ColivingDAO Insights: The Web3 Path for Regen Living

The Real World Impact of Token Economies and Fractional Coliving Ownership

• Daniel Aprea & Gareth Thompson • Season 1 • Episode 33

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This light-touch episode explores the revolutionary potential of coliving spaces and tokenised real estate as solutions to urban housing challenges. We discuss the advantages of fractional ownership, innovative design in small spaces, and the empowering aspect of resident governance within coliving communities. 

• Understanding tokenised real estate and its implications 
• Exploring the financial pressures of traditional homeownership 
• Emphasising benefits of partial ownership in coliving spaces 
• Optimising living experiences through innovations in space design 
• Reflecting on minimalism and living with less 
• Highlighting community governance in coliving environments 
• Acknowledging the need for new housing solutions and their real-world impact 

Daniel:

Welcome everyone to yet another episode of ColivingDAO Insights. This is your co-host, daniel. I'm joined today by my co-host, gareth. Hi Gareth, hey Daniel, how you doing today? Great to have you here Doing great. What we're doing today, again, it's gonna be something quite light touch. We will be discussing a couple of uh articles, tweets, maybe some news, uh, just to talk a little bit more about co-living, because, um, if you're listening to this right now, you're probably quite passionate about co-living, or at least you're curious, you'd like to find out more. So we'll be sharing more thoughts and, um, gareth, I know that you have uh prepared something that you wanted to discuss. You want to ask me now. I have no idea what I'll be asked, so this should add a little bit of an element of surprise. I don't know what questions I'll be asked. Gareth, what have you got for today?

Gareth:

Yes, I have some interesting news from Twitter, or X as it's now called, and I have a little article from the Web3 newsletter which is very related to that topic. So I kind of cheated, dan, because this isn't technically co-living news, but it's very closely related to what we're doing. So I cheated a little bit just to surprise you a bit more. But we are in a real world asset space, in co-living DAO, co-living combined with blockchain. Real world assets is the space that co-living DAO sits in, so it's closely related. So I have a little bit of a teaser for you about real world assets.

Daniel:

Fantastic. Yeah, thank you for letting me know that you're cheating. It makes things even more interesting. And let's see real world assets, of course, is something we both love. We're working on this. We're creating something unique in this space, so let's see what you got.

Gareth:

Great. Okay, so what I got for you is the Web3 Daily newsletter, which is a really good newsletter to keep up to date on Web3 news, and in one sentence they said one use case that's caught our eye recently is tokenized real world assets, because they make buying and selling things like houses cheaper, quicker and easier. Critics of blockchain technology have called it a solution looking for a problem, and they say, yeah, it's hard for blockchain technology and the everyday consumer to understand what it is, but actually, real-world assets are a real-world use case and this is something that they highlighted. And so they talk about tokenized real-world assets and we've spoken about that before in previous podcasts, dan. But just in a nutshell, if you take a real-world asset like a house or a co-living community and instead of selling the whole thing at once, you have the option to sell just a portion of it if you want to, and then all the sales can be tracked on the blockchain, which is really useful use of that technology to a consumer, tracking everything through the blockchain.

Gareth:

Okay, that's interesting. Why is that useful? It's because the process is quicker, easier and cheaper, and that's what tokenized real world assets can do for you. So they say imagine buying or selling a range of apartments, single homes or commercial properties, whatever the property might be, multiple times a day, the same way that you can trade stocks today. That's just not possible in the current system, because and we've all experienced this as well to buy or sell a property, it requires lots of agents, lawyers, brokers, paperwork, documentation. It's almost impossible to do that quickly can take months in fact and so blockchain enables real world assets to be traded instantly, and this is very closely related to what we do at CoLivingDAO, right, dan?

Daniel:

Yeah, absolutely, we are definitely firm believers in tokenization and in particular, for property real estate. There's definitely a big use case. So it's quite interesting that some people say it's a solution looking for a problem, because I struggle to believe that these people that say that can't see the problem. They probably have different agendas that are trying to kind of diminish the validity of this idea. But in reality there's so many problems in the real estate world and the problem this solution is addressing to me is very, very obvious. And if you look at the average price of houses versus wages, unfortunately the gap is becoming bigger and bigger. And if you think about how much house prices have increased in recent times, wages are not following. Wages right now are pretty much an all-time low compared to the price of property. What this means is that it can cost an individual anywhere, let's say, between five and ten times their wage, their annual wage, to buy a house, and that's even before taxes, so potentially even double that, depending on taxation.

