The First Real Estate Tokenization Platform in Miami Has Launched
The recent boom of interest in financial technology is encouraging the most innovative investors to take a look at the changes happening in real estate. In 2018, Savills Global Research estimated that the value of real estate globally was approximately $280.6T with residential real estate accounting for $220.6T, commercial real estate accounting for $33.3T, and agricultural and forestry accounting for the rest at $27.1T. Recognized as the largest asset class (disregarding derivatives) and the most significant store of wealth in the world, investors are savvy to pay attention to how financial technology is revolutionizing the way that real estate and real estate development is managed, financed, leveraged, and traded in the digital age. Considering the internet and its key role in globalization to date, its impact on the global real estate market may still be quite nascent. The potential for fractionalization, cross-border trade, and heightened liquidity in real estate markets via digitization is only beginning to become apparent to leaders in real estate globally, let alone Miami.
Crowdfunding has been the obvious approach in taking advantage of internet technology in real estate investing. The ability to advertise an offering, introduced by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the JOBS act of 2012, has opened up the opportunity for online platforms as a channel to raise money from investors. The crowdfunding market has exploded since the passing of these regulations and is projected to grow at an unprecedented rate in the next decade. Sitting at just under $14 Billion in 2019, the crowdfunding market is still in its early stages. Budding technologies such as blockchain and other distributed ledger technologies (DLT) are accelerating the crowdfunding trend by democratizing the world of finance as a whole and bridging the otherwise fragmented and highly restricted financial ecosystem. The rise of internet usage and its complexity of application are granting real estate investors around the world access to opportunities often suppressed by outdated technology, heavy minimum capital investment restrictions, and the lack of access to financial and economic data. Security Token Advisors have been helping leaders in real estate understand and apply the concept of digitization to their business.
The most powerful and disruptive features of digitization can only be powered by security tokens. Security tokens (ie. digital securities) use blockchain technology to help reinvent the process of managing liquidity, administrating stock ownership, paying out dividends, and much more. In early 2019, security token offerings (STOs) began to take the stage as a hot new opportunity for international crowdfunding in capital markets. Quickly, alternative trading systems (ATS) like tZERO (a subsidiary of Overstock.com), digital asset management platforms like Vertalo, and transfer agents like Securitize, ramped up efforts to become key players in the security token industry, raising over $790M in total funding for digital securities infrastructure throughout the year. Since the boom of security token infrastructure investment in 2019, enterprising entrepreneurs and creative startups have taken advantage of the infrastructure that has been built. This has led to a wave of investors rushing in to tokenize securities in various asset classes. From growing startups to venture capital funds, regional hotels, and individual houses, the race to tokenize has begun. Today, in the real estate industry alone, the market capitalization of tokenized securities tops $27M — just a tiny fraction of the total asset class.
Introducing BlokHaus Real Estate Technologies
Security tokens are a universal technology, with firms popping up all around the world. Locally, in our backyard, Miami is considered one of the leading real estate cities in the world. Now, a real estate broker-dealer turned fintech platform based in Miami, FL, is poised to be a key player in tokenizing South Florida’s highly sought-after real estate market. With “South Florida’s Real Estate Officially in Super-Boom Mode” according to the headline of an article by Peter Taylor on Forbes, there may be no better time and place to participate in the digitization of real estate investments. After working closely with the Blokhaus team for over six months, the Security Token Advisors team is proud to announce its partnership in the launch of Miami’s first real estate tokenization platform, BlokHaus. Riding off of the success of the brokerage branch of the parent company throughout Miami’s continued real estate boom, BlokHaus is preparing the city for the second wave of real estate innovation.
The company’s vision is to “Democratize real estate by providing liquidity solutions through asset digitalization”. This aligns with their mission to “Implement fintech into real estate services by offering investment opportunities and fractional ownership through security tokens”. Of this news, Juan Alvarez, the Founder and CEO of BlokHaus says “We firmly believe in democratizing commercial and residential real estate by using fintech to allow fractional ownership. Through this process, we can now forge access for anyone to own a stake in our proprietary investment portfolio of the most attractive assets driven by returns paid through security tokens”. And this was followed up by Salomon Abauat, Head of Blockchain at BlokHaus who said, “We are proud to announce that we’ve founded the first Miami-based Fintech Real Estate brokerage operating on the Blockchain, which is revolutionizing the way real estate is being transacted with complete disintermediation resulting in endless investment opportunities”.
The platform will be using leading tokenization providers and transfer agents to power their digitization movement alongside the help of top legal counsel to make sure investors are protected and covered in their investments to the same degree that they are used to in traditional markets.
BlokHaus represents what we believe is the future of Miami’s real estate market and the future of the global real estate industry. Learn more about the opportunity to invest in the next wave of digital finance for real estate investments by visiting www.BlokHausRe.com or join us on Clubhouse on April 30th at 5pm EST to talk about the opportunity for LATAM Investors to access real estate through security tokens. Spanish edition to follow on Wednesday, May 5th, at 5pm EST and the Portuguese edition on Thursday, May 6th, at 5pm.
