What I Learned This Past Week - 7.19.22

Fortune favors those investing in real estate and web3

I’m sharing with whoever’s interested in what I learn as I try to remain clear-eyed about the opportunities for real estate and web3.

Did I miss important news or a great article this week? In the likely event I did, please shoot me an email (mark@hurstx.com) and let me know!

Thank you for taking the time to read REw3. If you like what you are reading consider subscribing to stay up to date on this quickly evolving space.

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This Week’s Musings

After the last couple tumultuous months in the crypto universe, this past week was a needed reprieve for all web3 companies. Time will tell if the storm has passed or if we are just momentarily in the eye of the storm.

This week also saw an uptick in web2 real estate businesses launching (or announcing) web3 products. I expect this velocity to continue to ramp as established players jockey to be seen as innovators in the emerging web3 space.

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Informative Articles I Read

• The New South Park Movie Is Basically Just One Long Crypto Roast (the Verge) - Couldn’t miss the opportunity to start out this week’s newsletter with a shout out to South Park.

  

• HomeStart Aims To Save Families From Eviction By Selling Digital Apartments In The Metaverse (HomeStart) - HomeStart is selling NFT apartments in the Metaverse to raise donations and shine a light on homelessness in the real world.

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Podcasts That I Listened To

• Building The Financial Layer of Real Estate on Web3 with Kuma Ujjwal, Co-Founder & CEO of DwellFi (Audible)

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Innovate Companies I Discovered

• NFTStays - Perhaps more of a hospitality play, but I think it makes sense to include an NFT marketing system for hotels in this newsletter. Check out the project for the Nomo Soho hotel.

  

• ALTA - Alta Finance is building ALTA, the token powering the future transition of $280 trillion of global real estate assets into the Alta Finance Treasury.

• PlayEstates - The first play-to-earn web3 gaming platform that turns your gaming hours into ownership of real-world real estate assets.

• Cornerstone - The photorealistic metaverse where land is owned in NFTs.

• Yield Crowd - Tokenized, institutional real estate tradable on the blockchain.

• RealT - Fractional investment in tokenized real estate assets.

• Intelly - Fractional NFT real estate investment platform.

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People to Know (Those I Met Or Connected With Who Are Much Smarter Than Me)

• Jason Yourofsky - CEO of Mortgage Token

• John Kraski - Director of Strategic Partnerships at LandVault

• William Guo - Founder & CEO of PlayEstates

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Web3 Announcements from Proptech Companies

• HomeJab enables agents to promote their listings to crypto enthusiasts using NFTs (MPAmag) - HomeJab has announced that it will give real estate agents a free NFT listing for every photoshoot. The company will promote the NFT-backed homes for sale and list them on the new HomeJab NFT site at nft.homejab.com.

• New Home National Title and CoinEver Join Forces to Transform the Real Estate Industry (Newswires) - This is the first crypto title company announcement I have come across.

• Milo Originates Record $10 Million in Crypto Mortgage Loans (PR Newswire) - A milestone achievement by Milo on their crypto mortgage loans.

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Random But Important Things I Stumbled On

• Tony Hawk Skates Into the Metaverse With ‘Largest Virtual Skatepark Ever Made’ (CoinDesk) - The skateboarding GOAT’s foray into the metaverse will take place in The Sandbox on a 36 parcel plot.

• The US Government Is Digging Into NFT’s Impact On Intellectual Property (TechCrunch) - Given that the NFT was invented over 8 years ago, the US Patent and Trademark Office took its time in deciding to add this to their agenda.

• A Beginner’s Guide to Understanding The Layers Of Blockchain Technology (CoinTelegraph) - This was a good refresher for me to read now that I have a couple months of web3 research under my belt.