Arriving at the main entrance of City Dawn residential complex, Manager Yang from the sales office was already waiting outside.

“Mr. Pei, welcome, welcome!”

“I never imagined our modest complex would catch your eye. I’m truly honored.”

Faced with Manager Yang’s enthusiasm, Pei Qian didn’t have the heart to reveal the truth.

He had come solely because of the bizarre layout of this apartment.

Pei Qian had discovered this property by chance. After seeing the floor plan, he was immediately interested and had Assistant Xin contact them to arrange today’s viewing.

Given Tenda’s current reputation in Jingzhou, the sales office naturally took this very seriously and arranged for Manager Yang to receive him.

“Mr. Pei, shall we have some tea first, or would you prefer to see the property directly?” Manager Yang asked.

As soon as Pei Qian got out of the car, his gaze hadn’t left that peculiar cylindrical building: “Let’s see the property first.”

Manager Yang nodded: “Very well, please follow me.”

Pei Qian followed Manager Yang into the complex while his eyes swept over the surrounding residential buildings.

The City Dawn complex had many residential buildings, and the vast majority were square and normal layouts, no different from other ordinary residential complexes.

Only this one building, this proud cylindrical residential tower, stood out as so innovative.

It was located in the center of the entire complex, with the words “City Dawn” in large characters on the roof, indicating its prestigious position within the complex.

Someone uninformed might be impressed on their first visit.

But Pei Qian had done thorough research.

This building had one apartment per floor, each apartment measuring 248 square meters, with 5 bedrooms, 3 living rooms, and 4 bathrooms. There were 12 floors in total, with a ceiling height of 3.6 meters, taller than ordinary residential buildings.

Looking at the floor plan, it resembled the circular mosaic pattern that appears on TV stations when there’s no broadcast.

Previously, Pei Qian had looked at online forums and seen many bizarre floor plans, such as track layouts, sewer layouts, toilet layouts, warship layouts, and so on.

They were eye-opening and astounding.

Pei Qian had been itching to buy one, but unfortunately, the forum posts didn’t indicate the names of the complexes where these layouts were located, making them impossible to find.

Besides, most were probably not in Jingzhou.

As a second-tier city, Jingzhou’s housing prices weren’t particularly high compared to the rest of the country, and developers weren’t particularly short on land, so the probability of creating such bizarre layouts was low.

Generally, it was only in those ultra-first-tier cities where land was extremely valuable and building space utilization was maximized that various bizarre layouts might appear.

However, where there’s a will, there’s a way. After repeated searching, he finally found this 360-degree sunlight “Sun Never Sets” layout near the company.

This type of layout wasn’t unique. Many other cities, such as the Imperial Capital and Magic City, also had them, with areas ranging from just over 200 square meters to more than 400 square meters—the circle getting larger and larger.

As for why…

Who knows?

Perhaps the developers’ bosses thought the wealthy would like this type of layout…

The characteristic of this layout was that it looked beautiful but wasn’t practical at all.

From a scenic perspective, it was indeed nice, but imagine if all the living room, bedrooms, study, etc., were irregularly shaped—how frustrating would that be?

This type of layout meant that space utilization would be poor. Though labeled as over 240 square meters, in practical use it might not differ much from a normal 200-square-meter layout.

Moreover, even the best scenery becomes boring after three days. Most people buy houses for comfortable living and practicality.

This apartment was originally priced at around 15,000 yuan per square meter, but because it wasn’t selling well, the price had been reduced to 12,000 yuan. Even so, a single apartment still cost about 3 million yuan.

For an ordinary wealthy person, wouldn’t it be better to spend 3 million on a proper large flat?

To summarize the current situation of this property: the wealthy weren’t interested, and the intellectuals couldn’t afford it.

All the other buildings in the complex had sold out, except this building, which was still listed as available online.

The developer didn’t want to reduce the price too much, but buyers weren’t interested unless the price was significantly lower.

So they were at an impasse.

But it perfectly matched Pei Qian’s needs.

Having unique requirements and not having to compete with others—that was also a kind of happiness!

Manager Yang led Pei Qian to a sample apartment on a high floor and began eloquently extolling the incredible view and the grandeur of the layout.

Of course, Pei Qian didn’t listen to a word because he knew that 90% of it was just sales talk.

But he didn’t need to argue with Manager Yang about these points; after all, it wasn’t him who would be negotiating the price, but Assistant Xin.

Pei Qian walked around briefly and felt it was quite nice.

After all, this was a 240-plus square meter apartment with windows on all 360 degrees, and it was fully decorated. No matter what, it was better than the ordinary rental where he currently lived.

The apartment wasn’t selling well, not because of poor quality or any major flaws, but mainly because the layout resulted in poor value for money.

At the same price point, there were too many better options.

The more energetically Manager Yang introduced the property, the more Pei Qian became convinced that this apartment was indeed difficult to sell.

