Real Estate in The Metaverse: What You Should Know in 2023?

One of the oldest businesses in the world is now expanding its roots to virtual and augmented mediums. With the advent of VRs and ARs, investors are now looking at exciting ways to leverage the technologies for personal benefits. Following that, one of the most active and functional ways to invest that are trendy nowadays belongs to real estate in the metaverse.

The idea of real estate investing in virtual reality is relatively new when compared to other channels such as cryptocurrencies, NFTs, and so on. The topic became the center of attention when, in 2017, Dencentraland – a virtual real estate pioneer – stocked properties and plots in their 3D virtual world for a mere $20 per house. Now, in 2022, the market has grown more than 300% and asking for more than $5000 on an average listing.

Keeping that stat in perspective, let’s apply the monetary and economic theories to analyze the potential of real estate investment in the metaverse that helps us to know the right way to go into the business.

Metaverse: Explained in Two Paragraphs

Simply put, a ‘metaverse’ is a term used for a virtual world that can do almost anything that belongs to our physical world. Basically, it’s a mixture of a whole bunch of virtual realities representing specific tasks within the metaverse, ranging from sports, games, live events, buying real estate, meetings, and almost anything, including sleeping.

One thing you should that is ‘metaverse’ isn’t a term that comes under Meta’s umbrella or in some way exclusive to it. But, it’s the name of the concept that consists of the virtual world and things that are included in it. Metaverse has seven layered working mechanisms that, at its core, host infrastructure, and the outermost is for the visual experience to the people.

And that’s a simple explanation of what metaverse really is. I think now I’m in the third paragraph, so I must stop now!

A Discussion Around Real Estate in The Metaverse

As the metaverse shall acquire everything from our real world, investment methods and approaches aren’t any exceptions. Per se, if you’re a real estate enthusiast, then the virtual world should be competent enough to cater to your needs. And to your surprise, there are actually the big four companies heavily indulged in virtual property transactions. Their names are as follows:

Worldwide Webb
Decentraland
The Sandbox
Voxels

Using the services of these four real estate giants and many others, one can own, sell, lease, rent, and do anything on the property. Typically, such virtual platforms are built on web 3.0 frameworks. Therefore, for the transaction of such properties – we will use cryptocurrencies; the technology – blockchain; for assets – NFTs will be utilized.

How Big Four Carry Real Estate in The Metaverse?

The top four companies with high stakes in real estate are using and implementing different strategies to make their business more profitable. Let’s learn about them.

Decentraland: It’s one of the early adopters of real estate in the metaverse. In 2017, Decentraland made its way to the virtual property transaction by selling $20 homes. However, they are 100x their profits and expected to reach $20,000 per home by 2023-24. Their future looks promising, as the company has much to experiment with on its inventory.
The Sandbox: The Sandbox was officially released back in 2012 and literally evolved to a new level after all the recent chaos of the metaverse. For spectacular growth, after receiving Series A capital, Sandbox on-board popular celebrities on its VR platform, including Snoop Dog, Katy Perry, Will Smith, Justin Timberlake, and many others.

“The news popped up on mainstream after an anonymous buyer – in The Sandbox – bought a piece of real estate at a staggering price of $450,000 in the proximity of Snoop Dogg’s house.”

Worldwide Webb: A theme resembled Minecraft, with more realistic animations and characters that help you own land, play games, make friends, and fight bad guys. All of the game items and lands are on the OpenSea platform, representing small, medium, and large apartments and even penthouses, worth thousands of dollars. Similarly, special items, cards, powerups, badges, boards, and whatnot, are available as NFTs that are used as in-game resources.
Voxels: Voxels, formerly known as Cryptovoxels, is an emerging real estate platform that a person can use to engage in sports, play games, showcase artwork, and do anything that one can perform in a physical home. Voxels also allow you to watch, engage, and entertain other peeps in their homes. The primary cryptocurrency used in Voxels is Ethereum, using which you can buy, sell, and lease property and other NFTs.

When brands compete for features, it’s always the consumer who gets the advantage. This time, all four companies and other small and mid-sized virtual real estate businesses are battling to win the ‘editor’s choice’ badge from the people. And, in the future, we will experience something more incredible from them pertaining to real estate in the metaverse.

How to Buy The Real Estate in The Metaverse?

The process is quite simple, and all you have to do is to assemble the following four things:

Create and activate your exchange account
Establish your digital wallet that stores cryptos
Time to look for suitable land
Create an OpenSea.io account to buy NFTs

I know you’re scratching your head! However, these are pretty simple steps once we go through how you can accomplish them. So, let’s get into it.

