For me, it greatly enhances the game to have a base of operations, where I can store items, and sleep. I keep my alchemy items and my smithihg items there, and my ore and leather and reagents. And my wife.

I get it as soon as I can. It makes the game more fun to have it...and it's NOT fun to work up to buying it all. I want a place for my stuff at the beginning.

I figure that showing them how to kill a dragon is such a worthwhile advantage, that they can just give me a furnished house to live in. I hit the tilde key and type "player.additem f 7000" gives me 7000 gold. 5000 for the house, and 2000 to equip it with everything.

It makes the game more fun for me, and after 647 hours of play time, I haven't run out of things to do yet.

Anyone else do this?

No. 5000 is so easy to get in this game.

Hm... created an Orc 2 or 3 hours ago who entered Whiterun having close to 2000 gold in his pockets. My other characters had no problem using the barrel in front of Arianne's shop as an interim storage while breezing through Bleakfall's Barrow.

My nord have 281 000 gold, just from hard work!

Almost always had the 5k for the house itself by the time I can buy it initially. So easy to come by when hitting up some of the first ruins/camps/etc etc around Whiterun.

Yep. There's not a lot of need to cheat for 5,000 coin; and I've used the same barrel for storage as well. Those barrels are magical--they can hold literally hundreds of weapons, pieces of armor, and everything else.

Go to Dawnstar, do a couple of missions, and the money is made.

I do this in Solitude.

I figure, seeing how I killed that first dragon and saved Whiterun that I should get the house free!!! This is why I do the container trick,container trick+ Brezzehome+ furnishings=FREE HOUSE. And I wouldn't call it "cheating" seeing how this is a single player game.

But it is. Besides, 5k gold is so easy to get.

- doublepost

I always assumed that the house actually costs much more than 7,000 gold, but that you get it at a tremendous discount for your actions of bravery in taking down the dragon. Mainly because I never have any less than 3,000-4,000 Septims by the time I make it to Whiterun.

Dang, I'm not gonna hold it against you for playing how you want, but 5000 gold is really not that much to save up for. You are kinda cheating yourself out of the feeling of reward of earning that gold for the house. I just use the chest at the ruined house (along the road) West of Whiterun between the ruined tower and the bandit fort to store my extra stuff until I have enough money to buy the house. There might be a risk of it disappearing from that chest, but I just saw that as a necessary risk. (What made it worse is Maiq kept hanging out right by the house for a long time; I swear he was thinking of robbing me! )

I never cheat because it just ruins the game for you. I know of at least on kid who just cheated himself into a god till he could run around and kill anything and very quickly got bored of the game. It can be like an addiction for some people.

Or you could you use slow time and get it for free.

No. I have a PS3 so I have to work for it.

i agree. i need a house asap, and working towards it is no fun at all. i just use that little glitch to get one for free with furnishings

It takes me a small while to get the ball rolling. A few hours, since my funding mostly comes from enchanted items if I am choosing to hold off on the main quest.
At which point, dragon bones and such help.

To be fair, doing the MQ early on makes the dragon bones and scales really important for earlygame funding.
But I don't always go that route because some characters I just don't want dragons nipping at their heels.

I sometimes do the glitch where you buy it, exit dialog, stuff money in the nearby dresser. You get the key and then grab your money back from the dresser. Gotta save up for the 5000, but it not that hard.

Yup, it did not take me long before I got the first house.

...And what does that accomplish? Where's the glitch? Sounds like you just buy it for 5000, stuff your money in for no reason, and you just get the key and money back, and leave without getting any upgrades.

I just use the exploit that others have mentioned.

You put the money in a container while the Steward is still talking. The money isn't taken until the NPC is done speaking so if you're quick enough you have no money when the game tries to take it, but you had it when the game checked.

It works for the upgrades, too.

Or you can just not cheat at all, jump on the carriage outside Whiterun and head to Markarth: Fool around enough to get the House of Horrors Daedric Quest started and occupy the Abandoned House there. It's fully furnished and containers don't respawn, pre or post quest completion.

Easy as that

The money for the house is not removed instantly. If you are fast enough, storing all your money in the drawer before he attempts to collect the money will save you 5000 gold.

It's like writing a fake check to buy the candy off a mentally disabled kid.

I always wondered about that.

Thanks to the other two who replied to my confusion.
I'll have to try this, save me some coin.

Here it is being done without Slow Time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HooIbHOjN7c

It's obviously easier with the Slow Time shout because you don't have to wait for the Steward to be near a container or push him near one. The most difficult one to get this way is Windhelm because you have to wait for the Steward to be sleeping on a bed roll in what appears to be the Kitchen - the only place he 'paths' that is near a container.