That being the case, he absolutely had to buy it!

Manager Yang’s pitch and Pei Qian’s requirements took a turn and miraculously aligned.

Half an hour later, Manager Yang’s mouth was dry from talking. He paused to drink some water while observing Mr. Pei’s expression.

He couldn’t discern anything.

On one hand, Mr. Pei seemed to have completely seen through his sales tactics and was well aware of the apartment’s situation; on the other hand, Mr. Pei also seemed quite interested in the apartment…

These two contradictory expressions appeared simultaneously on Mr. Pei’s face, so Manager Yang didn’t know what he was thinking.

After contemplating for a moment, Pei Qian asked: “So far, out of these twelve floors, how many units are occupied?”

Manager Yang’s heart instantly skipped a beat.

Oh no!

Mr. Pei had asked such a pointed question right away!

In reality, only three units had been sold so far, accounting for a quarter of the entire building.

Moreover, these owners already regretted their purchase and wanted to resell their apartments.

What was the purpose behind Mr. Pei’s question?

Could it be that he had already seen through the current state of these apartments and deliberately asked this question to hint that the apartments weren’t popular, in order to negotiate a lower price?

Manager Yang wrestled with himself briefly, but he didn’t dare lie because such matters couldn’t be hidden.

“Rest assured, Mr. Pei, we still have a relatively abundant supply of units. As for which floor you’d prefer, you can certainly choose further…”

Manager Yang decided to be evasive.

Pei Qian frowned: “I asked specifically how many units have been sold.”

Manager Yang realized he couldn’t get away with being vague and had to tell the truth: “Three units.”

“Mr. Pei, our property is positioned as high-end, so it’s quite normal that ordinary people can’t afford it. These three homeowners are all successful individuals in Jingzhou, though they’re far behind you in comparison, but…”

Pei Qian raised his hand, interrupting Manager Yang.

“Please notify these three homeowners that I’m interested in buying their units as well. I hope they can move out as soon as possible, and I’m willing to cover their moving expenses.”

Manager Yang: “?”

He was stunned for a moment: “Uh, Mr. Pei, we have new units available for sale on other floors, you don’t need to…”

“Wait, Mr. Pei, do you mean…”

Manager Yang displayed an extremely shocked expression. He had correctly understood the meaning of Mr. Pei’s words but dared not confirm it.

Pei Qian nodded: “That’s right, I want the entire building!”

Manager Yang was dumbfounded, with tears glistening in his eyes.

At this moment, Mr. Pei’s figure seemed to emanate a glow, making him think of a savior.

…

…

Afternoon.

Pei Qian was leisurely drinking tea in his office when Assistant Xin returned.

It seemed that after an afternoon of negotiations and discussions, the three parties had reached a preliminary consensus.

“Mr. Pei, those three families were already very dissatisfied with the layout, so they all agreed. With this money, they can buy new homes, and they couldn’t be happier.”

“You mentioned that you hoped they could move out as soon as possible, so we arranged moving companies for these people and will reimburse their hotel accommodation expenses while they search for new homes.”

“As for the price, the average price is 12,000 yuan per square meter, 248 square meters per floor, 12 floors in total. Since we’re paying in full, we received a 10% discount on the purchase price, and they rounded it down, making the final price 32 million yuan.”

“If you think this is acceptable, we’ll proceed with this price.”

Pei Qian nodded, always having 100% trust in Assistant Xin’s negotiation skills.

Buying such a building for 32 million yuan—the layout might be subpar, but it wasn’t a bad deal.

Pei Qian hadn’t spent all the money earned from the movie; half remained.

The reason was simple: he needed to see if his approach was feasible and whether Sloth Apartments could successfully lose money.

Once confirmed, he could spend the remaining money as well.

Besides this, Pei Qian had another good method for burning money in his plan: the soft furnishings for the apartments!

This building was considered a fixed asset, and after the 10% calculation, there would still be 3.2 million yuan affecting the settlement.

In Pei Qian’s plan, the fixed assets in his hands for this cycle would total at most 90 million yuan. If it exceeded 100 million, creating losses wouldn’t be as convenient.

However, money spent on soft furnishings for the apartments could be spent freely!

For example, some expensive furniture, decorations, home appliances, etc., wouldn’t affect the settlement.

Of course, Pei Qian didn’t dare go too far, such as arranging the top-tier luxury furniture throughout, as that would make the place too famous. It might attract all of Jingzhou’s wealthy people, posing a significant risk.

Mingyun Private Kitchen was a cautionary example.

Therefore, Pei Qian’s goal was to spend as much as possible on soft furnishings without being ostentatious, while simultaneously raising prices to achieve a perfect balance.

This balance could be simply described as: too modest for the rich, too expensive for the poor.

Letting Sloth Apartments remain in this awkward in-between position would be ideal!