Never buy Mayfair! - How to win at Monopoly

To learn a new house rule to make the game more fun, scroll to the bottom of this post.

DISCLAIMER: The title of this post is clickbait; it should actually read

How to Not Lose at Monopoly

If you want to actually win at Monopoly, I highly recommend the book The Indisputable Existence of Santa Claus by Drs Hannah Fry and Thomas Oléron Evans, which has an entire chapter devoted to the subject and was used as a source for some of this post. It also makes a great stocking filler.

Having properly tested the techniques described in this post, I can confirm that they are no use in helping a player to win, especially in later stages of a game.

The techniques described below are best used in what the official Rules call Speedy Monopoly. This is where instead of waiting until all but one of the players has gone bankrupt, the game just stops after a certain amount of time and a winner is decided by totalling each player's money and properties after selling their assets (properties and improvements).

So after that lengthy disclaimer, it's about time I started on some tips.

Also, although the tips below can work with a game of two players, they are most effective with games with 3 or more players.

Firstly, DON'T buy properties. This may seem illogical in a game which describes itself as The Property Trading Game, but let me explain:

1. Buying properties costs money. You need money to 'stay afloat'.

2. Across a single game, most properties never make their money back in rent. This is especially true if you follow my second tip.

Second, do buy properties. But only if another player has a property of the same colour. If they manage to get an entire set, the rent for those properties can soon increase exponentially, meaning landing on those properties can be a bit of a drain on your finances.

Third, don't buy properties if another player has a property of the same colour. As long as a third player also has a property of that colour. For example, if one player (player 1) owns the first Green property; another player (player 2) owns the second Green property and you (player 3) land on the third Green property, you have no need to buy it.

Fourth, buy properties if they are stations. Stations increase in value the more you have, but also have a large payout immediately (25%!) 

Fifth, never buy the utilities. If you only have one, you have to multiply dice rolls by 4 every time, and who can be bothered with that? If you have both, the maths is easier (x10), but you still won't make anything like your money back.

The paragraph below is practically invisible, sorry, but I had to put it in yellow to match the theme. If you can't read it, you can highlight it to make it more visible (on mobile press and hold, then drag the brackets to select the whole paragraph.

Sixth, DO buy the commonly landed on properties. Not the ones known to be the most landed on according to science (Go; 2nd Station; 3rd Orange; 3rd Red; Jail), the ones most landed on in YOUR game. You should be able to identify these after each player has made around 3 goes around the board.

If you follow the above tips to the letter, you should never end up with a full set of properties except the stations. If you stray from my tips (and let's face it, you will) and somehow end up with a full set, DO NOT buy improvements (houses and hotels). Again, the reason for this is twofold.

1. Improvements cost money. See above.

2. There are Chance/Community Chest cards which force you to pay additional money on all improvements. See above.

Now we come to the tip I teased in the title of this post. NEVER buy Mayfair. Or Park Lane (if, as is statistically far more likely, you are using one of the many special editions (full list), these are the Dark Blue/Purple properties). These cost the most, but as there's only two of them, they're also the least likely to be landed on.

Finally, a few bonus pieces of advice. 

1. Technically, according to the official rules, if a player doesn't want to buy a property for its face value, it should then go up for auction. DO NOT allow this, or your brother will buy every property on the board for £1 each.
2. If you play Speedy Monopoly (every player starts with three random properties), and you end up with two properties of the same colour, do try to get the third property (even I don't listen to myself).
3. At some point, another player might offer you some money/properties in exchange for one or more of your properties. This is a trap; do not fall for it. Look at their properties and see if the transaction will end up with them having a full set of properties. They probably haven't read this post, so will probably do something stupid like buying improvements, which means you are about to go bankrupt very fast. And don't bother with counter offers either. Anything less than all their remaining money and properties in exchange is NOT WORTH IT.

And, as promised, a fun house rule:

Play while listening to a playlist on shuffle (preferably on Spotify (other music streaming services are available) to ensure that no one has an advantage). Every time a new song starts, everyone has the chance to yell out the name of the song. The first person to correctly name the song and the singer (or the musical, if you're listening to a Musicals playlist) wins a predetermined amount of money (we said £50).

Have Fun!