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The Sims The Sims 2 The Sims Life Stories The Sims Pet Stories The Sims 3 The Sims 4 This article is/was a featured article.


Gold simoleon

The Simoleon (§) is the unit of currency used in the SimCity and The Sims series. It is assumed to be the national currency of SimNation. While in The Sims, Simoleons resembled US dollar bills[confirmation needed], The Sims 2 onwards made them red, orange, and white.

Its value can vary between titles, and doesn't consistently reflect any real-life currency (such as the US dollar or British pound), as many of the more expensive items are marked down in price, while some of the cheapest may be marked up; for example, in The Sims 2 an SUV costs approx. §4000, while a pizza costs §40. Usually, items of limited duration are more expensive, while durable objects or house structures are cheaper. This reflects the fact that a Sim has less time to earn money in the series than would be available in real life. Much like the real world, better quality items are generally more expensive. Also, the simoleon has no sub-units; the only way something can cost less than §1 is for it to be free.

In SimCity, a stretch of road is §10 per segment and a Police Department §500. According to the SimCity 2000 "City Value" menu, one § unit that represents the cost of a building actually equals §1,000.

The Simoleon’s currency symbol is the section sign (§). In The Sims Medieval, the currency is known as Simoles, although the same symbol is still used to represent them. The same symbol is also used in another Maxis game, Spore, as the Sporebuck symbol in both the Civilization and Space Stages.

How much money can Sims have?[]

In The Sims 3 for Windows and Mac OS X, and The Sims 3 for console, 8 digits (up to §99,999,999) can be displayed, while earlier Windows games and The Sims 4 can show up to 7 digits.

Console versions of The Sims,[1] The Sims Bustin' Out, The Urbz: Sims in the City, The Sims 2, and The Sims 2: Pets only display 6 digits.

Game Max Money
The Sims (Windows), The Sims 2 and The Sims Stories §9,999,999
The Sims (PS2) §99,999[1]
The Sims (Console) through TS2 Pets §999,999
The Sims 3, The Sims Medieval and The Sims 3 for Console §99,999,999
The Sims Social Unknown
The Sims 4 §9,999,999

Starting money[]

In The Sims, The Sims 2 and The Sims Stories, families will start with §20,000.

In The Sims 2: Apartment Life, a new rule for figuring starting money has been added. The amount of starting money depends on the number of Sims in the family and their ages.

Age Starting Money
First adult / elder §20,000
Each additional adult / elder + §5,000
Teen + §3,000
Child + §2,000
Toddler + §1,000
Pet[TS2:P] / young adult[TS2:U] + §500

In The Sims 3 and The Sims 3 for console, a household will start with §16,500 to §30,500[TS3]/§26,500[TS3C][2] depending the on number of Sims created and their ages. For example, a single-Sim household made in CAS will start with §16,500.

Age Starting Money
First young adult and older §16,500
Each additional young adult and older + §2,000
Teen / child + §1,000
Toddler / baby + §500
Cat / dog[TS3:P] + §250
Horse[TS3:P] + §1,000

In The Sims Medieval, Hero Sims will start with either §12,000 or §1,000, depending on whether or not their house is furnished or unfurnished.

In The Sims 4, a household starts with §20,000, plus §2000 for each adult Sim beyond the first.

Making money[]

See also: Game guide:Earning simoleons

Sims need a minimum amount of money in order to buy food and pay their bills. Leaving bills unpaid for too long results in either a visit from the repo-man[TS][TS2][TS3] or in electricity and water systems being shut.[TS4] (In the handheld versions of The Sims Bustin' Out and The Urbz: Sims in the City, Sims/Urbz who skip their bills are arrested instead.)

Working for money[]

There are several ways for Sims to receive a steady income. The usual way is to work in a career or profession[TS3:A] that gives the Sim a regular salary or stipend. Owning a business[TS2:OFB][TS4:GTW] is another way to make money, though income from a business is not as steady as the income from a regular job, as the Sim does not get paid a salary.

