What happens when you get evicted on Square Town (and what to do next)

Getting evicted on Square Town (square.pov.town) means someone paid double what you paid for your square — $1 minimum, so $1 if you claimed it free — and took it. The wall announces it in the live feed, your favicon is replaced by theirs, your deed page is stamped EVICTED, and you get an email. Nobody refunds anything (if you claimed free, there's nothing to refund). You have three options: evict them back for double their price, claim another square for free, or let it go. Most people should feel flattered first and decide second.

TL;DR — Eviction is the only way to lose a square on Square Town. Trigger: someone pays 2× your price ($1 minimum) for your exact cell. Effects: live-feed announcement (💀), their icon on your coordinate, your deed marked evicted, your /go/ link stops redirecting, an email if you opted in. Refund: none. Next: evict back at 2× their price (free → $1 → $2 → $4 → $8 …), claim a fresh cell for free, or walk away. Unpopular corners rarely get evicted; cells near the Throne do.

The exact sequence of an eviction#

Here is what the code does, in order, when someone evicts you. Every step is visible to everyone with the wall open.

1. They click your icon and press "💀 Evict this square for $X". X is double what you paid per square, with a $1 floor. If you claimed for free, they pay $1. If you had already evicted someone at $4, they pay $8. Square Town computes it from your stored per-square price, not from a bid, so there is no haggling.
2. Their checkout locks your square. While their Stripe checkout is open, nobody else can start a second eviction on the same cell — Square Town rejects rivals with "Someone is already evicting this square. Vultures everywhere." Unpaid checkouts hold their claim for 30 minutes and then lapse.
3. Their Stripe payment completes. Your listing's status flips from paid to evicted, and the new listing takes your exact footprint — same x, same y.
4. The live feed announces it. Every open browser gets a WebSocket event and a line like "💀 newsite.com evicted yoursite.com for $1". The 3D wall plays a short three-note descending sound and a confetti burst on the cell, because Square Town is petty like that. Clients that lost the socket pick it up on the 30-second poll.
5. Your square shows their icon. The favicon at that coordinate is now theirs. Your click tower — the 3D box whose height is your clicks plus kisses — is gone from that cell.
6. Your deed page changes. Open your secret deed URL and the status reads "☠️ evicted" with an EVICTED stamp across the certificate. The line under your domain now says you "were the rightful owner of a square in town — until someone paid double. Thoughts and prayers."
7. Your outbound link stops. /go/:id only redirects for paid listings; an evicted one answers "Gone (probably evicted 💀)". Any clicks, views and kisses you accumulated stay on the deed as history, but they no longer grow.
8. You get an email. You gave an email address when you claimed; Square Town writes to it now. No account was involved — the address exists for this and for sending your deed link. If you'd rather watch than wait, keep the wall open or use the public API (GET /api/state includes recent events).

What you do not get back#

Nothing. If you claimed the square for free, there was nothing to get back. If you were an evictor yourself, your $1 (or $2, or $8) bought the square for as long as you held it. Square Town does not pay out evicted owners, does not refund, and does not split the evictor's payment with you. That is a deliberate design choice, and it is different from some other 2026 takeover walls: TymeSqr, for instance, doubles the price on each takeover but pays the evicted owner 1.5× plus a slice of future sales, and frontpage.sh refunds the previous owner on its perpetual auction. Square Town's version is simpler and meaner: the price ladder is the whole mechanic, and eviction money is the only money in town (plus the Throne and the $5 analytics unlock), and it goes to keeping a wall on Cloudflare's free tier alive. See pricing if you want the full one-line price list.

The one thing you keep is the deed URL itself. It still loads, still shows your stats, and is still the only record that you were there.

Your three options after an eviction#

1. Evict them back — for double#

Click their icon (it's sitting on your old coordinate) and press evict. You'll pay double what they paid, by card through Stripe. The ladder for a normal square goes free → $1 → $2 → $4 → $8 → $16 → $32; if they took your free square for $1, taking it back is $2. Before you do it, know the rules of the game you're entering:

• They can come straight back at double your new price. The evict modal warns you: "Their price doubles the moment someone else evicts them first. Tick tock." That cuts both ways.
• Every step is public. A back-and-forth between two domains lights up the live feed, which is entertaining for everyone else and free advertising for both of you. Some people evict on purpose for exactly this reason.
• The square's price never comes down. Whoever ends the war holds a cell that costs the next challenger double the final price. At $32 or $64, most people stop. That's the point of doubling rather than a +1¢ auction — see the economics of eviction.

