Looking to spend some jingle in my pocket and I hear this solitude house is worth every piece of gold. As far as main quest line goes I've spoken to the old folks at high hrothgar and that's that. Haven't picked a side yet neither. I'm assuming you speak to the jarl's assistant and in this case the jarl nor the assistant has any dialogue options for buying a house. Not even a quest or do they say anything relevant.

Do I just do quests do people in solitude like bards college and what not to open the buying dialogue?

Any help would be appreciated, playing on Xbox not that it matters in this case...

Well, I would suggest talking to the steward & court mage in Solitude.

Talk to the steward, he will give you quests to do, and THEN you can buy a house. If he doesn't then you have to talk to the Jarl, who will tell you to talk to the steward. Anyway, its just one or two quests, and then after you buy your house you will need to help people in order to become thane. I know I didn't explain this great, but it should suffice I guess.

Please do not post Spoilers in General.

People come to General to learn about the game without learning about what happens in the game. If they want to know about what happens, that is what the Cheats, Hints and Spoilers section is for.

Do not use quest details or location specific details related to quests/puzzles/NPCs in your posts in this section. General is for discussing gameplay and mechanics and general topics about the the game including but not limited to races, items and their use, magic, enchanting, skills, character builds, criticism, praise, funny random things that happen, places from an esthetic standpoint and and other general topics.

Use the Spoilers Section if you have to post quest details or other spoilers or a thread about the same. I will move this now.

well, spend that money on the house.

but be careful. I lost all of my furniture once.

See that's the thing, the jarl does tell me to speak to the assistant but, there are no quest options from him. Only two options from assistant are:
1. What will happen to Elsif if the empire wins the war?
2. Does general tullios respect elisif?

Both options have been asked.

Theres usually a scripted event in solitude where a man will tell the jarl and the court about wolfskull cave (the steward will tell you to stop talking while this is going on)
Complete that quest then talk to the jarl and she will tell you that she can trust you and you will receive a quest to place a horn on a shrine. After I did these two things she said I have earned the right to purchase property and on my way to becoming thane.

I love my Solitude house.

It's not that great. I think it's meant to feel like a Skingrad house, but it's cramped and not laid out very well IMO. Much prefer Vlindrel Hall, Hjerim or even Honeyside.

when you walked in the first time a man was telling the Jarl about a problem with attacks at Dragon Bridge, or near there.

1. clear the cave for the Steward
2. clear a cave of vampires for the court mage
the Jarl asks you to please do her a favor and take something on behalf of her husband to a shrine
then you can ask about a house and you will be given the quest to do nice things for her people and win the hearts of the locals so that you can become her thane... provided you will also buy property.

I think you'll like the house.

Very much this^. Hjerm and vindrel are always my favorites for putting my nice things in, the layouts are spacious and nice to look at. Honeyside is verrrrry cozy, love using that for my alchemy and thief house.

I love the Solitude House. It is beautiful but functionally terrible, but so are all the other houses. Just another house with very little storage and the storage it does have is nowhere near the enchanting or alchemy tables.

Who was in charge of figuring out the storage layout in the houses in Skyrim??? They should be shot

Hjerim is a murder scene and on my PC stays glitchy and has glass and spider webs and lighting that doesn't match the room... like it's still abandoned. My master bedroom has a pile of chairs on the bed and... well... yargh... as beautiful as the place is I feel like there's still blood in some places on the floor. It could be my imagination.

In Vlindrel Hall I feel always as if my neighbor is watching me over the wall... and I swear that butcher keeps licking his lips when I walk by, and not in a sixy way, either... something seems wrong here in Markarth and I don't think it has anything to do with the Forsworn, either.

Honeyside is a honey of a house that's my favorite house in the game by far. My neighbors are all the sorts who keep to themselves and the gardens are wonderful. I can't get my chicken to lay eggs yet, and that's alright. All over the countryside are farmers who don't mind a bit when I pick up a few eggs here and there for making my potions.

Breezehome was a breeze to get and has excellent amenities except for that climb (yes I know about fast travel, it's rp folks) up to the Keep when I need to do some enchanting and that bothersome busybody of a mage who likes to stand behind me and encourage me to head off to the mage's college even when I'm standing there in the arch mage's robes.

I found Proudspire to be beautiful and spacious and still seemed less worth the massive amounts of cash I had to plunk down to buy it. I also found that my husband slept in the basemant in a bedroll because the climb was just too much for him after a day of selling and cleaning and cooking without me around, and so it was a bit disturbing to come home after a long week of dungeoneering and have to tiptoe around his sleeping self in the basemant of our home before I could head off to bed.

lol

I have bought all the houses in the game. Honeyside is the one I tend to use as "home base" though. It's nice and cozy. Whiterun being second just due to the crafting stations.

The rest are just used for display cases...

For folks on PCs: there's a nice mod for Breezehome that adds an Arcane Enchanter, and there are mods for smithing equipment too, but with the smith just out the door and down the street they're not really needed; there's a VERY nice mod for Proudspire Manor which makes the basemant much more useful, adds storage etc.

For you console folks, I know that's not any help at all; I'm sorry.

Good mod and the only reason I used my proudspire home since the smith was too out of my way. If I didn't have that mod the house would of been left to my housecarl to sit alone in and eat herself into a deep depression.