I understand your frustration but personally would not want this rule to ever be changed. It is important that it stay difficult to remove owners possessions.
If you don't feel it is worth the 500k for tycoon, you have the option to purchase a town claim (I have paid between 50 and 170k or so) and then transfer the town to yourself for 250k. I suggest you make a contract to protect yourself and as soon as you are added as owner, you will have the rights to remove all lwcs.
Wishing you success, just not on this suggestion :p

 

Sure dgam, here is the link that explains the town transfer if you have a valid contract (or if you could get one from the original owner)
http://ecocitycraft.com/wiki/index....ts+)#Town_Transfer_Application_-_.24250.2C000

Here is the link that explains the town claim which would have to be done if you have no valid contract (either thru your own tycoon claim which you have stated you did not want to pay 500k for or thru the purchase of a town claim from a tycoon plus):
http://ecocitycraft.com/wiki/index....n_Claim_Application_-_.24Special_Instructions

I hope this helps explain this better than I could ever do.

 

I am glad to help. The server owners have tried to have a great balance of being able to utilize abandoned towns and at the same time protect official owners from losing everything because of inactivity.

 

I agree with this suggestion. The origonal owner of my town is not coming back/ is unresponsive to forum pms. But because I can't remove his locks, there are going to be random floating chests/doors in my farm area. +1

 

The good news is that since he is not coming back and not responding on the forum you may file a town claim.

 

The bad news is I don't have 500K.

 

The good news is that you can buy a town claim for between 50 and 200k at times and then you can remove the locks and also have the rights to transfer the town (250k) later if you write a solid contract :p