Tokenized real estate covers a spectrum of products — from individual rental properties fractionally owned via blockchain tokens to portfolios of home equity loans securitized on-chain. The common thread is using blockchain infrastructure to improve access, reduce transaction costs, and enable fractional ownership of property assets that traditionally required large minimums and long holding periods.
Categories
Residential Rental (Equity): Platforms like RealT and Lofty purchase single-family and small multifamily rental properties, then issue tokens representing fractional beneficial ownership. RealT has tokenized 700+ properties across the US, with minimums around $50. Token holders receive proportional rental income weekly, distributed in USD-pegged stablecoins directly to their wallets. Lofty operates similarly with an emphasis on Alabama and Georgia markets.
Short-Term Rental: Arrived Homes (backed by Jeff Bezos) focuses on vacation rental properties listed on Airbnb and Vrbo, tokenizing fractional equity with $100 minimums. Returns combine rental income and appreciation, with a 5-7 year target hold period before property sale.
Home Equity / Mortgage (Debt): Figure Technologies dominates this category with $15B+ in home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) originated and settled on the Provenance Blockchain. These are not equity instruments — buyers are investors in the debt, receiving interest payments. Figure’s model represents the single largest tokenized real estate portfolio globally.
Commercial Real Estate: Still largely experimental. Institutional CRE tokenization faces structural hurdles: complex governance, existing lender covenants, and title transfer complications. Propy has piloted blockchain-recorded deed transfers in Vermont and Utah. RealT has tokenized small commercial properties. Full institutional CRE tokenization at scale remains a 2027+ development.
Regulatory Structures
Most US tokenized real estate platforms use one of three federal exemptions:
Regulation D (506(b) or 506(c)): Restricts sales to accredited investors. No investor count limit, no dollar cap. Standard for institutional-grade offerings. Secondary trading permitted but thin.
Regulation A+ (Tier 2): Allows sales to non-accredited investors up to $75M annually. Requires SEC qualification (lighter than full registration). Lofty uses this structure for its retail offering.
Regulation CF: Crowdfunding exemption, up to $5M annually, unrestricted investor access. Limited to very small deals.
Tax Treatment
The IRS has not issued definitive guidance on tokenized real estate. Most practitioners treat token holders as beneficial owners of the underlying property interest, subject to normal rental income (ordinary income), depreciation pass-through (if structured as pass-through entity), and capital gains on sale. However, the token transfer mechanism raises unresolved questions: does each token trade trigger a taxable event for the issuer? Most platforms structure to avoid this through beneficial interest SPV structures, but IRS clarity remains outstanding.
Secondary Markets
Secondary liquidity is the Achilles heel of tokenized real estate. RealT operates its own DEX (RealT Marketplace) where token holders can trade — but volume is thin, spreads are wide, and pricing reflects illiquidity. Securitize Markets and tZERO list some tokenized real estate positions. The result is that tokenized real estate offers more liquidity than traditional real estate but far less than public REITs.
Comparison to REITs
Traditional REITs offer broad diversification, daily liquidity, and established tax treatment. Tokenized real estate offers property-level selection, yield transparency at the asset level, and programmable distributions. The tradeoff favors REITs for most retail investors seeking liquidity; tokenized real estate appeals to investors who want specific property exposure and are comfortable with lower liquidity.
Institutional CRE: What Is Needed
For tokenized commercial real estate to reach institutional scale, three conditions must be met: (1) a clear regulatory pathway for tokenized interests to transfer without triggering title insurance issues, (2) standardized DAML or DAML-equivalent smart contracts acceptable to institutional lenders, and (3) a secondary market with sufficient depth that institutional investors can exit positions within reasonable time horizons. None of these conditions fully exist in 2026, but each is actively being developed.