Daniel:

What this means is that, for people, buying a house is an extremely committal decision and it's not something that a lot of people are even able to do. Some people just don't have enough money to even put down a deposit, even when they utilize finance. So the fact that it's not possible to buy fractions of a property, it's something that is really limiting the ability for people to own assets, and what these people end up doing is renting, and renting is paying someone else typically someone else's mortgage and therefore there'll be people with more money they're going to accumulate more and more money and more and more capital and people that are just not able to afford the initial down payment on a house or simply that they cannot afford being committed to a 35-year payment schedule for just a single asset. Then they're just left out and they become poorer and poorer, because what this means is that they will not be able to have assets that appreciate over time. So the inability to buy a fraction of the property is already a massive problem in itself, and that's only one of the issues that tokenized real estate is addressing.

Daniel:

The other thing is liquidity. Imagine owning a property and being able to sell part of it and maybe buying part of it later on, even as an investor, because if we think about that, it's not only for homeowners, even for investors, being able to have an investment that is more liquid is a big advantage, because knowing that you can exit the investment and then re-enter, or maybe enter a different one, and knowing that you can invest starting from a lower price point, a lower investment amount this in itself adds a lot of value to the investment as well. In a nutshell, there's so many challenges that tokenized real estate addresses, so I see so much value in this solution and I'm happy that we're working towards this, gareth.

Gareth:

Yeah, absolutely. You said it beautifully, and at the end of the newsletter they said that although blockchain technology is not the solution for every problem, it's a damn good one for this one. So that's interesting. You know, some people are really bullish on real world assets for properties.

Gareth:

And just to make it clear how this is relevant for co-living DAO as well, when residents pay rent in a co-living DAO community, they gain some shares in the company, so effectively, indirectly, they get shares in the building that they live in and the property that they live in, and so they become partial shareholders as a resident in a co-living dial community. And of course, you can. You can then, if you choose to, you could potentially trade that partial ownership of the community at a future date or you can trade part of it in return for benefits immediately while you live there. So can you remind us a bit more? We spoke about this before, dan, but some of the benefits of being a partial owner for the residents in a co-living DAO community being a partial owner for the residents in a co-living Dow community.

Daniel:

Yeah, first of all, if we just compare that with just owning a single house and a single mortgage, nowadays not everyone intends to live their entire life in one place and, in fact, maybe not even the whole year in one place. Mobility, flexibility, is becoming more and more important for new generations, and what this means is being able to have the same flexibility they would have by renting while at the same time still owning assets they can appreciate. That's a really massive advantage. The difference can be felt over 10 years, 20 years, 30 years. Why give an unfair financial advantage to people that have decided to live in one location for all their life? That's just completely unfair, and this is a big thing that we're addressing. First of all, giving people the ability to own assets to be on par with people that are not moving every few years or simply they're not wanting to commit to one specific location for 30, 35 years. And it's not just the location, it's also being in debt. With our model, there's no debt required, so no mortgage, no one needs to go in the hole to own an asset and there's opportunities to relocate anyway within the federation. So even the relocation for people that want to relocate can be made easy, and surely not everyone wants to relocate, and some people will do that without ever even thinking of relocating, the reason being there's a lot of advantages for people that don't relocate as well.

Daniel:

One is not needing a large deposit. People that want to buy a house usually they need a significant deposit. Some people are just not able to save enough and also, because they're getting a loan, they also need good credit score. These things sometimes are just not easy to put in practice. I've seen a lot of people that potentially even have the financial means to get a mortgage, but they're just not able to be approved or simply because they're paying rent, they just can't put together enough money to put down a deposit. And our system really changes that because people can just pay rent and start accruing capital, accruing equity, therefore changing the gain completely, just making it accessible. So what we're removing really is the barrier that capital is presenting right now in the property market. So we're making it more accessible and making it fairer and ultimately, by being more liquid, it's easy for everyone to enter and exit as well.

