Baltimore Launches Blockchain Solution to Vacant Home Problem – Parofix

[Kathleen]

Baltimore Launches Blockchain Solution to Vacant Home Problem



According to a report in the Baltimore Sun, it can take two to three years for a vacant home in Baltimore to go into foreclosure. It’s a legally challenging process in Maryland.


The foreclosure requires city officials to wait for a title search to verify the home’s entire ownership history.


As a result of the multiple title searches required for each step in the process of acquiring, fixing up, and selling a home, you’re lucky to be able to wrap everything up within four or five months. Meanwhile, an empty house can attract critters, crime, and dangerous conditions.


Baltimore Home Real Estate Orders Blockchain


But the city hopes to solve this with a $225,000 blockchain project. The spending board accepted the contract in December. The Baltimore Sun reported:

“During the three-year pilot, Medici Land Governance will enter the records of the city’s approximately 13,600 vacant properties into a blockchain, creating a database that is safer and also more efficient than the system currently used by the city.”

Blockchain techniques can reliably verify ownership of metadata real estate in decentraland (MANA). Apparently, this technology can also keep property records in North America.

Baltimore attorney Ebony Thompson said the city will now keep an immutable chain of custody to avoid the need to search for multiple titles. The city can now approve homes more quickly as they change hands to new developers and residents.

On-Chain Real Estate’s $9.3 Trillion Opportunity


Former US president Bill Clinton once praised Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto as the greatest living economist. In his bestselling book “The Mystery of Capital,” De Soto wrote that the cost and time required for governments to keep accurate real estate records are among the biggest obstacles to economic development, especially in the third world.

In his book, De Soto argued that well-developed systems to protect property rights were the key to the wealth explosion in the first world. The Thompson Reuters Foundation reported in 2016:

“The consequences for the 5.3 billion people who do not have such rights are strong: People are unable to use their resources to create wealth, and their assets become “dead capital” that cannot be used to generate income or growth.”

Baltimore shows how blockchain can solve this persistent problem. It can help third world citizens enjoy their property. Smart contracts can help the world’s poor get loans on their homes by recording ownership and opening up liquidity. This is one of the most common ways for new businesses to get the startup funds they need to scale.

De Soto estimated in 2016 that giving poor populations titles to their land, homes and unregistered businesses would unlock $9.3 trillion in frozen assets and turn them into capital for the world’s poor.

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