Speaker 1: We talk about bringing two hundred and forty billion dollars
Speaker 1: of real estate on chain, Like, what exactly does that mean.
Speaker 1: We're actually tokenizing every property in Bergen County, and we're
Speaker 1: tokenizing the legal instruments and indexing them per property. So now,
Speaker 1: over time that two hundred and forty billion dollars will
Speaker 1: be able to interact with the broader tokenized economy that
Speaker 1: we all know is coming, which will open the door
Speaker 1: to faster settlements, real time recordings, fractionalization of these assets,
Speaker 1: decentralized collateralization of these assets, which will bring liquidity, stable,
Speaker 1: token and crypto based settlements on these assets, all while
Speaker 1: maintaining the same trust and legal recognition that underpins real
Speaker 1: world real estate today.
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Speaker 2: the link in the description. Hey folks, welcome into the
Speaker 2: Thinking Crypto podcast. I'm your host Tony Edward and we
Speaker 2: are recording at Station three in New York's Financial District,
Speaker 2: and my guest today is Dan Silverman, who is the
Speaker 2: co founder and co CEO of Balcony.
Speaker 3: Dan, great to have.
Speaker 1: You, great to be here, Man, Thank you for doing this,
Speaker 1: Thank you for putting on this podcast. I think that
Speaker 1: education is really the most important thing in our space
Speaker 1: right now, and by platforming. You know, leaders in the space,
Speaker 1: you're really allowing for that education to happen, so appreciate you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, I am excited to speak with you. And
Speaker 2: the reason I came across balcony I read the headline
Speaker 2: earlier this year that you and some other folks were
Speaker 2: working on tokenizing hundreds of millions of dollars of real
Speaker 2: estate on chain and Dan, I'm excited to get into
Speaker 2: the details of that. But let's kick it off with
Speaker 2: your background. Tell us a bit about yourself.
Speaker 1: Sure, So I come from a real estate development background.
Speaker 1: My family started in Hoboken, New Jersey City in the eighties.
Speaker 1: My dad just had this vision. He saw that people
Speaker 1: would be priced out of Manhattan and he started buying
Speaker 1: and developing real estate right across the river. So, you know,
Speaker 1: I grew up in that world. You know, that was
Speaker 1: my career path, and I graduated college started working for him.
Speaker 1: He was kind of in and out of retirement at
Speaker 1: the time, so I ended up starting my own thing,
Speaker 1: took over his book of business, started my full service
Speaker 1: real estate company, doing everything from property management, maintenance, brokerage,
Speaker 1: to ground up development throughout the state of New Jersey.
Speaker 2: And given your background in real estate. I'm curious when
Speaker 2: along the timeline did you come across blockchain and crypto.
Speaker 1: So I was twenty seventeen. I remember that at the
Speaker 1: time Bitcoin had just set a new all time high,
Speaker 1: which is two thousand dollars, and I was like, huh,
Speaker 1: that's interesting. I had heard about bitcoin in the past,
Speaker 1: and this time it really caught my attention, and it
Speaker 1: was kind of like a funny reason as to why
Speaker 1: it caught my attention. So the same day that I
Speaker 1: heard that news, I was listening to Elon Musk talking
Speaker 1: about colonizing Mars and it's crazy. But where my head
Speaker 1: went was like, huh, you know, wait a minute. If
Speaker 1: we're going to colonize Mars like he's taught talking about,
Speaker 1: we're not going to have a fiat or gold based
Speaker 1: currency system there. It'll be impossible to actually ship gold
Speaker 1: to Mars. It'll cost more to send the gold there
Speaker 1: than the gold is actually worth or the fiat paper money.
Speaker 1: It's like to truly have this kind of type one
Speaker 1: digital currency that's interplanetary, which I know sounds sounds far fetched,
Speaker 1: but you know it is. It is coming right. It
Speaker 1: needs to be this frictionless currency that can move anywhere
Speaker 1: in the world or even across worlds in a way
Speaker 1: that has no friction. And that was kind of the
Speaker 1: first moment that I was like, you know, I should
Speaker 1: buy bitcoin, and I'm going to look at it with
Speaker 1: really a real estate mentality. I'm going to hold it
Speaker 1: for the long term, for that crazy future that I imagine,
Speaker 1: and I'm not going to flip it if the price
Speaker 1: doubles or triples or goes one hundred.