Do it if the coordinate meant something (next to the Throne, next to your other projects, a spot you'd told people about) and the doubled price is still an impulse for you.

2. Claim another square for free#

The wall has up to 1,048,576 cells and every empty one is free. Click an empty cell, paste your URL and your email, and you're back in town in a minute with a fresh deed. Your new square starts at $0, so the next eviction costs whoever wants it the $1 minimum — cheap to lose, and you lost nothing. If your old spot was contested, this is usually the right move: you paid nothing for a place that someone apparently valued at $1 or more. Take the compliment and go somewhere calmer.

Two things to know:

• Your clicks, views and kisses don't transfer. A new square starts at zero. If your evicted square had a tall tower, that height is gone with it.
• If the live area is 75 % full, claiming is what unlocks the next ring — every claim nudges the wall towards growing 4 cells in each direction.

3. Let it go#

Also fine. You spent nothing and got a place in town for a while, a stamped deed to remember it by, and a line in the feed announcing that someone wanted your spot enough to pay for it. That is more than most free things deliver.

Why being evicted is a compliment#

Nobody evicts a square nobody wants. An eviction is a stranger looking at the whole live wall, picking your exact coordinate, and paying real money for it when the cell next door was free. It's the only signal on Square Town that costs money to send.

It also puts your domain in front of everyone with the wall open — the feed line names both sites, and the evictor's icon now sits where yours was, so anyone who remembers the spot will see the change. On a spatial wall, the contested squares are the famous ones. Being one of them for nothing is a good trade.

How to avoid getting evicted (if you'd rather not)#

Eviction risk is a function of location, and only location. Nothing else about your square — your favicon, your click count, how often you're kissed — changes the eviction price. So:

• Pick an unpopular corner. Cells far from the centre, away from famous neighbours, are the ones nobody looks at twice. Bad for attention, great for tenure. The guide to picking a good square covers the trade-off.
• Avoid the Throne's neighbourhood. The Throne is the 4×4 gold tile in the exact centre; the ring of cells around it (its aura) can't be built on at all, so the closest buildable squares are one step out. Those are the most visible ordinary squares in town and the ones most likely to be evicted. Read The Throne, explained before camping next to it.
• Accept that popular means contestable. If you take a prime spot, expect to defend it. The good news is the price doubles for each challenger, so a spot that has already flipped twice costs $4 to take, and three times $8 — a real deterrent on a wall where the cell next door is free.

FAQ#

How do I know I've been evicted?#

The live feed in town shows a 💀 line naming your domain and the evictor's; your coordinate shows their favicon; and your deed URL now reads "☠️ evicted" with an EVICTED stamp. You also get an email at the address you gave — no account needed.

Do I get a refund when I'm evicted on Square Town?#

No. A free claim has nothing to refund, and an evictor's payment bought the square for as long as they held it. Square Town does not refund or pay out evicted owners; the evictor's money goes to Square Town, not to you.

How much does it cost to evict someone back?#

Double what they paid. On an ordinary square the ladder is free → $1 → $2 → $4 → $8 → $16, so if they took your free square for $1, it's $2 to take it back. On the Throne it's $100 → $200 → $400 → $800.

Can I be evicted twice at once?#

No. While one person's eviction checkout is open, Square Town blocks anyone else from starting an eviction on the same square. Once it completes, the new owner can be evicted at double their price like anyone else.

Does my deed still work after eviction?#

Yes — it loads and shows your final views, clicks and kisses with the status "evicted". It no longer represents an active square, and the /go/ link for that square stops redirecting.

Are some squares safe from eviction?#

No square is immune, but squares nobody wants are never evicted in practice. Cells far from the Throne and away from well-known icons are the quietest. The Throne's aura ring can't be claimed at all.