In this series, I talk about various aspects of The Lord of the Rings Online. This series is meant for newcomers, but may also help veteran players find more to love about the game.
Have you ever wished you could live in Tolkien's Middle-earth? In a comfortable hobbit hole in the Shire? Or an elegantly beautiful home among the elves? There's good news for you! You can make yourself at home (literally) in several different locations in Lord of the Rings Online, and I'm going to do my best to discuss all of the basics about becoming a home owner in the game.
Preface
I managed to cobble together a selection of screenshots taken in between server downtime this past week and repurpose some older screenshots. I apologize for lacking images for some things!--snarkqueen
The Basics of Housing
Once you reach level 15 on your first character, you will be able to purchase a house of your very own. Depending on the size and location, your purchase cost will be anywhere between 1 gold and 8 gold. This means that to get anything other than the smallest personal house, you will have to get rid of the gold cap by purchasing the removal (account-wide) for just under 400 Points in the LOTRO store, or by subscribing to VIP for at least once.
Homesteads
There are four locations of Classic Housing: Bree-land, Shire, Falathlorn, and Thorin's Hall. Each is located in close proximity to the four original starting areas, and there are NPCs in nearby towns with quests that will take you to the homestead as an introduction to them.
Premium Housing
To purchase Premium Housing, you have to spend Mithril Coins or Housing Writs (obtainable from the Store or from losing previous Premium housing to foreclosure or world transfer). At the moment, the housing in Gondor is the only Premium housing available, but they are soon going to offer two different options in Rohan (I recommend seeing D&Co du Milieu's write-up on them). For more information about Gondor's Premium Housing, see the LOTRO wiki.
Neighborhoods & Services
To make housing more convenient, there are central areas in each of the homestead neighborhoods which contain a variety of NPCs and services: Vault-keeper, Healer, Housing Furnisher, Provisioner, Supplier, Forge & Relic Masters, Far-Reaching Stablemaster, VIP Rewards, Town Crier, Party Planner, Escrow Broker, Skirmish Trainer, Skirmish Bard, and random NPCs that are in place as neighbors.
Each homestead has a list of instanced neighborhoods, but each has the same layout in a homestead. So if the house location and size you want is unavailable in one neighborhood, you can check dozens of others for it.
House Sizes
Classic Housing has three sizes of housing: Standard, Deluxe, and Kinship. The sizes determine the number and type of item hooks inside and outside of a house. I'm not sure how accurate this chart is from the LOTRO wiki, but it should give you a good idea. They have increased the numbers over time, and probably will do so again. To obtain a Kinship house, you have to be the Kinship leader of a Kinship that has reached level 7.Decor
So what are hooks? They are locations inside and outside of a house where you can place a decoration item. The hooks come in sizes, and you can further adjust the placement and rotation of the item once it's on a hook. 
There are a lot of ways to acquire decoration items: festivals, reputation, crafting, vendors, and taxidermy. The last is a great way to show off your conquests to visitors! Your barter wallet has a Taxidermy section -- check to see if there's anything you can bring to a taxidermist and receive a trophy decoration item in exchange.
You can also customize the interior walls and floors with patterns and colors, and set your own ambient music. Play around and find the combination that you like best!
Management & Upkeep
To toggle Decoration Mode, click the flower bouquet next to it. You will see silhouetted boxes where you have decoration hooks inside and outside of your house. Clicking one will open another window where you can drag the item to and then adjust its display.
To access Housing Management, click the house icon on the edge of your radar. Clicking this will bring up a window with three tabs: Info about your house and its costs; Maintenance information about what you owe and when; and Permissions which shows who can do what on your house (you can add people individually to give people access to your storage or let them decorate for you!).
Features
Every house has storage, a mailbox, provides a personal teleport to the owner (and all of their other characters on the server), and a vendor discount to the NPCs in the neighborhood center. The discount doubles if your kinship has its Kinship house in the same neighborhood.
Other features are available for purchase: Crafting stations, Visiting Banker, Visiting Barber, various Property Guards, Gondorian Supplier.
Acknowledgements & Then Some
For a lot of GREAT information on housing and decorating, visit D&Co du Milieu's site. They have a wonderful guide on how to purchase your first home, and a huge list of where you can acquire all of the housing items you could possibly want!
Thanks to some random home owners whose houses I dropped in on unannounced to get screenshots while I could during the up-and-down of many of the servers. I apologize for not asking, but thank you for making great use of your interior hooks! Thanks to: Luinori (Landroval), Meadowlarke (Landroval), Resolina (Landroval), Luusziel (Anor).
Was this entry helpful? Let me know! The series continues next Monday!
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