Speaker 2: X, right, And it's just a great point. You know,
Speaker 2: the world is becoming more digital, not less. We both
Speaker 2: have kids, and the world they're growing up in they
Speaker 2: don't know about necessarily the analog or offline world imersed
Speaker 2: in online and digital. And to your point, if we're
Speaker 2: entering the space exploration era of the human history or
Speaker 2: human timeline, we're not going to be here's a dollar,
Speaker 2: paper money in space, come out instant settlement on the block.
Speaker 1: They were born into a world where bitcoin exists, stable
Speaker 1: tokens exist, NFTs exist. This will be normal for them
Speaker 1: as they grow up, you know, completely.
Speaker 3: Normal, absolutely.
Speaker 2: And then with that revolution, you know, comes the tokenization
Speaker 2: and putting traditional assets so to speak, if you want
Speaker 2: to call it that like real estate, light, gold, and
Speaker 2: other things on chain to allow them to be able
Speaker 2: to be settled or move faster or transact better.
Speaker 1: Right, yep, exactly, and really like, you know, so twenty
Speaker 1: seventeen I started buying bitcoin. I saw they did the
Speaker 1: first real estate fractionalization deal that year, so they fractionalized
Speaker 1: the Saint Regis Hotel and Aspen. So that was kind
Speaker 1: of the first thing that caught my attension that maybe
Speaker 1: there's a crossover between my career and my hobby, which
Speaker 1: is investing in crypto, right, And I started like really
Speaker 1: studying what the blockchain does, and I realized that cryptocurrency
Speaker 1: is an application of blockchain, but there's other applications, and
Speaker 1: blockchain infrastructure could be applied to the aging real estate
Speaker 1: structure that I knew is archaic and old school, and
Speaker 1: it could fix a lot of the problems that I
Speaker 1: knew to exist. And then a couple of years later,
Speaker 1: I kind of like just check mark that in my brain.
Speaker 1: I was like, maybe, you know, I could revisit this
Speaker 1: at some point A few years later. It was like
Speaker 1: ended twenty twenty, I learned about non fungible tokens, and
Speaker 1: that was like the light bulb moment for me because
Speaker 1: I realized that real estate is non fungible. Every single
Speaker 1: real estate deal is unique based on the different attributes
Speaker 1: that make it unique. So a real estate deal you know,
Speaker 1: has different rent role, it has different unit mix, unit count, zoning, location,
Speaker 1: all these things are unique attributes that make real estate
Speaker 1: non fungible. So the proper way to tokenize or digitize
Speaker 1: real estate is with a non fungible token as opposed
Speaker 1: to fungible token. And furthermore, the d to your home,
Speaker 1: which is just a flimsy piece of paper that authentic
Speaker 1: case ownership over your most valuable asset and is also
Speaker 1: non fungible. Because every deed is unique, I knew would
Speaker 1: eventually become an NFT, it would live on a distributed ledger,
Speaker 1: and you'd be able to transfer ownership in a way
Speaker 1: that's undisputable.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that absolutely makes sense.
Speaker 2: And to your point, you highlighted some of the pitfalls
Speaker 2: or archaic ways that we've done things, and look, at
Speaker 2: one point in our timeline that worked right, but we
Speaker 2: keep progressing and evolving and we're seeing some of the
Speaker 2: areas that need to be improved, and blockchain can certainly
Speaker 2: solve that. A major issue a lot of people run
Speaker 2: into is fraud as well when it comes to the
Speaker 2: real estate industry. So tell us a bit about how
Speaker 2: blockchain can solve some of that fraud problem.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, So when you tokenize an asset, let's say
Speaker 1: a deed, right, it becomes provably authentic. It's a one
Speaker 1: of one original. So with the rise and generative AI,
Speaker 1: it's never been easier to fabricate documents and make them
Speaker 1: completely indistinguishable from reality. So when you have a tokenized
Speaker 1: deed and it lives on the blockchain and it originated
Speaker 1: from the governing body that's responsible for housing and maintaining
Speaker 1: these records, you could prove its authenticity. And because of that,
Speaker 1: we're able to over time eliminate things like deed fraud
Speaker 1: or mortgage fraud.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Dan, I have a confession to make, and I
Speaker 2: hope you know, the prosecutors anybody don't come after me.
