Seriously, though, I’m blessed to be spending Christmas with my Dad and younger sister (who flew in from Japan to us in Florida). Also @dee_cooke , this is my sixth sober Christmas (as an adult) and it is wonderful to actually remember things and to be happy remembering them isn’t it?
– Mike
100%! Makes everything so much better.
Monopoly house rules at my house:
1b) Breaking a £500 is allowed for anything costing more than £200, or if the player has fewer than three £100 notes. (Even board games can have immersion… Attempting to break this rule or other house rules runs the risk of the Parking Tax penalty (see below).
Free parking/Parking Tax: Literally a free space. Unless the players unanimously agree that one of them has been a jammy dodger due to missing all the taxes, or was caught trying to breach a house rule. In either of those cases, which case it becomes a Parking Tax square for the “offending” player only. Parking Tax is negotiated at the time of infliction, but must be the same throughout a game session (my household typically plays 2 or 3 games of Monopoly in a single session, unless the first one goes long). Continuing the bad behaviour after getting the Parking Tax is an immediate forfeit.
Cash Grab: The editions my household plays both have one. Instead of throwing all the £100s in the air and catching them, the banker calmly issues all remaining players with a £500 note. (Rule 1 remains in effect, since everyone at that point would have an intact £500). If the bank cannot do this, it’s taken as a sign that nobody was paying enough attention, the game is drawn and everyone must do something else.
Bank solvency: If the bank runs out of £100s, everyone with at least £600 in £100 notes must exchange as many sets of 5 x £100s as possible for £500s. Again, Rule 1 remains in effect for anyone who is able to do this.
Negotiation: No negotiating on properties unless someone is trying to pay a rental fee and that person initiates the negotiation (said fee does not, however, have to exhaust the player’s ability to pay cash, let alone threaten bankruptcy). Only one offer allowed per turn unless the player can’t pay the rent with the cash they have in hand at the end of that negotiation (in which case, a player can negotiate for the length of time it takes a kettle to boil). The person paying rent can’t do a negotiation that involves them giving cash to someone who isn’t the landlord. Failure to present an offer acceptable to the landlord in these limitations results in bankruptcy. This helps a bit with game flow.
House selling: if selling houses, all the houses on the set must be cleared simultaneously. This encourages some caution when buying houses.
Repeat offender fees: if jail is visited too often - 2 x the number of players who started the game - the price doubles to £100. In theory, it doubles again if another (2 x starting players) visits occurs, but that’s never happened in any game I’ve played. On the other hand, it also doubles if every remaining player is in prison at the same time, and that has happened. All fee increases as soon as the person whose visit to jail triggered the increase decides whether to pay the old fee to get out immediately (if they decline, and don’t get doubles on any of their dice rolls, they pay the increased fee to leave).
5b) (Consideration has also been made of a courtroom/lawyer fee: paying all of the smallest denomination note one has immediately upon going to jail. This has not been tested).
Early result:
6a) If two or more people manage to get a set of one of the 8 coloured blocks of property, play continues as usual.
6b) If only one person manages to get a set of one of the 8 coloured blocks of property, that person wins immediately.
6c) If nobody manages to get a set of one of the 8 coloured blocks of property, it’s an immediate draw.
Later victory:
If an early result does not occur, the first player out becomes the banker. A dedicated banker helps speed things up a little.
If anyone ever has enough £500s to pay for all remaining players’ starting money (so 6 notes if 2 players remain, 9 if 3 players remain…) that player won, even if others might eventually have wrested the win through sheer endurance. A player may not sell their last coloured set to achieve this.
If the game only has two players remaining (or only had two in the first place), it’s considered good ethics to concede defeat if winning is implausible and people start looking bored. (This rule does not apply if there are 3+ players left, even if the game started with 6 players - the dynamics are usually too complicated).
If the next meal is about to be served or a pre-determined time limit is hit, play ends and tie-breakers are processed in this order:
Now that I woke up from my food coma of the lunch one… it was great! 
I played monopoly with my son and ex wife today! It was pretty fun!
