How do you make a faction owned object not appear as something that the player could steal. So when the player is close to the object, the red steal doesn't appear. Is there a way to do it without setting ownership to none or making the player a faction member? Or setting the object to players faction.

Nope. Its part of the game engine and the reason for factions and cell ownership.

Thought as much. Looking forward to seeing those clocks from Oblivion again!

I have already built the clocks in the Levelers Tower mod I am working on. There are pictures.