well... about the "lending items" we could do it like this:
have an option in the /itemtrade window that says "lend items" click it and then you select for how much time you want to lend it... max will be 24 hours. and when this desired time expires the item will automaticly return to the owner. (even if he/she is offline, when they login again they'll find it at their inventory)
this lended item of course, cant be traded until it returns to its owners hands. also if this item is droped it'll return to its owners inventory (even if he/she is offline) or simply it just cant be droped =P
and maybe each time you select a lending item see a small info that tells you how much time you still have with it.
The Era staff team will not make amends for idiotic acts. However, we will do our best to fix a legitimate problem (such as the item trade close exploit). It's not so much that scamming is LEGAL, it's so much that we don't want to be hindered in more important matters because of a lack of general sense.