Exchange Account

You can find hundreds of crypto exchanges online, and out of them, on these four, you can blindly rely on:

Binance
Coinbase
Kraken
Gemini

Basically, the need for exchanges is to access crypto funds, such as Bitcoin or Ethereum – in our case. You need to exchange your physical paper money to get digital currency to do anything on the metaverse platform.

The next step is to store your digital currency in a reliable currency wallet, so you don’t lose access to your crypto funds.

“There are exchanges that support in-app wallet feature, but they are more suitable to traders than any normal crypto holder.”

Digital Wallet

Digital wallets are easy-to-use, highly secured, provide a user-friendly experience, and come with crypto-accepted shopping options. Due to their excellent encryption services, it’s advisable to store your crypto funds in a reliable digital wallet.

As with exchanges, there is an influx of crypto wallets. However, our personal favorite is MetaMask, as the platform is good for holding Ethereum.

“Three ways using which you can access your wallet: desktop, mobile, and a hardware device.”

Evaluate Your Virtual Real Estate

As your prerequisites are in place, it’s time to plunge into virtual real estate in the metaverse to find the right property. As an investor in the metaverse, experts say the rules are the same and straightforward as one follows in real-life. For your ease, the following ways to look at property in the metaverse:

Location: It’s the location that determines your property’s worth. All real-life principles are applied here. Search for areas that are near popular public places, celebrity homes, or in the proximity of something important.
Calculations: Get your mortgage loans, financing, funds, and equity in place. Because things can mess up if you don’t do that beforehand.
Emotional Intelligence: Most importantly, for any vital investment decision, it’s time to make use of your emotional skills. Don’t grab any real estate in the metaverse out of FOMO, don’t rely on speculation, and don’t ever squander your precious capital over someone’s inciteful chatter.

Create an OpenSea Account

At last, you have to sign-up for an OpenSea.io account, as the majority of metaverse’s real estate players have their NFTs hosted on this specific website. After opening the account, all you have to do is to attach your digital wallet from the website and transfer some funds to the OpenSea account for gas fees and others.

These four simple steps are there to help anyone who needs a headstart in real estate in the metaverse. One piece of advice for you is to accompany yourself with an expert that is to some extent involved in the business; that will be beneficial for obvious reasons.

Investing in Virtual Real Estate: Is it Worth a Try?

Real estate investment in the metaverse follows almost the same processes as the ones we use in real life. But when it comes to property brokers and agents or nearly anything involved in virtual reality, nothing has the backing of any organization on which an investor can rely for its capital.

Everything is under the possession of the peeps, affirming that they are the same guy mentioned on their virtual IDs. No one really knows the proper medium to opt for if their money gets stolen or they encounter other fraudulent activities. Therefore, investing in anything related to web 3.0 is as risky as investing in cryptocurrencies, perhaps even more in some circumstances.

But, What About 300% Growth?

Quoting growth numbers won’t add much trustworthiness for investment purposes. The numbers can be misleading, such as the Bitcoin bubble and others having had massive growth in recent years; however, this isn’t the case anymore.

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t look toward real estate in the metaverse. The thing has massive potential and can turn out to be a reliable investment option in the FUTURE. For now, don’t plunge too much into this investment option and sacrifice your hard-earned money. Follow the investor’s advice as they say about dedicating 5% investment portfolio to crypto; the same rules apply here at an even less percentage amount.

Answering Common Questions

Most Popular Real Estate in The Metaverse?

The places influenced by celebrity presence right now play an essential role in determining the popularity of real estate in the metaverse. Many celebrities’, athletes’, and influencers’ homes play location factors for other properties inside the metaverse.

Virtual Real Estate House Pricing?

In 2017, at the time of the launch of virtual real estate, the houses were sold at $5, $10, $15, and $20. Now, over the years, the prices have gone up a lot, and now, in 2022, an average real estate in the metaverse costs more than $5000. And exquisite locations are soaring at 25,000, 50,000, 100K, and 150K dollars.

What About Real-Life NFT Properties?

Some startups are focusing on providing NFTs along with real-life property. That sounds mind-boggling, but this is true. So, these companies are selling brick-and-mortar properties that exist in our world as a collectible, along with digital NFTs of the same property in a virtual world. “What a time in we are alive.”

Are There Any Cheap Properties Available in Metaverse?

To your shock, yes, there still are properties in new metaverse platforms that are offered at relatively minimal pricing. There are apps such as Super World that have amazing potential and are offering real estate along with unique features and requiring minimal capital.

Ending Notes

Metaverse has the potential that can surely change our lives and hopefully for good. As you know, our lives are constantly under influence of many factors, one of which is property investments and metaverse tackling that aspect of the economy in a virtual world. Real estate in the metaverse is going to be the next big mode of investment for the futuristic, virtually-enabled world. And the future isn’t that far; it’s now!

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Real Estate in The Metaverse: What You Need to Know?