Daniel:

The other advantage is that by owning, as opposed to renting effectively, people have an element of governance as well. So it's not just the capital appreciation but also the fact that they have a real voice in the way their community is shaped. So being part owners means that they also get governance rights. So effectively they own the place. They're not simply utilizing it for a limited period of time and then leaving. Thank you very much. I just paid you my rent money and that's it. But they effectively have a say in what happens in that place and they truly build community because it's their own place.

Gareth:

Yeah, absolutely. We're changing the game, changing the property game for co-living residents. And you know, when we look at the property system, there's an interesting point you made, dan, that this is just the way the system is today and the property system and mortgages are just one way of doing property. There's no reason why we can't have an entirely different property system. It's just one of many ways of doing it. So why have this outdated, slow, bureaucratic, difficult process? Where it could be fluid, it can be partial, you can move from one place to another, opens up much more flexibility, right, just by tweaking the system a little bit.

Daniel:

Yeah, mortgage system is a prehistoric system. Right now, Of course, I mean, if people want to use it, use it. There's nothing wrong with that. But right now we have better technology, better systems that can be utilized. So I literally see no reason why we shouldn't progress in the area as well and just make life easier for everyone.

Gareth:

Absolutely so. Do you want some interesting news from X in the real world asset space? Bring it on. Okay, so I'm going to quiz you a little bit here, dan, we're going to test you. So we're talking about real world assets and fractionalized property, and maybe for some people listening, this sounds like a very theoretical concept. Is this a future thing that hasn't yet happened, or is this, in fact, a thing that is already happening right now? Yeah, what do you think, dan? Is this already happening?

Daniel:

Of course it's already happening. I mean, it's been happening all along and gradually I see things happen more and more. And, by the way, right now, when you talk about tokenization and fractionalization, fractional ownership, it's not just something that a small group of utopian system changers are trying to create. This is something that even big institutions like BlackRock are claiming to be the future. So when we talk about tokenization, the question is not even like is it going to happen or not? Is it happening already or not?

Daniel:

I mean, of course it's happening. It's happening right here in front of our eyes. But, more importantly, there's no stopping because big institutions want that. The people want it. So it is going to happen. The question is, how is it going to happen in a way that is going to really benefit everyone and make society fairer and more equitable, or is it going to happen while keeping the same dysfunctional elements of centralization and dysfunctional barriers that are in place? So this is the question. So it is happening, but what we're doing here is we want to make sure that it happens in a way that benefits everyone.

Gareth:

Correct, dan, you passed the first question. It is happening already. Tokenized property, tokenized real estate is happening, and so the news from X is one particular company, a European company, has quite a big portfolio of tokenized real estate and they're about to hit quite a major milestone. They may have already hit it, because this was 10 days ago. This tweet came out. How much do you think they have in their portfolio, this one european company? How much tokenized real estate do they have, do you think, if you were to guess?

Daniel:

how much they have in tokenized real estate. Is it what they're tokenizing that they're selling, or is it already sold, like their portfolio means that someone has actually bought this tokenized shares, or is it simply what they have tokenized? They're ready to effectively sell to a wider crowd, but it hasn't been sold yet.

Gareth:

Just ready to go I believe it's been tokenized and ready to sell and it may well have been sold already, but I'm not sure about the details on that one, certainly tokenized, interesting.

Daniel:

Okay, well, us dollars.

Gareth:

Although it's a European company, they've quoted the number in US dollars. They're very close to a big milestone.

Daniel:

Got it, got it. Well, I'll have to make a very rough guess here. I mean, if we think about I't know how many um units they they would have, but assuming that they're doing this on relatively large projects, I would assume that early movers would do that on on larger projects just because there's a cost in doing that as a first mover. So doing that on a small project probably wouldn't make too much sense initially. The beauty of innovation is that it can start on a certain scale and then gradually be more accessible for everyone. So I mean, if you think about the first mobile phones, if you think about the first computers, the first computers were definitely not for the general public. They were super expensive and hard to use and eventually pretty much now everyone has a computer, at least in some parts of the world. What this means is innovation starts a certain way where the barriers are very high and then gradually spreads much wider. So with all these assumptions in place, I would have a very rough guesstimate. I would say between five and 10 billion.

