A Safehouse in the Hills expands GTA Online with high-end mansions in the Vinewood Hills, a new set of contact missions tied to Avi Schwartzman, and a story-driven mission featuring Michael De Santa. The mansions act as a prestige property and a combined operations hub, while Avi’s missions revolve around sabotaging the autonomous KnoWay taxi service. Clearing Avi’s jobs and owning a mansion eventually lead to a one-off defensive mission at your home with Michael.
What GTA Online mansions provide
The new mansions are designed as luxury safehouses with a strong focus on convenience. Each mansion has its own large garage that can hold around 20 vehicles, and owning all three mansions gives space for up to 60 cars in total. Inside the garages, there is a management terminal that lets you move vehicles between slots and place one car on a display podium as a centerpiece for the garage.
Beyond storage, mansions bundle together several high-end utility features in one property. They offer a fast-travel option, a master control terminal for managing various businesses, an armoury, and a full vehicle workshop that can handle all standard upgrades. Nightclub and arcade functionality is also accessible from the mansion, along with social spaces such as a cigar room.
The result is a property that largely consolidates tools and perks already available across other businesses and apartments into a single, visually impressive location. For many players the main draw is having most endgame functions and vehicles centralized in one stylish base rather than gaining entirely new permanent gameplay systems.
How to buy a mansion
Step 1: Open the in-game phone and launch the internet browser from the home screen. This gives access to the usual property and vehicle websites.
Step 2: Navigate to the Prix Luxury Real Estate website. This site lists the new mansion properties introduced with A Safehouse in the Hills.
Step 3: Browse the three available mansions and review their prices and customization options. Choose the property that fits your budget and location preference.
Step 4: Purchase the mansion directly from the website. Once bought, you can set it as your new property and travel to it from the map or by normal means.
Step 5: Enter the mansion for the first time. A cutscene will play in which Michael and Amanda De Santa welcome you to the neighborhood and reference both GTA V’s story and your GTA Online character’s career. This scene introduces Michael’s presence but does not yet start his mission.
Avi Schwartzman and the KnoWay missions
Avi Schwartzman returns from the original Heists update as a central contact in A Safehouse in the Hills. His new jobs focus on disrupting the autonomous KnoWay taxi company that operates self-driving cabs around Los Santos. The structure is similar to a compact heist sequence: several lead-up missions tied together by story, capped with a finale that pays a large lump sum.
The mission set involves tasks such as remotely causing chaos with KnoWay taxis, destroying company assets, stealing data from the firm, and breaking into an FIB facility to extract sensitive information related to the service. The individual jobs are titled Inside Job, Negative Press, Trash Talking, Tunnel Vision and A Clean Break.
These contact missions can be played without owning a mansion. They exist as their own chain and award regular payouts for participants. Several of the earlier jobs function like setup work, so the host may not receive a direct cash payout every time, while the final job in the chain delivers a significant reward. Completing the full set yields a substantial one-time payment from Avi of around $525,000, on top of whatever each mission pays along the way.
In some event weeks the game adds first-time completion or weekly challenge bonuses on top of the base payouts, so the total cash take from finishing the full Avi sequence can rise noticeably during those periods.
How to start Avi Schwartzman missions
Step 1: Load into GTA Online after installing A Safehouse in the Hills. Once in a session, open the map to look for new icons.
Step 2: Find the yellow A icon in the main Los Santos area. This map marker represents Avi Schwartzman’s contact point for the new missions.
Step 3: Travel to the A marker. At the location, there will be a ringing payphone. Approach the phone and interact with it using the usual contextual button on your platform’s controller or keyboard.
Step 4: Listen to Avi’s introduction over the call. After the briefing, the first mission in the sequence, Negative Press, will launch, sending you out to destroy KnoWay taxis and cause disruption.
Step 5: When you finish a mission, the A icon will move to a new location on the map connected to the next job. Repeat the process of heading to the new payphone, answering Avi’s call, and completing each mission until you have played through the entire set.
Step 6: After the final job in the chain, you receive the main lump-sum payout from Avi. At this point, if you also own a mansion, you are positioned to unlock the Michael-focused mission that follows.
How to unlock Michael De Santa’s mansion mission
The new Michael mission is tied to both mansion ownership and completion of Avi Schwartzman’s jobs. Owning a mansion is required for Michael to appear in GTA Online at all, and clearing Avi’s KnoWay missions is the story trigger that leads into his role.
Step 1: Buy any one of the three mansions using the Prix Luxury Real Estate website on your in-game phone, then enter it once to watch the introductory cutscene with Michael and Amanda. After this scene, you can freely use the mansion’s facilities, but Michael’s mission remains locked.
Step 2: Complete all of Avi Schwartzman’s KnoWay missions started from the yellow A payphone icon. Make sure you play through the entire chain until Avi has no more contact jobs for you.
Step 3: After the last Avi mission, remain in free mode and wait for a phone call from him. The timing can vary, but eventually Avi will ring you with new information about the fallout from your attacks on KnoWay.
Step 4: Answer the call and accept the mission invite Avi sends. The job you receive is called Home Sweet Home, and it takes place at your own mansion. The exact layout and some details of the action change depending on which mansion you own.
Step 5: As you head back toward your property, Avi warns that KnoWay mercenaries intend to retaliate. Your AI Assistant also alerts you that hostile forces have taken over the mansion. The mission then has you and Michael De Santa fight to clear out the attackers and secure the house.
Step 6: On first completion of Home Sweet Home you receive a large one-time payout of $500,000. The mission also serves as a narrative teaser that hints at possible future content involving Michael in GTA Online.
If you finish all of Avi’s jobs without owning a mansion, you do not get this mission. The game requires both conditions, so players interested in Michael’s appearance need to invest in at least one mansion before or during the KnoWay chain.
Mission payouts and long-term value of mansions
From a progression standpoint, the mansion-linked content delivers two main bursts of income. Avi Schwartzman’s KnoWay missions function as a compact contact-job storyline with normal per-mission earnings plus a notable final reward of around $525,000. Completing those missions then unlocks Home Sweet Home, which pays $500,000 for the first clear. During certain event weeks, extra bonuses can further raise the total take for players who run the full sequence promptly.
However, both the Avi chain and the Michael mission are essentially one-off sequences. The lasting benefit of spending money on a mansion is not repeatable mission income, but the convenience of having large garages, a full upgrade workshop, a master control terminal, fast travel, and other high-end functions in a single location. For players already deep into GTA Online’s business ecosystem, the mansion acts as a consolidated headquarters and a status symbol more than a new long-term money maker.
Putting everything together, A Safehouse in the Hills links mansions, Avi Schwartzman, and Michael De Santa into a short storyline centered on sabotaging an autonomous taxi company and defending your new home. Once the missions are complete, the mansion remains as an efficient hub that brings together many of GTA Online’s endgame tools under one luxurious roof.
