Meet the Man Who Sold Real Estate on the Moon
His customers include three former presidents.
Imagine owning your own home. For a lot of people, that’s the pinnacle of success; the American dream. It’s what many hard-working Americans spend decades trying to achieve. But for a moment, imagine what it would feel like if you owned an entire country or even the moon.
For Dennis Hope, that almost-impossible dream became a reality. After being unemployed for a year, he thought he’d try making a living from managing real estate.
But instead of buying a normal house or apartment block, Dennis wanted to do things differently. He looked up at the night sky and saw more unclaimed property than he could possibly fathom. In case you hadn’t already guessed, his eyes were set on the moon.
Having taken a political science course in college, Dennis remembered that no country could own the moon, according to a 1967 United Nations Outer Space Treaty. The loophole? It said nothing about individuals. So he sent the United Nations a declaration of ownership, detailing his intent to subdivide and sell the moon.
Once Dennis realized that the moon was a goldmine of opportunity, he quickly began selling real-estate to some of the world’s wealthiest people. Since then, Dennis has sold more than 611 million…
