12 Days of Christmas: Day 2 update: 30% OFF Rooms that make M$1,000,000+

There we go: a nice, tempting sale there. Today's deal in the ongoing 12-days-of-Christmas goodies from EA for the Monopoly Hotels game: 30% off all rooms that make a million or more.

That is to say, a million per payout. So Neanderthal rooms, for instance, are not on sale ... they pay out M$312,500 every six hours, easily topping a million a day, but they do not qualify because they don't generate a million every single payout.

Not to say that this is a lack-lustre sale. Far from it. There are several rooms that are well worth picking up - true, they'd be even more worth picking up if they were half-price, but even at 30% discount, you may want to stock up. 

Don't spend all your savings today, though. Set up a budget and buy only the rooms you really, really, REALLY want. Remember that today is only day 2 of the 12 days of Christmas. 

No, I don't know (and obviously cannot guarantee) that there will be a sale anywhere near as good as this one over the upcoming 10 days. But I do know that if there is, I will be mighty unhappy if I've spent all my savings before that day! :)

You could stock up on any of a number of enticing rooms today (well, for the next 12 hours or more, for sure - I'm not certain as to what time of day the updates are happening, and I got home fairly late today!)

So what rooms do I find tempting? There are actually rooms at almost every level of savings. 

If you have just a little gold and want a million-producer, you could pick up either a Barbell room (105 gold; produces a million every 12 hours) or a Delaware room (175 gold, produces a million every 20 hours) or a Piano room (245 gold; produces a million every 3 hours). Of those 3, the Piano room is your best producer, but only if you can afford it.

Of course, if you've got 245 gold, you *may* want to hold out for a 50% off sale to pick up a Harvest Pumpkin, which would yield M$24,000,000 every 36 hours instead, which would be better bang for your gold. The only thing is, as I've already mentioned, there is no guarantee that there will be a 50%-off sale during this 12-days-of-Christmas promotion.

If you're at the low end of the M$ savings, just M$10,500,000 will buy you a Cobra HQ room, which pays out just over M$1,500,000 every 3 days and 22 hours. Or a Science Lab, which will set you back M$21,000,000 to pay out rent of M$5,091,667 every 3 days and 22 hours. (Hmm, anyone else notice that those two rooms have identical payout periods?)

You may be better off, though, picking up an Ancient Egypt room in the Museum. For M$14,000,000 spent, you'd collect M$1,125,000 every 36 hours [that works out to 3.25 million every 3 days] - but not if you want the best value per square per day.

There are, of course, higher end rooms you could buy for gold or for M$. 

What you choose to buy will ultimately depend on how much you can (or choose to) spend, and what your priorities are. 

Do you want the best bang for your buck? 

If so, pick the room that will pay out the most rent on a per-square-per-hour basis; AND will let you make the most of the savings you already have. 

For example if you have mostly Thimbles and TopHats, you're not likely to generate enough additional cah to buy anything more fancy within the next 12 days, so if you can pick up any of the million dollar rooms (even if they take more space than your ideal room), you might as well do so.

If, on the other hand, you already have a few high producing rooms,  your strategy may be different. For example, if you have something that gets you reasonable amounts of gold every day (let's say a few Golden Cauldrons, or maybe a Bullet Train or two), and you've managed to save up 2,000 gold. 

What would be your best bet then?

You could pick up a single Flute room for just under 1,400 gold. 

But you'd arguably have a better daily payout if you instead used that 1,400 gold to pick up 4 Harvest Pumpkins instead - that will take up more space in your hotel, but you'd have a payout of M$96,000,000 every 36 hours, rather than the at most M$30,000,000 every 24 hours (assuming you managed not to miss even one collection while you were sleeping!) - at best approximately M$45,000,000 every 36 hours.

Of course, the trade-off for the higher payout would be that instead of a single square given up to produce that M$45,000,000 from a single Flute, you'd be using up 8 squares to produce the M$96,000,000 from the 4 Harvest Pumpkins.

So, really, only you can decide where and how to spend your savings. Think about all the angles: yield and affordability and per-square rent. 

If you, like me, have more Top Hats and Thimbles than anything else, even though you do have a fairly good daily rental income, then the multiple Harvest Pumpkins may make excellent sense, whereas, if you have a lot of Golden Cauldrons and Microphones and Tiny Pilgrim Hats and Flutes already, then really, you'd not want to delete any of those, so you'd be squeezing in more Flutes into every available square. Or perhaps a few of those Golden Snowflakes!

Caveat: if you spend all you have saved up so far to stock up on rooms during this 30% off sale, you may bitterly regret it in a day or two if a better sale comes along. So know your limits and your own instincts as well as your room/hotel requirements before you make your purchasing decisions today!

So that's it for today's update. Enjoy the nice discount on million-producing rooms.