Feb 12, 2022
Virtual Properties | Gaming | Upland
Upland Beginners’ Startup Guide & Referral Bonus — A Virtual NFT Property Trading Game
How to get started in Upland with free UPX. Read this BEFORE you create an Upland game account.
To put things in perspective… I published a guide like this one a while back on how to start as a beginner in Upland, the virtual property trading game. And many people used it. But later on, I deleted it because I’ve had issues with gaming during my depression and suicide attempt. However… Here’s the thing: playing Upland has actually helped me cut my excessive spending on smartphone games because I am turning a profit in Upland, by now! I’ll give you a summary of how I did that, and especially, what you should do BEFORE creating your Upland account in order to get a bunch of free UPX, which is the Upland currency.
To get a bunch of free UPX to help you start on the right foot trading virtual properties in Upland, you need to use an affiliate link like mine, which I will explain later on in this article. It is so important that if you have just created an account and barely done anything on it, forget it and re-start!
But first, let me explain why Upland is an interesting “game”, especially if you are tired of spending too much on in-game micro-transactions in every other smartphone game! And even if you don’t like gaming!
What is Upland, The Virtual Property Trading Game?
As the description implies, it is a game in which you buy, hold, and trade virtual properties. The fun part is that the properties use real-world addresses. I own properties in Los Angeles, Nashville (I like country music, what can I say), Chicago, Brooklyn, Cleveland, New Orleans, Santa Clara, Staten Island, Bakersfield, and a couple in the Bronx. And each one of my properties is at a real-life address. Within the game, I can check the Google street view of that property.
NFTs authenticate ownership of the properties. In short, NFT stands for non-fungible token. “It is a non-interchangeable unit of data stored on a blockchain, a form of digital ledger, that can be sold and traded” (source: Wikipedia).
Just like in real-world real estate, you buy and sell properties. You can keep them, hoping they will be worth more later on. You can also build different types of buildings on properties to increase their value.
While you hold a property, it pays you dividends, a bit as if somebody was renting it, although these revenues are provided by the game to owners of properties. I pile up these revenues and eventually have enough to buy more properties that pay more dividends. It’s not difficult to grow, is what I can say about that.
Some properties are obviously worth more than others when the real-world address is unique like the Chicago Theatre, Deno’s Wonder Wheel in Coney Island, and the Rockefeller Center.
How much can we trust Upland to stick around? I don’t have a crystal ball, but they just raised another $18 million in November 2021, and the company is now valued at $300 million.
How does the UPX Upland in-game currency work in relation to US$?
You can buy UPX with US$ for a fixed rate of 1,000 UPX per US$.
In-game, you can buy and sell properties in either UPX or US$.
You can withdraw US$ to your Paypal account.
You have a one-time chance to get free UPX when you create an account, and I will explain that soon. You will need to use my referral link before creating that account.
How well did I do in trading virtual properties in Upland so far?
I started in May 2020, a little less than 2 years ago. During that time, I have “invested” $1694.60 in purchasing UPX. Recently, I’ve sold enough properties in US$ to withdraw a total of $1613.85 which means that I have spent, all in all, $80.75 in Upland, and here’s the thing: I still own a whole bunch of virtual properties in Upland!
I currently own Upland virtual properties valued at over 1.4 million UPX. If I could sell each one of these properties in US$, simply for the price I paid, this would generate US$1,492.
Furthermore, these virtual real-estate properties are generating 8,079 UPX in monthly revenues, which means the equivalent of US$8 per month.
That’s why I say that I made money playing the Upland virtual real-estate trading game. In comparison, I’ve lost thousands of dollars playing traditional smartphone games.
In fact, because I’m channeling my “gaming urges” to Upland, I consider that Upland has prevented me from losing a few more thousand dollars in traditional gaming.
That’s for me. What about you?
A Beginner in Upland: How to Get Free UPX
Obviously, if you start with more UPX, you can buy more virtual NFT properties and speed up the development of your Upland portfolio.
Once you are playing the game, there are only three ways to get more UPX:
- Buy UPX with US$
- Accumulate revenues from your current properties (that takes time)
- Sell properties for more UPX than you bought them for (that can take time to)
But before you start the game, you can get a tremendous boost by using a referral link like mine to get free UPX.
Because Upland is still fairly new, they have a generous “refer-a-friend” promotion that goes like this. If you use a referral link like mine to set up your account, you will get a 50% bonus on your first purchase of UPX (and I will also receive a bonus).
In other words, if you purchase 100,000 UPX, you will actually receive 150,000 UPX, which is equivalent to getting a US$50 bonus! I do not know for how long Upland will keep this generous offer going.
There are two ways I recommend you take advantage of this offer for free UPX to startup in Upland.
Option One: Go Big!
It is hard to grow a portfolio if you start with only pocket change. Let’s say you buy a property for 10,000 UPX and you have no more UPX left. It will take a long while for that one property to generate enough UPX for you to buy another virtual property.
I found that once you have above a million UPX, it becomes easy to “play the market” and grow your portfolio. To do that, you can create your account by using my Upland referral link, then buy a million UPX for US1,000. You will actually receive 1.5M in UPX which is the equivalent to a US$500 bonus, and you will be in good shape to enjoy Upland.
Important note: To buy that amount of UPX, you need to use the web version of Upland, not the iPhone app version.
If you manage to do as I did, you may generate enough sales to recuperate your money but of course, I can’t promise anything! It depends on what you do with your virtual properties inside Upland.
Option Two: Dip Your Toe!
If you can’t afford to jump into Upland in a significant fashion, you will still need to buy some UPX.
When you start in the game, you get 2,500 UPX but there’s pretty much nothing you can do until you get above 10,000 UPX. On the other hand, if your net worth remains below 100,000 UPX, you get some newbie benefits. For instance, there are properties marked FSA that can only be purchased by new players with a net worth below 100,000 UPX.
Therefore, if you want to start small (or you can’t afford to do more than that), I suggest you buy US$50 worth of UPX. This will give you 75,000 UPX (the 50,000 you bought and 25,000 in bonus). Once again, to get that bonus, you need to use an Upland referral link like mine.
A Beginner in Upland, The Virtual Real-Estate Trading Game
There are many more things to learn about developing your wealth in Upland, but the steps above will give you a head start with a big pile of free UPX.
After that, join the official Discord channel for Upland and navigate to the New-Player-Chat room.
Disclaimer / Notice
It should be obvious, but just to be sure: owning properties in Upland does not entitle you to make any claims to their real-world counterpart!
There are opportunities within the Upland game to make real money by turning your UPX into US$. This attracts many people like me. Yet, I highly recommend that any money you invest in any game is money that you are willing to lose. I take no responsibility for any losses you may encounter within Upland.
If you use my Upland referral link for free UPX, I will also get a bonus. It costs you nothing.
More about my journey with depression and a suicide attempt.
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