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. It is revealed in The Sims 2 that Simoleons are 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. This is the result of lower time that a Sim has to earn money in the series compared to a real life person; usually items of daily duration are more expensive, while durable objects or house structures are cheaper.

In SimCity, a stretch of road is §10 per segment and a Police Department §500. One might think of a SimCity § as equivalent to 1000 The Sims Simoleons.

In another Maxis game, Spore, the Sporebuck symbol in space stage (§) is the same symbol as a Simoleon (§).

Income
There are several ways for Sims to receive a steady income. The usual way is to work in a career or profession that gives the Sim a regular salary or stipend.

Investments
Investments are another way Sims to earn money over the course of The Sims 3. A Sim can buy a partnership into one of the rabbit holes in a neighborhood and collect weekly earnings.

Other strategies

 * Arts and crafts: There are a number of crafts Sims can partake in, such as painting or inventing, where an object can be created and then sold.
 * Collecting: Sims can collect a number of objects that can then be sold.
 * Rummaging through garbage: Sims can rummage through garbage and occasionally find something worthy.
 * Kleptomania: Kleptomaniacs can steal objects that they can then use, sell or give back to the original owner.
 * It grows on trees: The money tree grows simoleons. With some care Sims can "rake" in the cash.
 * Counterfeiting: Genuine Buck's Famous Counterfeiting Machine is an aspiration reward that allows a sim to print bills.
 * Merge and purge: The player can move their Sim(s) into another household and then move the existing members out enabling the player's Sim(s) to steal their house and money without the need of cheats.

The Sims

 * rosebud or klapaucius - 1,000 Simoleons ("klapaucius" only works in unpatched version and can be used over again with out opening a new cheat box e.g. klapaucius !;!;!)

The Sims 2 & The Sims 3

 * 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)


 * The Sims 3:
 * familyfunds (family name) (amount)
 * (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.

Trivia

 * The symbol can often be typed by holding in the Alt key and typing 533 on the numeric keypad. This requires that NumLock be turned on, and the symbol that appears may depend on which font is in use. If NumLock is off, typing 533 on the numeric keypad while holding in both Shift and Alt may work. On keyboards with an AltGr key, it can be typed by using AltGr + Shift + S, and on some European keyboards a simple Shift + ½ will do. The symbol can also be typed on the Macintosh operating system by pressing Option(Alt.) + 6 without using the number pad.
 * The name for the § is the 'section sign' and is most often used to split sections of text. It is often encountered in legal documents.