Gareth:

Wow, that's a huge amount. I think you're on the right tracks on starting small and building up. So this is quite a big milestone. It's not quite as big as the figure you guessed, but this is a single company, remember this is only one company in the space in Europe.

Gareth:

They're within touching distance of $100 million of tokenized real estate, so they are starting relatively small. They're saying it's 115 plus four new properties, so 119 properties and over 21 countries and 11 marketplaces, presumably around Europe, although I haven't looked into the details there. The company's called BlockSquare and they have a headquarters in Slovenia. Awesome so this is interesting it's happening already, and that one company alone has 100 million in tokenized real estate, so this is not a theoretical concept. We talk about blockchain technologies. This is happening today. This is happening right now.

Daniel:

That's great, and this demonstrates that it can be done with smaller properties as well. I mean, I was thinking in terms of, like, huge complexes with maybe massive hotels in prime locations or a huge commercial property or just property that is, in general, more expensive, but in this particular case, based on the numbers you've given me, it looks like they're doing it with a property that pretty much the everyday people could afford. So it's very interesting because it means that not only this is happening, but it's also extremely accessible as well. It's not something that is only limited to some specific use cases and can later on be more widespread, but this is already within reach for the average person.

Gareth:

Yeah, that's right, and I think, if you look at the numbers, the average property price would be just under a million dollars. That's the kind of size that they've gone in at. And this is interesting because, yeah, like you said, maybe these are the small first steps that they're moving into to test the market, get some properties in their portfolio. Maybe the big hotels will come next, maybe some big commercial sector properties might be up next, who knows? This is big news and it just also goes to show that tech is now a global ecosystem. Web3 and blockchain is now a global ecosystem, and Web3 and blockchain is now a global ecosystem. It's not confined to the United States or to Europe or to China. This is really a global phenomenon now.

Daniel:

Awesome? Yes, it is, and in fact, the fact that this company is from Slovenia, a European company, it really shows that this can be done pretty much in I wouldn't say anywhere, but certainly in multiple places. It doesn't have to start from the usual ones. So spot on and great to see this initiative, and I'm sure there'll be more and more, and that's what we're working towards as well. So very glad to see examples like that happening in front of our eyes.

Gareth:

Yeah, likewise I think it's great, great news from Europe.

Daniel:

Fantastic. Now let me give you something, and I'm taking this from an article that I found. This was an article on ArchDaily, and it's called Maximize Density how Co-Living Spaces Do More with Less. Now this was published not too long ago it was slightly over a week ago and the whole point is with co-living and we discussed this, by the way, in this podcast as well. We had an interview with Tom Manuel where we discussed the architecture and the elements of design within co-living that can really make the experience better for everyone involved, and this article really discusses how space can be arranged, but also more in general, like the concept of space and so on, and especially because it's called Maximize Density, there's the idea of efficiency in there as well. So there's a big question, because we know that a lot of people are worried about living in a co-living space because they don't know if they're going to have enough private space, and so, on the other hand, space can be utilized very efficiently and effectively, and this would not just lower the the entry price, but also effectively add more value to the people who live there.

Daniel:

But, just by going with what the article says, developers face significant spatial constraints when attempting to create new housing stock, often working with limited land availability and zoning regulations that restrict building heights and densities. Residents, too, must grapple with the phenomenon of shrinking living spaces. As the demand for urban housing continues to outpace supply. Micro apartments and compact living quarters are gaining traction, challenging individuals to adapt to living environments with minimal square footage and increased density. Co-living spaces have emerged as a remedy to these spatial constraints, optimizing limited square footage through innovative design strategies and shared amenities. By embracing open concept layouts, multipurpose furniture and vertical space utilization, these communities are able to maximize the functionality of compact individual units. Gareth, what are your thoughts on this?