I’m from Utah and belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but that’s all pretty standard American. Growing up we had a big tree and we opened one gift on Christmas Eve, the rest on Christmas, and had lots of family parties Christmas Day (and often Christmas Eve as well). We would write letters to Santa weeks earlier and burn them in the fireplace.
Now I’m a single dad of an only child it’s a lot smaller, he sleeps at his moms and I go over there to watch him open gifts then take him back to my place. For several years I’d eat so much chili ate I’d get acid reflux and take pure baking soda to calm it down, but end up clutching the toilet vomiting. It took me three years to figure out that baking soda is an emetic. No throw up this year! And my church donated a new washer and dryer to me since I’ve been washing clothes in my tub for four years.
Ah, you have several house rules that end the game early - like getting a color Monopoly first and nobody else has a route to one so it’s possible to play a short game of Monopoly! Sounds balanced by the “no auction/must buy if you have a $500 note”.
someone can give a breakdown of UK monopoly notes ? I can’t figure well the rationale of the £500/£100 rule…
(the last time I played monopoly was before 2002, and Italian set was denominated in lire, 500, 1000, 5000, 10.000 and 50.000, mirroring the late 60s actual Italian bills’s denomination) and I never witnessed an shortage of notes in playing monopoly (albeit I reckon that the blank reverse made a convenient quick note sheet, but it’s the main role of every boardgame bill set… now you know the former owner of italian monopoly notes with C64-related pokes jotted on the reverse 
)
now, pokes aside… an interesting idea: fake bills. That is, jot “serials” on the back of the note, taking care that there’s many 2’s and 3’s as and few 6s, 7s and 8s, for a reason, and when someone lands on jail, the unfortunate player must show the reverse, then throw two dice, and if has bills with the last digit equal to the dice thrown (11 and 12 has no effect, of course) the bills s/he has are declared “fake” and withdrawn for the remaining of the game, and the unfortunate player remain in the jail for a number of turn proportional to the number of fake bills he happens to have in hand (the player is assumed to be the forger)
Throwing more uncertainess in a well-known boardgame is always a good idea (I merged chess with Risiko (pawn, one die, queen, six die, king zero (for sake of chessmating…) three for knight, & bishop, and four for rook…)
Best regards from Italy,
dott. Piergiorgio
In the US at least, there’s $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100, $500.
I’m very surprised because in the 1980s in Germany it was $500, $1000, $5000, $10000 (not sure if there were $2000 notes, and yes, it were in Dollars.)
Was it because Germans were so rich? 
Probably currency conversion. Every set has a “largest bill” which for US is $500. Italian Lira are ridiculously small amounts in comparison to a USD:
US Dollar to Italian Lira
| $ US Dollar | Italian Lira |
|---|---|
| 1 | 467,289.72 |
The other head-canon thing I’ve also read to make prices in Monopoly make more sense - you can imply “thousand” after every denomination so the $1 represents $1000 dollars; the $500 represents $500,000 - a half-million dollars. So when you’re scoffing at your $2 rent on Baltic, it’s actually the absolute lower level of luxury apartment at $2000 - either a lower-middle-class moderate dwelling in an expensive area, or a closet-sized room in luxury digs.
Man, now I want a Monopoly with all these different currencies mixed together with a constantly changing currency exchange rate, so you’re trying to play the exchange rates while also playing the game.
Rules for International Monopoly.
Tip : Because there’s so much more money and property involved, International Monopoly games will last longer than a traditional game
Okay, first of all, that is cool. Secondly, be real with me, did you seriously already know about that or did you just google it in response to me posting that? Honestly curious.
I think this is what the devil would sit me and my dyscalculia down with in a gambit for my soul, actually. This sounds so chaotic and fun to witness from the sidelines, but a terror to actually play.
I googled because I’ve heard of it, but I know I’ve also heard of a published Monopoly variant that has an inner board that represents “international travel”…
Well, someone at that game has to LARP as Mr. Worldwide then, it’s just too perfect to not.
Fair enough. Color me impressed. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
Why you send me to Jail and make me pay $50,000 for bail??
Here you be thinking I forgot about that squeaky hammer! 
