Rules I play (haven’t played in ages)
Fines go on Free Parking
Can buy property as soon as you land on it
Only person whose turn it is may participitate in trades
Decline to buy a property? It remains unsold until someone lands on it.
That’s great if you want to trade with yourself. 
Unfortunately I rarely have anything good to offer me.
Actually the official rules are optimal for producing a competitive game. Almost every homebrew rule out there reduces the competitiveness and throws much more luck into it. (e.g. Free Parking payouts. Can’t buy unless you pass Go first. Double money for landing directly on Go. No auctions.)
Auctioning properties is key strategy. For example, no one who lands on it wants to pay full price for Pacific Avenue when the other two properties are owned by two other people. So put it up for auction, and you can get it for less, or force someone else to pay much more than its worth. (Though, they can do the same to you, of course.)
Not a real rule. It’s an optional rule. Anyone can be a banker. The banker can be a player, but doesn’t have to. The banker can opt not to play, but there’s no requirement for that.
Pretty much the banker goes to whoever wants to do it. We always made one person in charge of the money, and one other person in charge of doling out the property and handling bidding, since being banker pretty much sucks. It speeds things up when you divide the tasks.
As far as passing GO before buying property, I kind of liked it because it reduced the random element of gets go first (and get the much coveted Connecticut Ave) and evened the playing field a little.
In actual practice, it turns a little randomness into a lot of it. There’s always going to be one player stuck near Water Works while everyone else is collecting their $200.
What I meant:If it’s not my turn, I’m not allowed to initiate trades. 
Or worse, landed on the Go to Jail space and is suddenly 3/4 of the board behind and $250 down if they pay to get out.
What if no one could buy properties until ONE person passed Go? That would spread people out and be a little more far to bad rollers.
That might work, but then the best roller is going to start out with the worst properties, and the second best gets options on the real money properties.
Yeah, it adds more of an element of luck for sure. I like the official rule, even if it means landing on an already-purchased Vermont Ave on your first turn.
Consensus on trades is a ludicrous rule. There is no rational reason to ever agree to let other people trade anything.
Since two people trading something are by definition improving their position, and therefore gaining an advantage on me, the only logical strategy I have is to veto all trades.
Auctions are a pretty important part of the game’s strategy. It cuts down the randomness of property ownership being determined solely by who rolls onto them, since any spot landed on is potentially available to everyone, and it makes you weigh the value of a property to yourself against its value to others. Pay the straight up price to deny it to others, or send it to auction in hope someone bleeds an excess amount of money trying to secure it? Cutting out the auction rule completely changes the game.
Monopoly without auctions is barely a game. It’s a long grind to determine who’s lucky enough to land on the right spaces. Pointless.
Early in the game, do you prefer to just buy properties outright when you land on them or bid $1 and send them to auction?
When in early auctions, do properties usually end up going for below, near, or above face value?
Early in the game, I prefer to buy them outright. Because it’s rare that it will go for much less than sticker anyway, could possibly go for more, and dumb luck might actually allow you to get the monopoly of that color anyway. Not to mention that overall the more property you have, the better the position you will be in.
Same except I do play the “have to go round once before you buy anything” thing.