You start of with very little money. Each lot costs 2000 simoleans. So here are a couple of things you can do:

When you first get there:
1). You can move in with someone (go find a house, make some friends and ask if you can move in). Then your money is added to the house money. Most newbies do this first.

2). Or, you can do what I did... get some very minimal furniture (bed, toilet, bookshelf) and don't build anything on your property. Save up and build little by little.

3). Or you can just go from place to place hanging out without a home of your own

Once you have decided on a starrting option:
1). Pizza Game: this is a game where four people get different ingredients and try to make pizzas. This is the quickest way to make money. Find a place with the Pizza game and play for a while. Great payouts

2). The Maze Game: this is really hard to do and the pay out is not as great as pizza. Two people try to get through a maze. One sees the maze and guides the other who is in the maze. Not my favorite and takes way too much time.

3). Pinata: You can do this by yourself. It builds body skills and give you coins every so often. The higher your body skill, the bigger the payout is. This is my favo next to pizza.

4). Making perserves, elves and potions: not only do you get cooking, mechanical, and logic skills, but you actually get to sell your goodies. Again, not much of a payout.

5). Core: I am not sure what this game is, but I know it makes money.

6). Make your place a fun hangout and you get 1 simolean per visitor. As you can imagine, very little pay off in the beginning.

Hope this helps

Regards,
Sabinka
sabinka@boutika.org
Boutika Sims