Speaker 2: But there was a point I worked at a mortgage
Speaker 2: broker and I did a loan processing and I remember
Speaker 2: some people using some white out on certain things.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then scan it and the photoshop it.
Speaker 2: I'm not going to name names, but those things happened.
Speaker 2: But if you put the blockchain in place, it can
Speaker 2: help mitigate a lot of that.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. I mean we're entering an era where it will
Speaker 1: be impossible to tell what's real and what's fake if
Speaker 1: not for the blockchain. The blockchain is this ultimate truth machine,
Speaker 1: as you may have heard like it referred to, and
Speaker 1: that's the beauty of it. You can't fake things on
Speaker 1: the blockchain, and it's never been easier to fake things.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And in addition, do you see a world where you
Speaker 2: have the counties, the states, and folks like yourself, the
Speaker 2: realtors and so forth, all connected on a blockchain where
Speaker 2: there's full transparency, there's no ambiguity. Everybody knows this document
Speaker 2: is what it is, and we can move it in
Speaker 2: lightning speed.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean that's literally our mission to modernize the
Speaker 1: world's property records and infrastructure, bringing land records and just
Speaker 1: the entire process of conveying ownership and all the parties
Speaker 1: that are involved with that process, bringing them on chain.
Speaker 1: And I think it's going to happen in a way
Speaker 1: that's subtle, like people aren't going to realize they're using
Speaker 1: the blockchain. It's just going to be a faster, cheaper,
Speaker 1: more efficient, more transparent way to conduct business.
Speaker 2: And could we see a day where the process is
Speaker 2: so streamlined and so fast and transparent because we can
Speaker 2: trust each other. Because it's a blockchain, that I can
Speaker 2: be in another part of the world and buy a
Speaker 2: property in New York City and yes, I need to
Speaker 2: see the three D view in the photos right and
Speaker 2: know that I want to buy.
Speaker 3: It, But I don't necessarily need to be there. I
Speaker 3: could just do it digitally.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, I think that blockchain will streamline due diligence,
Speaker 1: It'll streamline settlements, it'll streamline the title process, you know,
Speaker 1: doing title searches, which is cumbersome right now and expensive
Speaker 1: and takes time. So by streamlining all these processes, it'll
Speaker 1: still be difficult to settle immediately on real estate because
Speaker 1: it's a little more complex than you know, other RW
Speaker 1: ways that are being tokenized, of course, but we can
Speaker 1: get to a point where there's near instant settlement and
Speaker 1: there's a very short gap between deciding you want to
Speaker 1: buy a property and actually closing on it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, right, the process can maybe be way shorter
Speaker 2: than it is currently.
Speaker 1: Right, absolutely, you know, I think that what people don't
Speaker 1: realize is there's two steps to the process of actually
Speaker 1: closing on real estate. There's the settlement and at the
Speaker 1: settlement and that's when the title agents put together the
Speaker 1: closing money is es road, title changes hands, legal conveyance happens,
Speaker 1: and then there's the actual recording of it. So then
Speaker 1: the package gets sent to the county clerk's office, the
Speaker 1: deeds get recorded there, and then it officially becomes recognized
Speaker 1: as a transfer of ownership. However, sometimes there's as much
Speaker 1: as a ninety day gap or more in between the
Speaker 1: settlement and the closing because of these bottlenecks that exist,
Speaker 1: and that's obviously extremely inefficient and it opens the door
Speaker 1: for more more realms of fraud.
