A virtual landgrab as buyers snap up property in metaverse | News

It was Mark Twain who purportedly said: “Buy land, they’re not making it any more.”

It turns out the American humorist was wrong — landlords are snapping up digital space in the metaverse and renting it out for profit.

The practice took off in Decentraland, a 3D virtual world opened to the public in February 2020.

Prospective landlords can buy virtual plots as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) — digital certificates that record ownership on a digital ledger — before setting a price to rent out their properties for days, weeks or months.

A block of land near the centre of Decentraland is on sale for 198,888 MANA, the in-world cryptocurrency, which is equivalent to $147,844 or about £119,000. To rent the plot for a day