World’s most expensive virtual real estate: A plot of digital land sells for a record $2.43M as the metaverse real estate race heats up

The metaverse craze is spreading like wildfire just about a month after Facebook changed its name to Meta to reflect its focus on developing virtual reality products for the metaverse. Thousand of big tech companies and venture capitals are pouring billions into the metaverse hoping to get a piece of the pie.

Though still at a nascent stage, the metaverse real estate race is heating up. To further highlight how much deep-pocket investors are willing to pay out to secure virtual land before the metaverse goes mainstream, Decentraland announced Tuesday it sold a patch of virtual real estate in the online world for a record $2.43 million worth of cryptocurrency, according to a report by Reuters.

The buyer, a subsidiary of Tokens.com, called the Metaverse Group, bought the digital land for 618,000 MANA (Decentraland’s cryptocurrency) on Monday, which was around $2,428,740 at the time, a Decentraland spokesman and a statement by Tokens.com said.  Andrew Kiguel, CEO of Tokens.com told Reuters that the assets would complement the real estate already held by Metaverse Group.

In a related report, play-to-earn gaming platform Axie Infinity announced yesterday it sold a plot of virtual land for $2.3 million. Axie said in a tweet below that it was “the largest sum ever paid for a single plot of digital land.” Axie Infinity is a Vietnam-based company was created by Sky Mavis and also one of the biggest non-fungible token (NFT) platforms in the world.

We believe this is the largest sum ever paid for a single plot of digital land.

Congrats to the buyer and seller! pic.twitter.com/M52AN6uLZl

— Axie Infinity (@AxieInfinity) November 24, 2021

Meanwhile, Decentraland is one of the most popular destinations where crypto enthusiasts can buy land and other items that are sold in the form of NFTs, a kind of crypto asset.

Interest in metaverse has surged last month when Facebook changed its name to Meta to embrace the idea of what Meta CEO called the “embodied internet.” It’s noteworthy that the prices of the two virtual lands are higher than those for most real-life homes in some of the US’s most expensive cities. So, is buying virtual real estate the future just another fad that will soon pass? Only time will tell.