per term, up to what visitors can still load in full.

• Storage is paid until the plot's paid term ends and renews with the plot (a year of it also costs 3 terms). Zone and extra-plot factors do not apply to it.
• It goes with the plot when its rental is passed on.
• If it is not renewed, the plot falls back to its base allowance: nothing is deleted and what is published stays up, but a new version must fit the base again.
• The island can refuse new storage when its own ceiling is reached (it stores 10 GB for free, plus what is paid, never above 50 GB).

Passing on your rental

Plots are rented to be built and lived in, not held to be traded. So a rental can change hands only when the plot is built, and only after a wait.

• Only built plots. You can pass on your rental only while the plot has a published build: a version of this plot that you published as its current tenant and have not withdrawn. If you withdraw it after offering the rental, nobody can take it over until you publish again.
• After you have rented a plot for 90 days, choose Pass on your rental and set a price between 1 and 100,000 ꜩ.
• The new tenant pays in one operation: 95 % to you and a 5 % transfer fee to the treasury.
• The new tenant takes over the rest of your paid term, the plot's storage and the same obligations, and waits their own 90 days before they can pass it on.
• Your published gallery does not go with the plot. It leaves the map; its files are kept.

Reservations, the drop and gifts

• The drop. The 10 plots facing the Palazzo delle Arti are reserved for the drop's artists and are not for rent. The host gives them for their first term (1); after it they renew like any other plot in their zone.
• Reservations. The host can hold any free plot back from rent and from gifts (for the drop, for a civic use or another reason). A reserved plot shows as Reserved. Reserving never takes a plot from its tenant.
• Gifts. The host can give one wallet a gift voucher, optionally limited to a largest size or a zone. That wallet chooses any free, unreserved plot within the limits and takes it at 0 ꜩ with its first term paid (Claim my gift plot · 0 tez). After that it renews like any plot. A gift can be revoked until it is used.

What happens to your work

Losing a plot (by not renewing, by passing on the rental, or by the host taking it back) never deletes what you made. Your published gallery is taken off the map, but its files are kept. Your drafts stay on your device and you can export them from the editor at any time; the host can send you a copy of your published gallery. NFTs are never held by the site: they stay in your wallet.

Rentals open only when the host opens them and a treasury is set: first to invited wallets, then, with a separate switch, to every Tezos wallet. The plot picker says which applies today.