Gareth:

Oh, yes, not only thoughts. I've lived this and you've lived this, dan. So we lived in one of London's first big co-living communities and when you talk about pressure on urban space and the premium that is placed on urban space, there are few places more expensive than London in the world right, big global cities, very high price of square meterage. And so we really lived and breathed restricted spaces. Because our apartments in the co-living building were very small. Right, they were very, very small and at first, you know, my reaction is, as anyone's reaction is is oh wow, how am I going to fit my stuff in here? How am I going to live in this space? But there is a beauty to it and as I was living there and managed to find an efficient and effective way to live with a small space, it becomes quite cozy, it becomes quite comfortable because there are some benefits. Like, I didn't have a lot of stuff. Therefore I didn't have to look after a lot of stuff, and I've noticed that when I lived in bigger apartments before, I gradually accumulated a lot of stuff and I just had to put it into cupboards, had to store it in places, and then I forgot all about it and you know, you open a cupboard and you have this box of stuff that you forgot you had. And then one day, all about it, and you know, you open a cupboard and you have this box of stuff that you forgot you had and then one day you decide am I actually going to use this? Do I need to throw this away? Geez, this is a bit of a hassle. It causes mental clutter on the mind to have to take care of all the stuff that I own. So I found it quite refreshing that I had to actually be really conscious of the things that I owned and how much stuff I bought took home with me. And then you know, when I was much younger, I used to be really obsessed with what I saw in news from Tokyo like really tiny Japanese apartments, and they had some really cool fold-away furniture solutions where you could have a bed in your tiny micro apartment in Tokyo and then you could just press a button and the bed would fold up and disappear into the wall almost, and I really wish we had that. We didn't have that in the co-living spaces where we lived in London, but I'd often fantasized about that and thought that'd be super cool, right? Imagine you had cupboards or furniture that you could just press a button and it folds away, or even maybe even physically fold it yourself if it's easily, easily done and well designed. I think that would be amazing and I think we are starting to see some furniture innovation and space innovation that looks a bit like that. You know, why have wall mounted, fixed, fixed units when you can have, even in the living space that you live in in your small apartment?

Gareth:

Make it modularized, make everything foldable. You can put it away. You can make it a social space, you can make it a dining space, you could make it a video gaming space where you you get your video game chair out. Dan, you would love that. You've got a really stylish and aesthetic video games chair and you can just sort of adapt the space as you see fit. So yeah, I mean I love it and I've really gotten used to living in smaller spaces and now I kind of look for it and I'm I think it's fun. It's kind of fun living in small spaces because you get creative. Make the most of it.

Daniel:

Absolutely, and the question here is really like are people leaving for lack of space, because there's an actual lack of space, or is it that the space is just not functional enough? As you mentioned, there's many creative solutions that can make the space even more functional than a larger space. And also, which is quite obvious and the article reminds us of as well, there's the potential for shared amenities outdoor living space. So we're only talking about the personal private space, the rooms that can be relatively smaller, because obviously that the more amenities we have, the less space there will be for individuals. But also that's shrinking anyway. I mean, even in new builds that are not co-living spaces, designed with amenities and so on, the personal space is just less and less because of a constraint Population is increasing, especially in the cities, more and more people want to move to the city, so certainly the space constraints. It's kind of interesting because I feel some people might believe oh, is it that the space is less because it's a co-living space? It's quite the opposite really. Space is shrinking anyway and co-living is providing a solution by saying hey, you've got these additional amenities outdoor space, so your home is not just your room, your home is the whole thing, and therefore it's definitely a solution to that. Something that you will definitely like is multifunctional furniture pieces.

Daniel:

Another key strategy I'm reading the article here is the use of multipurpose, flexible furniture that can adapt to different needs throughout the day. Co-living units often feature transformable furniture and movable partitions, allowing residents to reconfigure their living areas as needed To optimize space. In their high street house co-living building in London, noyescape and Tidum plus Tidum employed the design of multifunctional furniture piece and integrated storage solutions within the compact living units. Specifically, they designed the beds as elevated platforms that not only serve for sleeping but also integrate surfaces for working, studying and built-in storage underneath. They also incorporated custom mobile storage closets made of perforated metal that can serve multiple purposes, like clothing storage, room dividers or displaying objects through the perforations. So, gareth, I know you mentioned disappearing beds, but how about a bed that can be multipurpose and function as a desk as well, or something else too?

