I haven’t been on these boards long but I haven’t seen much discussion in the area of future housing mods. I’ve been a TES fan since Morrowind (never even heard of Arena or Daggerfall before that) and love that they made it so easy to mod the game. Now I’m enjoying Skyrim but find some of the housing options a little lacking. I’m only about 30 hours in and am not power-leveling or grinding anything, just trying to work my way through the game naturally. This is what I’ve seen so far regarding housing.

Breezehome
I purchased Breezehome and a few upgrades, it’s a good place to store stuff for now but I would like to see something bigger, nicer, and with better options for displaying stuff. In short, it’s a good starting point when playing the game but a more advanced character needs a nicer place to stay.

Arch-Mage Quarters
Got this for free for becoming the head of the college. I like that it has alchemy and enchanting features plus storage. Also like that it has some plants in the middle which will (may?) grow new alchemy materials when I run out. I don’t like that the town is a ghost town and it’s on the edge of nowhere.

I was looking to move to a new place, so naturally I was shooting for the top: Solitude or Windhelm.

Windhelm
This house is the second most expensive but seems to have the most storage available. It gets up to 3 mannequins, 12 bookshelves, and plenty of places to display weapons. I’m not sure I like the location though, seems to snow a bit too much on that side of the world.

Solitude
This seems to be the nicer area with nice weather, decent views, and a nicer town. It is also twice as expensive as Windhelm, but it doesn’t have as much storage. I also had my hopes up for an open balcony that would let me see the bay, but the design has a bunch of arches which kinda block the view.

I guess I’m looking for a few points in a Skyrim home and maybe modding can help. Specifically, something incorporating the following:

1 – Location. Wherever I end up living, it should be in a nice place with a sweet view if possible.

2 – A library with enough book shelves to store a ton of books, possibly with a fireplace and sitting area.

3 – An armory/museum to store all the sweet loot I am hoarding, probably 4-6 mannequins plus a few weapons racks and display cases. In my head they are all lined up on one side of the room with maybe some display cases/shelves in the middle.

4 – Workshops for the basic professions, including smithing, with appropriate storage containers nearby. Smithing stuff can be out in a courtyard or whatever, just close by.

5 – Vendors close by so I can sell all the junk I make.

I don’t know if the Solitude house can be modded to accommodate this or if we’d have to generate something completely new. If we’re going to generate something new, I have an idea.

*Background*

I liked the way we acquired houses in Morrowind, when we worked for a merchant house then eventually built a compound. The compound was just outside a city and included a few trainers and merchants, so it wasn’t just a boring place with only me there.

*Idea*

Create a mod so the player can generate a similar experience by building a small keep. You can contact a contractor, earn his trust (quest), then hire him to construct your estate. It should meet the criteria above but be expensive. It can be done in stages like the current upgrades, but the construction should take time, say about a game week per project. I had a thought where you could expedite the construction for an extra fee, cutting the time in half. I don’t know how difficult it would be to make this happen as I’ve only modded characters before, not sites or script. But this is a basic idea of how it might flow:

Start – Find builder in town close to build site, he would love to help but his architect has gone missing.
2 – Go somewhere and rescue architect
3 – Return to builder, he proposes job if you’re interested. Need Jarl’s approval for land.
4 – Quest for Jarl to earn right to build
5 – Return to builder, he needs front money. Offer two forms: a) paid in full up front or paid in installments, but construction will not be complete until paid.
6 – During construction, if player visits the site there will be a few workers there plus a foreman. Land will be bare except for some material and building clearings.
7 – Once construction is complete, builder will suggest upgrades. Each will cost money and take more time to complete (construction should mimic initial development of site if player visits during construction). Some potential upgrade options could be to build shops, a perimeter wall, storage space, workshops, upper level deck to help the view, grotto for alchemy reagents to grow, etc.

Basically after that there are a number of things that could be done, like having the player responsible for securing the keep (themselves or hire guards) or taxing the vendors. I just really like that when you got a house in Morrowind, it felt like you were becoming someone important and not just “the new guy who moved in”.

So anyways, those are some of my thoughts on housing in Skyrim. I am eagerly awaiting the CK so I can get an idea of how tough this would be to implement. In the meantime, I am looking for a great location to set up my keep.

The house in Solitude definitely needs some work. There's no storage near the alchemy and enchanting tables and like you've mentioned, the stone arches outside in the patio area kill what would be a great view. Then it has that one crappy storage room/bed room? with a dirty sleeping bag which can be found in caves where I guess the housecarl sleeps in. Lydia is living the life in Whiterun/Breezehome, Hopefully we'll see the community fix these issues.

I would actually like to see someone add a basemant to Breezehome-Whiterun, but I don't know if that is even possible.

Wherever I end up living I'm going to need quite a few mannequins and a ton of bookshelves.

I had the same thought about the basemant in Breezehome. It should not be too difficult, assuming there is a matching hatch type of floor-mounted door for the houses.

This thread should be to your interest:

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1296823-wip-living-compound/

I think just enough to realize this idea in one of the forts captured from the bandits. Checking the appropriate quest and repopulating the fort prodovtsami coaches and guards.
* Google translation into English

<3

And I think I understand what Karma said, and I had thought of that earlier. That is, taking one of the abandoned/destroyed forts inhabited by bandits and rebuilding it through quests/money could be cool too.