Community lot

A Community Lot is a public lot which serves as the basis for commercial or recreational buildings/facilities in a neighborhood, such as shops, parks, etc. These lots often provide important services for a neighborhood, such as selling clothes, groceries, and magazines; and providing gathering places and entertainment. Townies and playable Sims alike often appear on community lots to browse the goods, socialize or just hang around, so community lots are great places for Sims to make friends. Some (commercial only) objects can only be placed on community lots, and likewise some objects can only be placed on residential lots. As a rule, Sims cannot build skills on community lots, but university students can build skills on campus community lots.

In the Open for Business expansion pack, playable Sims can buy community lots and establish businesses on them, as an alternative to running a home business. A lot's owner, and members of their household, can build skills on that lot, though the progress bar will not appear.

Differences between The Sims and The Sims 2 community lots

 * Except for Vacation Island lots and family members on Downtown lots, non-controllable Sims on Sims 1 community lots cannot be interacted with until they are either greeted, or autonomously interact with a controllable Sim. This does not appear to be the case on Sims 2 community lots.


 * All Sims 1 community lots have an NPC who serves as a janitor. This NPC does general cleanup and repair work on the lot. Sims 2 community lots do not appear to have such NPCs, at least not as a matter of course.


 * Grilling on Sims 1 community lots produces a plate of burgers, which will be ignored except by the griller and either the griller's date (if any) or members of the griller's family. Sims who grill on Sims 2 community lots will serve the burgers or hot dogs they produce, and other Sims (even total strangers) may come to eat them. It's even possible that the griller won't get to eat.

Time on community lots
In both Sims 1 and Sims 2, community lots exist in a sort of "time warp". No matter how long Sims spend in them, they will return home no more than a few hours after they left. It's not only possible, but common, for them to return when they left.