I'd like it if players could buy or claim their own satellite or dwarf planet. Perhaps claiming would come with an attack mission followed by a large defense mission then smaller & smaller. Perhaps even one could hide mecernary(ies) to help with those; to avoid friendly-fire, perhaps the mercenary would and the player would "lock" to their "own" enemy and while assigned to a foe, the other couldn't fire toward in the vicinity of the battle.
There should be some benefit of having a personal station. Perhaps while there your crew benefit from increased chance of doing a repair, and have an increased rate of "skill" increase (engineering, sensors, ...).
Perhaps there can be role-playing while there, a family or lover could be living there, and some value could increase while there and decrease while away for too long (ie after a month away). It could be something very simple, a text-based game with backgrounds changing depending on the type of conversation one is having (ie lover in sleepwear while having more adult chats). For this part one wouldn't even need to have one own station, at a station with at least 1 residential building, one could rent/buy an apartment/condo; for this option there could be the option of getting a 2nd one for your whole crew (ie you have a 2½ and your crew have a 4½), which you wouldn't get crew benefits without (see 2nd paragraph).