We'll assume you've looked over the apartments, selected one to your liking and moved in.

The landlord is a good person to get to know. If you can get a very good relationship with them, they may even reduce your rent somewhat. However, if your relationship develops so well that you want the landlord to live with you, you will not become co-owner of the building. Your new family member will have given up their job as being landlord and a new one will be appointed. It might serve a better purpose just to be "good friends" with them and enjoy the benefits that having a landlord entails. Once a week on a Saturday, if there is a communal area with a barbecue, the landlord will throw a party for the building and invite you. However, this might not be such a big deal. Hot dogs has never seemed to be a major crowd puller and every time one of my apartment sims has gone to the party, he has been the only person there. Also, when one of my playable apartment sims has tried to make burgers on the communal BBQ, yes, he serves it up in the communal area but he wanders off with his plate and goes to eat alone in his apartment. Bad routing, Maxoids.

# Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours, with a little understanding, you can find the perfect blend #

It is a good idea to get on good terms with your neighbours. They move into the building after you have claimed which apartment you want. Many apartment buildings come with communal areas. It can be a TV lounge, outdoor barbecue area or in this case a games room. If you develop a good rapport with them in the same way as you can do with townies, you can develop some benefits. I am bemused as to how so many of my non-playable tenants (NPTs) work in discount furniture stores or have invented expensive objects that your sim gets to check the prototype. If you can make friends with these neighbours, it saves a lot of travelling and they count towards the friendship requirements for different careers. Throwing a block party is a good way to get to meet them.

Not every neighbour is as good as you might like. Your neighbours can also be noisy and smelly. You can complain about it, banging on the wall for starters if they are being too noisy. In order to get a good night's sleep, it is not a good idea to have your bed against an adjoining wall through which is your neighbour's apartment. Otherwise, your sleep might be more interrupted by noise from the neighbours than if you had a ghost in the house.

You can complain about it, but your relationship could take a hit as a result.

Watch your own noise and smell levels too, though. Noise and bad smells are problems for apartment buildings. If you are having loud parties or there are loads of flies buzzing around bad food, this might get the negative attention of the neighbours.

# Neighbours need to get to know each other. Next door is only a footstep away. #

Apart from throwing a party or inviting those who you know over for a meal, you can now go and visit them. On an ownable lot, neighbours could not be visited. You could invite them over but you could not go and visit them. Now, things have changed. You can knock on their door and introduce yourself to them, ask them to come out or even visit them. Normally, a NPT's apartment is in darkness. This is not dissimilar to what happens to dorm rooms occupied by non-playable students. Just a bit darker. Also, it's a good thing. I don't think most computers would be able to handle displaying what is going on inside every apartment in a very large apartment building. Fog can be good.

When you do visit a neighbour, their apartment brightens up and you can see them and their furniture. You can even use their facilities. To make up for those times that the visitors from FreeTime have hogged your computer, you can now hog their computer instead. Seriously, unless they have locked certain areas off from visitors, you can do that, watch their TV, use their bathroom, you can even relax on their bed.

Personally, I like this feature and I am expecting to see more of it in The Sims 3 especially considering the plans to have a seamless neighbourhood for the next incarnation of our sims.

If you reckon that there might be a problem for your sims to pay the rent and even run a risk of losing that Vettriano print that has been a family heirloom for generations to the repo man who may be calling if you cannot afford the rent, it may be an idea to get a roomie. Assuming there is room available, it might be an idea. I don't think a roomie would be too happy paying a sizeable slice of the rent if they are expected to sleep on the couch.

A tenant can look for roomies in two ways. This can be done from looking in the newspaper or by using the computer. It brings up a picture the job details and personality of the prospective roomies. An apartment-sharing situation might not work out too well if your personalities are not compatible and certainly if the prospective roomie is untidy. Unless you have an efficient maid or have bought or made a cleanbot, you do not want to be following them around cleaning up after them ... unless you want to live in a dump and risk the neighbours complaining.

Once you have selected your chosen roommate, they turn up on the doorstep carrying a suitcase. It is your duty as the tenant to make sure their stay is comfortable and to try and promote a happy house. If you have a poor relationship with them, they are less likely to contribute to the rent. Also, they may be more inclined to pack their bags and leave.

Here are some things you need to know about your roomies.

In the penultimate part, we will be looking in more detail at the neighborhood, at the different areas of Belladonna Cove and a look at the people who live there. We will also be looking at some of the additions that haven't really fit into any category of this review so far.

Also coming in the near future as a separate editorial will be a separate tutorial for those wishing to build their own apartment buildings.