Gareth:

Oh, I love this. This is so amazing. And not only is tokenized real estate real, transformable modular furniture is also real, so this is super cool. I didn't know that it was so well developed currently. So, yeah, this is exactly what I'm talking about Having furniture that can change shape to make you you can do so much more with existing spaces.

Gareth:

I mean, I like to think, if you think about your daily routine, if you're listening to the podcast now, right, think about where you live in the space you live in. Think about what you actually do in those spaces and how you use those spaces. You'll probably find that a lot of space is dead space. You know a table sitting in the corner that you don't often sit at. Maybe you've got a chair that you don't really sit in. I often think about this and think how can we make more use of of the space that we already own and we already use? And and also, dan, yeah, what you pointed out about the public shared spaces and co-living Even if you live in a very small urban apartment, in a co-living space, there is the opportunity for really big shared spaces, and George Monbiot has an interesting phrase that he uses to help us ensure environmental sustainability in the future, and it's the idea of private sufficiency and public luxury.

Gareth:

So the things that we share could be luxurious and spacious and very large, like the shared amenities and co-living, and private sufficiency being just what we need when we need it. Just a big enough space for what we need when we need it. Just a big enough space for what we need privately, and big enough stuff, enough items, enough technology, whatever it is that we use on a daily basis. I think that's a really nice concept, because you can have really big, luxurious, well-equipped shared spaces and co-living facilities. So that's super cool and I think the combo is great.

Daniel:

Absolutely, and once again, I want to remind everyone that if you want to listen to a more in-depth conversation about architecture in the co-living spaces, feel free to check the session that we had here in this podcast with Tom Manuel. There was an episode specifically on that. But other than that, I think, garth, we can all agree that co-living can offer a more efficient use of space, and shrinking private space is something that is happening anyway. So with co-living, we can really make sure that it doesn't feel that it's shrinking and also it offers more functionality because of the, the way things are designed, and we welcome these creative solutions as well yeah, absolutely.

Gareth:

And you know, even if spaces are shrinking in big cities, in co-living dial you get to own your space, not just rent it, which is, um, that changes the game and really changes the property game, as we discussed before. So there's much more space here for creative solutions in the way that we live and there's so much more that we can do with less and make you know, the spaces that we live in really influence and positively affect our lives and we have control over that. We can change the way that we use spaces, the way we design spaces, the way we live in spaces change our mindset, change the way we live, and it can be much better than it was before. It can be an improvement. Even when you're working with restrictions like space restrictions. It could still be much better than the way it was in the past.

Daniel:

Absolutely so. Thanks for the insights. I'm glad that we resonate on this one and I think we'll be very soon wrap up this little roundup that we did with a couple of pieces of news here and there, some articles, and I'm glad to see that things are happening, whether it's in the tokenization space or in the co-living architecture space or more in general. It looks like the world is certainly taking a direction where there'll be more and more opportunities for everyone, and we are very happy to play an important role in this with the co-living DAO. So, gareth, based on what we discussed, we mentioned that here at co-living DAO, we're definitely a big playing organization. We allow for ownership as well, so it's even better than having a functional living space is to own a functional living space, because then you can really make your own more than you would do if you were just renting. So certainly a big advantage. And, gareth, what are your final thoughts about everything we discussed today?

Gareth:

I think, to wrap everything up, you know the main headline from what we discussed today. That was a fun talk today, actually and I think the main headline is that this is not theoretical. These things are happening right. This innovation and property innovation and living spaces this is all real, it's happening now and we're a part of that and co-living dao are a part of that movement and we want to bring new ways of living into being and make them a reality. And you know, join in, let's join in, let's do this, let's build the future of living together absolutely.

Daniel:

Let's join the future, let's build the future. That's exactly what we're doing here and, for everyone who's listening, you are here at the right time in the right place, because if this is the change you want to see in the world, then we're very happy that you're on board here at co-living dao. So thanks again for being here with us today. We'll be back as usual next week with more, so stay tuned, make sure you're subscribed and we'll be back next week. You.