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Deals from your neighbors can go both ways. You can either receive money for your services or pay someone to supply them to you. Deals that let you earn money from your neighbors are beneficial to a city that is starting out, since you'll most likely have excess services. It is an easy way to make quite a bit of money that can help your city grow. And you can always cancel a deal or simply choose not to renew it later on if your neighbors are cheating you or are eating up all your services. If you cancel a deal, however, you will most likely be charged for doing so.

There is a catch with some deals. Water and electricity neighbor deals are usually for more than the amount that you can spare. If you do not keep a close watch on your consumption of water and electricity, it is very easy to think that you'll have enough for the deal. Generally, the amount they ask for is just a little more than you can spare. For example, one city was using approximately 8,500 kW and was offered a deal to sell 42,000 kW. The fusion power plant in the city supplied 50,000 kW. See how sneaky they can be? If you do accept a deal that is for a greater amount that you can handle, you will be given a penalty by the dealer because you will obviously have to terminate the deal ASAP.

Trash deals seem to be the safest of all of the neighbor deals. You just need to be sure that your landfill zone is as far away from your city as possible so as to avoid its nasty effects (plus, they will need to expand as they fill up). Be sure to zone enough landfill to handle all the incoming garbage, and plan extra room for that expansion. Incinerators, recycling centers, and certain ordinances can also help cut down on your garbage, but keep in mind that ordinances will only affect your city's garbage and not your neighbor's.

One slick way to sell power and water to your neighbors is to build water pumps and power plants exclusively for them. However, they can still ask you for more than you can handle, so you'll still have to be careful.

For example, you can build a power plant at the opposite side of the map and then connect it to that neighbor. When your neighbor offers you a deal, they may want an amount that is more than that one hook up can handle. So, immediately after accepting a deal (it may help to pause the game), hook up additional power plants to your pre-existing plant to handle the demand. Reference the existing plant's output and the amount the dealer wants so that you won't waste excess power; build a power plant that most closely matches that output you'll need.

While the power plants and connections you'll make in the beginning years of your city will be costly, they will provide you with a steady income that can be hard to attain early on.

Another tip about selling water or power or trash deals: do not accept a neighbor's first offer unless you're really hard-up for cash. They will almost always offer you a couple more bids that are for higher amounts (which will turn out in your favor). This also goes for buying water or trash services from a neighbor. They will ask for a large amount of money to begin with and they will lower it, if you refuse.

Ross Tolner also has some suggestions regarding neighbor deals. Here's his version:

Start by building an incinerator in the far corner of your map along with water pumps (tip: place a drop of water every two tiles and surround each water drop with 8 pumps for maximum efficiency). Connect pipes to 2 neighbors for starters. Wait for garbage and water deals and accept them. 

Build your city SLOWLY, increasing the capacity of water and garbage structures as needed until you hit about $50,000 a year. Then cancel all neigbour garbage deals. This will give your city a better aura all around. Keep the water deal, however, to retain a steady income.

Then, if you are really greedy, or if an earthquake all but flattens your town build a fusion power plant with your excess funds and create a neighbor deal to provide a new source of income until your city gets back on its feet.

In respect to the "Mr. Landgrab" offers: if you accept the maximum security prison, place it far away from your sims and make sure it has road access. Otherwise, you won't get paid $250 a month.

Contributor(s): Genie, Ross Tolner (also edited and added to by Wren Weburg)

Copyright 1998, 1999. Ray Wong.