Land rental is a thriving business in Second Life; if you own a large amount of land or a Private Estate, it can be profitable for you to lease some of your land to other Residents.  Private Estate owners also have several additional tools available to them to help facilitate land rental.

Basic Rental

Rentals in Second Life consist of a tenant/landlord structure.  Tenants pay a landlord a regular fee for the use of a defined quantity of the landlord's resources.  Those resources may vary from situation to situation; some landlords rent predetermined parcels of land, while other may charge for a finite number of objects allowed in a Region.

There are many ways to collect rental fees from tenants; some landlords prefer informal direct payments and real paper record-keeping, while others use Resident-created, automated rental machines.  You should settle on a collection method you are most comfortable with, and inform your tenants upfront about your payment policy.

 
Tip: To learn more about the different rental collection options available, try asking the opinions of some existing landlords.  They have the benefit of experience, and may be able to help you choose a solution that works best for you.

You will also need to determine what level of control you would like your tenants to have over your rented land.  One common method involves the creation of a "rental group".  The rental group forms a common bond between your land and your tenants; as long as the parcel is set to the rental group, and you tenants use their rental group tags, they will be able to place objects on your parcel without fear of autoreturn.  For more information on how group land and group objects work, see the Groups section of the Knowledge Base.

To evict a deadbeat tenant from group-owned land, you can eject them from the land rental group and return their objects from the land parcel.

Private Region Rental

Estate owners have a number of tools at their disposal to make land rental easier.  In addition to greater control over the general environment in their Regions, Estate owners may divide their Private Regions into parcels for sale.  When a Resident buys a parcel in a Private Region, he gains control over that parcel as though he owns it.  This added feature eliminates the need for rental groups or complicated rights-granting rituals sometimes associated with rental properties.

To evict a deadbeat tenant from land in your Private Region, you can choose the Reclaim Land... button from the About Land window:

Note: Parcels bought by Residents in Private Regions are still technically owned and paid for by the Estate owner.  As the owner of a Private Region, you will still need to determine a way to collect rental fees from your tenants. For more information on Private Region land sales, see How do land sales in Private Regions work?