I've heard that Hjerim has a lot of bugs associated with it in terms of not doing certain quests correctly, or buying upgrades in the wrong order. How should I do things to avoid the bugs? I plan to side with the Imperials.

Save before starting the

Pray everything goes smoothly for you, if not reload and try try again. If it fails to and you are on the PC

Here's how I do this quest every time. Ive completed it "successfully" (i'll explain why the quotes) 3 times. By successfully I mean the only 'bugs' I had was a glitched item in my inventory.

I have done both civil war chains and been successful in getting the house after each civil war. 2 times stormcloaks and once imperials.

-After completing the entire chain and taking over windhelm, I speak with the new ulfric, he does a little speecha and says I can buy property.

-I talk to the stewart, he lets me buy the house.

-I go to the house before buying anything, entry of the house will initiate blood on the ice.

-Investigate all targets: Pots in kitchen, mead bottles on floor, chest, two wardrobes, the secret rooms altar, and the chairs upstairs in bedroom.

-As you investigate be sure to grab both butcher journals and one of the butcher flyers (grab the amulet you find as well).

-After investigating ALL those targets listed, go out and find Viola. She lives near Hjerm and wanders windhelm....tell her about the journals.

-She will also accuse the person you suspect and advise you to go to the steward....ignore this request and go straight to the accused.

-He will proclaim his innocence and reveal the true killer and a way to catch him.

-You will patrol the city at night and make your way to the market (around 10 pm should be sufficient), at the market you will see the killer about to commit another murder.

-Kill the butcher, loot his body and inform the jarl of your success.

-After speaking with the steward, he will have decoration options....BUY CLEAN UP MURDERERS MESS FIRST, the option will disappear if you buy something else first.

-After you bought clean up the mess, finish up by buying the remaining decorations.

You are done, the amulet will be stuck in your inventory (why successfully was in quotes above), but the house will be useable, cleaned and ready to go. It should take about 5 minutes to complete the quest chain if you do it this way.

Personally I'm waiting on the data patch before trying that house again. All I got was a fully upgraded house with a bloody floor and an un-killable NPC attacking me everytime I enter.

Haha, sounds like you got into a bad marriage.

If you speak to the museum guy before you speak to Viola, he offers to buy the amulet, and later in the quest (or after the quest, I forget which) you can get an upgraded version of it that is not a quest item. I'll note that this didn't work for me; the museum was locked & the guy never came out of the house until later in the quest, so I'm still stuck with the 'strange amulet' in my inventory.

The amulet I think is needed to help the original accused killer determine who the real killer is so I didn't risk letting it go just in case. There was enough problems with the quest so I was worried, luckily it still has no weight and im not a stickler for having stuff in my inventory. Im sure its fixable on pc as well, I jsut haven't gotten around to it.

I've bought it twice now, going from both sides (Imperial and Stormcloak).

For Imperial I found the dead body in the graveyard. This appears to ONLY happen after dark so check between midnight and maybe 2am. Talk to the guard and he will start you on the Blood on the Ice quest. In this regard, you can ONLY buy the house at the completion of the Civil War quest line and the Imperial's take over the city.

From the Stormcloak side, once you get your rep up high enough with Ulfric he will offer to sell you land in his city. Talk to the Steward and you can buy the house. You do not have to finish the Civil War quest or have started the Blood on the Ice quest. If you go this route, I never found the dead body but there was blood all over the house. You can "examine" several items and when you click on the fliers about the Butcher this triggers the start of the Blood on the Ice quest.

In both cases, complete the BOTI quest and then return to the steward to press your accusation of the Butcher. He will make the arrest and then (as Imperial) offer to sell you the house. Then (in either event as SC or Imp) make sure you take the last option to CLEAN THE HOUSE and do this before you buy any of the home add-ons like the alchemy room etc. You have to clean the house first!!

Hope this helps.

The trigger method is the one where you enter after dark (at least 4 times) and find the butchered body. If you get the house however, the quest to complete blood on the ice is activated as soon as you enter the house and is much faster to complete without having to trigger the night scene, especially if you have never visited markarth before.

If you do it the way viola wants it, it requires alot more time instead of going straight to whom she accused in the first place.

You don't need the item in your inventory for the mage to identify it as the necromancers amulet. He figures it out from your description.

Ah good to know, I was assuming it was only triggered if you had it. Now I will be able to do this without any bugs whatsoever, ty.

I've never had any trouble with that quest. The first time I enter the city - during the day - I just went straight to the corpse and it was there. It's always been there for me. Granted, I always do the quest before the civil war, which is likely muddying things up, but shouldn't most people do it before the civil war? Seems like an odd thing to put off.

The body is only triggered after a certain amount of times going into the city (particularly at night). Ive completed civil war and blood on the ice without ever having triggered the body scene. Its an optional way of doing the quest. I also like to do it before the body scene since upon the first time doing it with the body, it doesn't despawn after complteing the investigation. I hid the body in some bushes on my first playthrough, completely avoided it on my following 3