What is ResCounty?
Welcome! ResCounty is a blockchain-based land registration system that offers a transformative solution to the traditional complexities of property ownership. The app is built to revolutionize land transactions by creating a decentralized marketplace where buyers and sellers can engage in secure, transparent, and efficient land transactions using blockchain technology. Buyers can confidently verify property histories, and sellers benefit from a streamlined, cost-effective platform. This innovative approach not only enhances trust between parties but also sets a new standard for the future of land transactions, combining the security of blockchain with the ease of a user-friendly marketplace interface.
We aim to improve the efficiency, security, and transparency of land management. A decentralized application that uses blockchain could overcome the short-comings of the existing methods of land registry.
Motivation
The motivation for building a blockchain-based land registration system stems from several compelling factors that address longstanding challenges in traditional land transactions. ResCounty is built to support:
- Increased Transparency and Trust
- Reduced Fraud
- Accelerated Transactions
- Security
- Usage of Modern Technologies
The decentralized nature of blockchain ensures a transparent and tamper-proof ledger. This transparency builds trust among the users (Sellers and Buyers) of ResCounty. The immutability of the blockchain records (transactions) significantly reduces the risk of fraud and corruption in land transactions. Moreover, the Hyperledger fabric enables faster transaction processing compared to traditional methods. A centralized database would induce latency in such a system and cause delay in transactions. Blockchain also employs cryptographic techniques to secure data. This feature ensures the protection of sensitive information related to land ownership and avoids record tampering. Lastly, building ResCounty on a Hyperledger network shows our commitment to leverage innovative solutions for age-old challenges in the real estate and land registration domain.
Motivated by the existing problems and the potential of blockchain technology, our system would be an entirely decentralized network designed to record and securely store all transactions involved in land purchases.
Why ResCounty?
Here we will highlight the key functionalities that make the system innovative, efficient, and secure.
User Registration: Any user of ResCounty can register into the system either as Seller or Buyer. They will be assigned a wallet amount of 10000 RoK (Resillient Tokens)
Seller Dashboard: As a seller, you can add new lands and sell your lands. The seller will be able to see a real time balance in its wallet.
Buyer dashboard: As a buyer, you can submit purchase requests, view your owned lands and visualise available lands through an interactive map. The buyer will also be able to see a real time balance in its wallet.
Payments/Transactions: Users can visualise the process of a transaction through the ResVault chrome extension. Each user will have a purse of 10000 RoK initially.
ResCounty is completely:
- Decentralized
- Anonymous
- Lightweight
ResCounty does not:
- Collect/track your data
- Require registration
How is ResCounty built?
We will see a comprehensive overview of the design and structure of our application below:
Web Technologies:
The frontend development involves using standard web technologies to create the user-facing elements. Methods used are:
a) HTML for structure
b) CSS for styling
c) JavaScript for interactivity
Blockchain Technologies:
a) ResilientDB (https://resilientdb.com/) for ordering transactions through a highly optimized implementation of the PBFT protocol. These transactions are used to register users, add lands and handle payments. ResillientDB sits at the core of our architecture.
b) Resillient Javascript SDK for interaction with our frontend application. It recieves and sends transactions based on user input.
c) ResVault (https://github.com/ResilientApp/ResVault) for connecting the website with ResillientDB. ResVault helps us to keep track of the transactions. It serves as the wallet and entity registeration mechanism.
d) Google Cloud for hosting our work on a server.
Our application mainly leverages the blockchain ledger based on the novel ‘ResilientDB’ system. Through the efficient system design of this fabric, ResCounty enhances the accessibility and transparency of land-related data and also facilitates quicker and cost-effective transactions.
How it works?
We provide a step-by-step explanation of the processes involved in recording and transferring land ownership through this video:
You can access the codebase for the application below:
Challenges
- The amount of transactions could lead to increase in latency while rendering dashboards.
- Prior knowledge of blockchain could be required to understand the ResVault chrome extension.
- Resillient DB does not have adequate updated documentation which makes development fairly challenging.
- ResVault has a user interface that could be difficult to understand for new users.
Future Scope
The future scope of ResCounty is promising, offering a range of possibilities for expansion, improvement, and integration. Here are several key aspects to consider when discussing the project’s future scope:
- Adding real time verification of the Sellers and Buyers. The identities of the users could be authenticated before they are registered for enhanced security.
- Adding real estate agents to manage land buy requests and approve transactions. These users could possibly verify the buyer’s personal details such as credit scores before approving their request.
- Adding financial reports for each user showing details such as revenue and budget.
- Using a smart contract based verification system for the transactions.
- Reducing the latency of transactions and webpage loading. Transactions that are previously processed could be handled better in cache.
Let us know what you think about ResCounty! :)