Meet the real estate mogul of the metaverse, who has already spent millions and plans to profit from Fashion shows, rent and billboards

Forget media, oil, or even social networks, a new generation of moguls are emerging in the nascent sector of metaverse real estate.

Andrew Kiguel, the CEO of crypto-asset investment firm Tokens.com, said he and his company have amassed a portfolio of metaverse properties across several virtual worlds, some of which are worth millions of dollars.

Kiguel declined to reveal how much the company had made off its metaverse land, but did say the company looks at its investments with a long-term mindset. As for his company’s digital real estate portfolio, he says this is just the beginning.

“We don’t want to sell the land, we want to continue buying land”

In the physical world, real estate moguls make their money in a few ways: by collecting rent, creating advertising space, or selling their properties when they appreciate in value. The same is true in the metaverse.

“We think there’s a great business plan here with respect to advertisers wanting to pay for space from us, whether that’s digital billboards, virtual stores, or preparing events for them in this new form of social media and gaming environment”~kiguel

One of the most valuable Tokens.com plots in the metaverse is in the center of one of Decentraland’s most popular neighborhoods, the Fashion District. The plot made headlines last November for being, at the time, the most expensive metaverse land ever purchased at $2.43 million. It will be used this month to host a metaverse “fashion week.” Tommy Hilfiger and Dolce & Gabbana, among other designers, will be participating in the fashion show that will be hosted on a plot measuring the metaverse equivalent of 270,000 square feet.

Kiguel also said the company is planning to build advertising spaces on every street corner of its fashion district land to sell to companies that want their name in front of the fashion week attendees.

At another property, shaped like a giant office tower complete with a rooftop events space, Tokens.com is selling advertising and hosting events for companies.

There is a risk in having so much invested in metaverse real estate. The price of real estate could depreciate quickly depending on the popularity of a certain platform, resulting in major losses. Kiguel, however, is all in, and says he sees the metaverse as a big monopoly board.

“As people land on your spaces you collect revenue and rent, If there were millions of people on the same monopoly board, you could collect all the time.” ~kiguel

Many metaverse platforms have specifically limited the amount of “land” they make available to create a market out of that scarcity. Decentraland, for example, only has 45,000 plots of digital real estate available for sale, but it hopes to attract legions of users. Already, the metaverse platform said it hosts about 300,000 users every month. The Sandbox, another major metaverse platform, has only 166,464 plots of digital real estate available. It surpassed two million users last week.

As the users have poured in, so have the brands. Companies like Miller Lite and Samsung have already created metaverse experiences and others like McDonald’s and Walmart have plans in the works. The entry of these large companies means the metaverse could soon be filled with brands and advertising.

“Kids today don’t watch TV, they don’t go to malls — they do their shopping online, they don’t read newspapers, they’re consuming information on social media platforms, and the metaverse is the next social media platform” ~kiguel

In an interview, Tokens.com co-founder and CEO Andrew Kiguel said, “several big names are about to be part of an online fashion show” on the virtual plot. Kiguel said fashion labels Tommy Hilfiger, Cavalli, Elie Saab, Dolce & Gabbana, Etro and fragrance company Paco Rabanne have all signed up to participate starting March 24. The show will run over three days. There will also be several big name DJs and an after party sponsored by Mercedes-Benz.

Kiguel describes Decentraland, one of the platforms his company is focused on, as a different kind of NFT, or nonfungible token. Anyone can buy virtual land on the platform. In the case of Decentraland, you have to use a form of digital currency called MANNA, which can be purchased only with Bitcoin or Ethereum.

Users can then go to the site to see what’s for sale.The parcels have been purchased already, but many are available secondhand. The price fluctuates just like real estate in the physical world.

As for Kiguel’s November purchase of land in Decentraland, his team follows transactions there closely. They knew who owned what, and they knew where they wanted to buy. The transaction was registered on a blockchain, which acts as a digital deed in the metaverse.

There isn’t infinite space on metaverse platforms. Worlds have beginnings and endings. Kiguel likens it to a Monopoly board.

What makes land more valuable? In most cases proximity to something else with heavy traffic. In the metaverse, you click to get somewhere. You don’t need to walk, drive, fly or take the subway.