Some Sims can make money through creative endeavors, such as painting or writing. In The Sims 2: University, The Sims 3[3] and The Sims 4 Sims can collect tips while playing an instrument. There are a number of crafts Sims can partake in, where the objects they create can be sold. In The Sims 4: City Living, Sims can set up street tables and galleries in order to sell their collectibles and paintings with the price being freely decided from 0% to 300%.

Investments[TS3] are another way Sims can earn money. A Sim can buy a partnership in one of the rabbit holes in a neighborhood and collect weekly earnings. As of Ambitions, Investments are not limited to rabbit holes, and Sims can buy into almost every community lot, being challenged to upgrade it in order to make even more money.

Sims can make money by completing opportunities[TS3] and choosing wisely when given a career chance card[TS2].

Inheriting money[]

Main article: Inheritance

In The Sims 2, family members and best friends can inherit money on the death of a Sim. How much a Sim will inherit depends on three things; the deceased Sim's aspiration level at death, the type of relationship the Sim had with the deceased, and the Sim's lifetime relationship with the deceased.

Found money[]

Sometimes money is just lying on the ground. Random phone calls may be able to net Sims a few extra Simoleons.[TS] Collecting objects that are littered around the neighborhood could net a Sim some money. One Sim's trash is another Sim's Simoleons! Sims can rummage through garbage and occasionally find something worthy.[TS3] Sims in lots that have the "Penny Pixies" lot trait can find randomly money from the ground.[TS4:CL]

Money grows on trees. The money tree grows Simoleons. With some care Sims can "rake" in the cash. Money falls from the sky when Sims wish for wealth from the Genie[TS2:FT][TS3:ST] or the wishing well.[TS2:S]

Illegal gains[]

Some Sims are born to steal. Kleptomaniacs can steal objects that they can then use, sell or give back to the original owner.[TS3][TS4] Fraudulent Sims can try their hand at counterfeiting. Genuine Buck's Famous Counterfeiting Machine is an aspiration reward that allows a Sim to print bills.[TS2:U] Hacking is another great and fast way for Sims to gain massive amounts of money.[TS3][TS4]

Some players also like to take the easy route. A player can move their Sim(s) into another occupied house and then move the existing members out enabling the player's Sim(s) to steal their house and money without the need of cheats.

Money cheats[]

Main article: Money cheats

The Sims[]

  • rosebud or klapaucius - 1,000 Simoleons ("klapaucius" only works in the unpatched version. Said cheats can be used over again without opening a new cheat box by typing in !;!;!;x and holding Enter. E.g. klapaucius !;!;!;!;!;!x)

The Sims 2, The Sims 3 and The Sims 4[]

  • kaching - 1,000 Simoleons
  • motherlode - 50,000 Simoleons
  • The Sims 2:
  • familyfunds (family name) (+/-)(amount)
(e.g. familyfunds Goth +10000 gives the Goth family 10,000 Simoleons; familyfunds Goth -10000 takes 10,000 Simoleons from the Goth family; familyfunds Goth 10000 changes the amount of money the Goth family has to 10,000 Simoleons.
  • money (+/-)(amount)
(e.g. money +10000 gives the current family 10,000 Simoleons; money -10000 takes 10,000 Simoleons from the current family; money 10000 changes the amount of money the current family has to 10,000 Simoleons)
The allmenus cheat must be enabled for this cheat to work.
  • familyfunds (family name) (amount)
  • freerealestate on/off
(e.g. familyfunds Bachelor 2000 sets the Bachelor family funds to 2,000 Simoleons). For familyfunds to work in The Sims 3, testingcheatsenabled needs to be activated. Unlike The Sims 2, this cheat can only be used when a family is moved into a lot.
  • money (amount)
(e.g. money 50000 sets the current household's funds to 50,000 Simoleons). For this cheat to work, testingcheatsenabled needs to be activated.
  • rosebud - 1,000 Simoleons
  • money (amount)
(e.g. money 50000 sets the current household's funds to 50,000 Simoleons). Only affects the household that is currently being played. For this cheat to work, testingcheats needs to be on.

