We recognize that not everyone completes the Hylian Homeowner quest in BOTW. We understand that it’s not necessary. We realize that this quest may, in fact, be a vanity, and that we of A Certain Age are more inclined to assume home mortgages than younger (and perhaps more astute) players.
Nonetheless.
Here’s what we loved about acquiring a home for Link:
- We had a place to sleep, free of charge, and replenish our hearts. It’s true the same can be said of lodgings in the Great Deku Tree Navel, but the inn isn’t as easy to find as Link’s house. (Demelza left a bewildering array of stamps on our map of the Korok Forest in an attempt to breadcrumb her way to the inn. And still she rarely finds it before giving up and eating apples instead.)
- We could expand our inventory beyond that which the miserly Hestu – or his game designers – allowed, by using the walls on Link’s home to display up to three each of weapons, shields, and bows. Thus, we could store a ceremonial piece or one we didn’t want to risk destroying, at the same time freeing up space in our mobile inventory for a more disposable weapon or shield. (Bolson will gift you with the first weapon display piece; after that, you must pay.)
- There’s a great apple tree in the back yard, which can be bludgeoned periodically to retrieve its fruits, using a sledgehammer which conveniently appears along the side of the house; there are also a couple of excellent rocks near the property under which amber and flint are often hiding. (Ask Itzal, should you meet him, to regale you with his tales of Amber, her boyfriend Flint, and that third wheel Opal; he’s dying to tell someone.)
- We got to move on to even bigger real estate, that of building a new town From the Ground Up. (Itzal, who hates his real life mortgage, shouts that Tarrey Town is the real prize made possible by completing the homeowner quest.)
And, finally:
- There is just something about having a house with our name on the deed. We’re of a generation, of an age. What can we say?
Location, location, location
Link’s (prospective) house is located just above Hateno Village. Fast-travel to the Myahm Agana shrine and head up the hill and over a bridge.
There you will find three workers taking their sledgehammers to an existing residential structure. It appears that the previous owner left for the castle, where things must have ended badly, resulting in the dwelling’s abandonment. (Internet rumors abound that the previous homeowner was none other than…Link, a hundred years ago.) The good people of Hateno decided to nip urban blight in the bud and hired Bolson Construction to demolish the poor fellow’s home.
Talk to Bolson, the one with an earring and a pink headband, to trigger the Hylian Homeowner quest. Bolson starts out asking for a whopping 50,000 rupees. Fortunately, he quickly, if snarkily, bargains down to 3000 rupees and 30 bundles of wood for the unfinished home. Now, the wood is no issue – bomb a couple dozen trees, and you’ve got that prerequisite – but the rupees? That’s another question, if you’re playing without Amiibos and have your hard-earned rupees already stretched thin by fairy wakeup calls and fancy armor. Three thousand rupees buys a lot of room nights and recovered hearts at an inn, too, with no HOA to worry about.
But let’s assume you’ve got the cash, and you really fancy a place to call your own. You hand over the wood and the rupees to Bolson, and the deed’s yours!
It’s a Fixer-Upper
Of course, that’s just the start. Now your financial obligations really expand. (As Demelza discovered the first time she bought a house, and the HVAC unit died a year and a day after the warranty period.)
For another 1,400 rupees, you can commission places to hang, on the home’s walls, a few shields, weapons, and bows that you don’t have room to carry in your inventory. You can always return to retrieve or to admire them, as the case may be. You will have a door. (Arguably, though, shouldn’t the house ought to have, you know, come with a door?)
You will also have furniture, including pretty flowers inside; exterior landscaping including trees; and a sign out front denoting that it’s Link’s residence. Because, really, it’s about the sign.
You don’t have to do everything at once, certainly. We did, because Demelza was a nag about the house, most particularly wanting the wall space, and she’d been budgeting rupees for weeks.
After you purchase the house, one of the construction crew, Hudson, will depart for the Akkala region. That’s the subject of another quest, From the Ground Up. Unfortunately, however, unless you finish the Tarrey Town quest, the remaining members of Bolson Construction continue to loiter around Link’s campfire. We found them annoying, always hanging around the fire when we arrived to cook dinner. Inevitably they wanted to engage in conversation!
And now, for the good stuff:
As a housewarming gift, we recommend a Key Lime Martini.
True, Link doesn’t get a key to his house. Like Hyrulean abodes everywhere, the door (but at least he has one now) is always unlocked. Still, it’s as good an excuse as any to enjoy one of our favorite libations.
