On the other side of the world, a "tokenized apartment" sold out in a single day

Original | Odaily (@OdailyChina)

Author|jk

May 26, 2025, Dubai Land Department (DLD) joins forces real estate fintech company Prypco with blockchain infrastructure provider Ctrl Alt has officially launched the first real estate tokenization platform in the Middle East, "Prypco Mint", and successfully achieved full financing of the first Real World Asset (RWA) apartment on the XRP Ledger chain in just one day. The platform is an important part of the UAE government's blockchain strategy, which aims to get about 7% of transactions in Dubai's real estate market on-chain by 2033. At that time, the total assets are expected to reach $16 billion.

Previously, most RWA real estate projects either stayed at the level of independent projects without official endorsement, basically relying entirely on the credit of a single company, and due to factors such as the lack of precipitation time in the Web3 industry and the obvious lack of credit of users for the project, there is no so-called "well-known" RWA real estate projects. And this time, the Dubai operation may be able to fill that gap.

Why Dubai?

Another reason why many RWA projects have not been out of the circle before is that their tokenized properties are not any real estate hotspots. In the global real estate industry, Dubai is a well-deserved hot city; The booming real estate investment here has attracted a lot of foreign investment, and if you search for "Dubai" on social media, you will most likely see the word "real estate" automatically completed at the end.

Why is Dubai famous? Quite simply, room for appreciation and a very high rent-to-sale ratio.

In recent years, Dubai's real estate market has continued to heat up. According to a CBRE report, residential prices in Dubai will rise by an average of 18% in 2024, compared to 20% in the first quarter of 2025. During the same period, the number of property transactions also hit a new high, reaching 45, 474 in the first quarter of 2025, an increase of 22% year-on-year. This growth trend is due to the "golden visa" policy launched by the Dubai government, which is equivalent to buying a house for five or ten years of long-term residence, attracting a large number of high-net-worth individuals to invest in real estate. In addition, Dubai's geographical advantages, stable political environment and diversified economic structure also provide a solid foundation for the continued growth of the real estate market.

In terms of return on investment, the Dubai real estate market is outstanding. Data shows that Dubai's rent-to-sale ratio is around 1:132, with up to 90% of the foreign population giving rental returns as high as 8% to 9%, much higher than the 2% to 3% in cities such as Shanghai. This high rental yield allows investors to pay for themselves in a shorter period of time, typically within 10 to 12 years. In addition, the UAE government exempts all personal income tax and capital gains tax, which further enhances the attractiveness of investment.

This is not an advertisement, but the reality of the Middle East real estate market over the past decade.

Of course, Dubai's market has seen very high growth over the past decade, so there have been a number of arguments during the year that this year may be the culmination of Dubai's property market, citing data such as high construction capacity and slowing population inflows. However, judging from the historical data alone, Dubai's property investment is indeed very hot.

So what exactly is the asset that is sold out in one day?

RWA Real Estate's business model is simple: the ownership of a property is tokenized, the token holder holds a portion of the ownership of the property, and the appreciation and rental income generated by the property is distributed to all property holders. In this way, holders can incorporate real estate into their portfolios even if they do not have the ability to buy the entire property outright, and exit liquidity is significantly better.

Perhaps for the sake of hunger marketing, PrypcoMint only took out one apartment to tokenize on the first day of opening.

Located in Business Bay, Dubai's central district, this fully financed real estate tokenisation project is a two-bedroom unit in Prive by Damac, a residential complex built by renowned developer Damac. The building area is about 130.88 square meters, and the unit type is two bedrooms and three bathrooms. The project focuses on the panoramic view of the lake and is equipped with hotel-style service facilities.