Lot prices[]

The Sims 3[]

In The Sims 3, the maximum furnished value a lot can have is §2,147,483,647, more than 21 times more than a household would be allowed to have. Going over that value, will cause the lot to instead cost §0, making the lot free of charge for any household to move into if it's a residential lot.

The maximum value is determined by signed 32-bit integers, a somewhat outdated (First used in production hardware in 1970~1972) but common measurement system that was still used by many software programs well into the 2010's.

Reaching such a lot value is highly unrealistic in regular play (where lots intended for living or business rarely cost more than 10 million), very difficult to achieve unmodded, and extremely difficult to achieve unmodded without the Leon's Fountain of Youth (Hidden Springs) or the Lady Ravendancer spell book.[Store] One possible trick to speed up the process, is to edit an object's OBJD file's price in the game's or expansion pack's FullBuild0.package file to somewhere in the tens or hundreds of millions.

How to type the § sign[]

Some keyboard layouts have § as a directly accessible key combo, or in a select few cases as a standalone key. These include:

  • Standalone § key: Swedish, Belgian, Czech, macOS British, macOS International English
  • AltGr + ⇧ Shift + S : US-International, Canadian CSA, Canadian Multilingual Standard
  • ⇧ Shift + M : Serbo-Croatian-Slovene
  • ⇧ Shift + ù : Italian
  • ⇧ Shift + 0 : Hungarian
  • ⇧ Shift + 1 : Polish (QWERTZ)
  • ⇧ Shift + 3 : German (Standard, T2, and T3)
  • ⇧ Shift + ! : French, Tamazight International
  • ⇧ Shift + | (Vertical line) : Norwegian
  • ⇧ Shift + @ : Classic Dutch
  • ⇧ Shift + ½ : Danish
  • AltGr + O : Francophone Canadian
  • AltGr + P : Romanian
  • AltGr + à : French 2019 standard
  • AltGr + Õ : Estonian
  • AltGr + 4 : Portugal
  • AltGr + 5 : Greek
  • AltGr + = : Brazilian

For people who use other layouts, it can often be typed by turning on NumLock, and then holding down ⎇ Alt key while typing 21 on the numeric keypad.

If NumLock is off and cannot readily be turned on, holding down ⇧ Shift + ⎇ Alt while typing 21 on the numeric keypad may work.

Trivia[]

  • The name originates from the word simolean/samolean, first used as far back as 1895.
  • The name for the § is the 'section sign' and is most often used to refer to sections of text, particularly in in legal documents.[4]
  • Some computer users use $ (dollar sign) instead of § (Section sign) to represent Simoleons, likely because they either do not know how to or are otherwise unable to type that character. Simoleons in SimCity and SimCity 2000 for Super NES also appear as $.
  • In the PlayStation 2 version of The Sims, the funds display will only show 5 digits, so if the family had over 100,000 Simoleons, it would be displayed as §99,999. However, the full amount would still be available. This was fixed in the GameCube and Xbox versions of The Sims and in the PS2 versions of The Sims Bustin' Out and The Urbz: Sims in the City.
  • In The Urbz: Sims in the City and The Sims Medieval, Sims made by players do not share money. However, in The Sims Medieval, if two Hero Sims get married, they will share their funds.
  • If The Urbz: Sims in the City is inserted in a Nintendo DS, DSi or 3DS, the icon of the game will show a Simoleon sign (§). The console must be in Manual Mode to see the icon; if not, the game will directly start instead.[5]
  • In The Sims 4, the Simlish word for Simoleon is "Simola". This can be heard sometimes by choosing the materialistic trait.

Gallery[]

Related game guides[]

References[]

  1. 1.0 1.1 PS2 versions will only display 5 digits, so amounts of §100,000 and higher will be displayed as §99,999. This was fixed in the PS2 version of The Sims Bustin' Out.
  2. The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of The Sims 3 only allow up to 6 Sims.
  3. In The Sims 3, Sims cannot play an instrument for tips unless they have at least level 5 skill with that instrument.
  4. Section sign at Wikipedia.
  5. How to Change "Start-Up Mode" (Switching between "Automatic" or "Manual" Play)
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