Speaker 2: Then I've been through the process two times buying a
Speaker 2: condo and in a house. So if we can speed
Speaker 2: up that process and make it easier, I think it
Speaker 2: will save a lot of people a lot of stress
Speaker 2: at yeah time question and make things more efficient for all.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've in my real estate life, I've had
Speaker 1: deals that almost fell through because the day of the closing,
Speaker 1: you know, someone realized they have to go into the
Speaker 1: bank to actually do the wire transfer, and the bank
Speaker 1: is like, hey, you have to set an appointment, come
Speaker 1: back tomorrow and it's the time of the essence clothes,
Speaker 1: we need to close today, and they have no way
Speaker 1: to actually wire funds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you.
Speaker 2: Look at that and you're like, man, the solutions here,
Speaker 2: stable coins, blockchain and all that, right, you can get
Speaker 2: that done faster. But you know it's crawl walk run, right,
Speaker 2: We're getting there now. Earlier this year you the news
Speaker 2: of Balcony working to get Bergen County properties two hundred
Speaker 2: and forty billion in properties on the blockchain using Avalanche. Yep,
Speaker 2: tell us about the details there. Why Bergen County, Why
Speaker 2: Avalanche as well?
Speaker 1: Yep. So I'll start with Avalanche. So there we're building
Speaker 1: our l one on Avalanche. They've been great partners to us,
Speaker 1: and they allow you to fully customize your blockchain. So
Speaker 1: it's never been easier to kind of spin up a
Speaker 1: blockchain and create your own controls and permissions, which is
Speaker 1: really essential for when you're dealing with government records. Of course. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Bergen County, it's the largest county in the state of
Speaker 1: New Jersey. You know, being a real estate developer in
Speaker 1: New Jersey, I have relationships throughout the state, so it
Speaker 1: was a target of ours. And we met with the
Speaker 1: county Clerk, John Hogan. His name is I got to
Speaker 1: shout him out because it's really his leadership that enabled
Speaker 1: us to get to this point. And sure we realized that,
Speaker 1: you know, we started working together and we realized that
Speaker 1: there was a big opportunity there. He's always been at
Speaker 1: the forefront of technological advancement. Three years before the state
Speaker 1: mandated e files, they implemented it in Bergen County and
Speaker 1: then the state mandated it. So he's always looking out
Speaker 1: for his citizens and trying to protect them, and he
Speaker 1: realized that blockchain is a way to actually protect his
Speaker 1: citizens and their property rights. So we entered into a
Speaker 1: five year engagement with the Bergen County Clerk's office to
Speaker 1: migrate their deed processing onto the blockchain. It's the largest
Speaker 1: blockchain deed initiative in US history, and the goal is
Speaker 1: to create a permanent, immutable chain of title that preserves
Speaker 1: record integrity, mitigates deed and mortgage fraud, and provides real
Speaker 1: trust and transparency to citizens. So, like I mentioned, you know,
Speaker 1: the blockchain is this ultimate truth machine. And when you
Speaker 1: have documents that provably originated on chain from the governing
Speaker 1: body that's responsible for housing and maintaining these records. And
Speaker 1: you have a permanent and unalterable chain of title that
Speaker 1: can't be disrupted from some natural disaster or by a
Speaker 1: ransomware attack or hack. And you have you know, authenticated
Speaker 1: documents that are tokenized and are provably original, and you
Speaker 1: have this real, underlying source of truth that protects citizens
Speaker 1: and their property rights.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So you mentioned building that I think avalanche. They call
Speaker 2: it subnets if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they used to. Now they call them l ones
Speaker 1: oh once.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So with building your l one balcony, is is
Speaker 2: that a private chain? So can anyone access the information
Speaker 2: or is there certain guardrails?
Speaker 1: There're certain guardrails. So it's very important for real estate.
Speaker 1: Of course, when you know, if you're buying real estate,
Speaker 1: we need to know who you are. So anybody there's
Speaker 1: certain data that the normal people will be able to consume. Sure,
Speaker 1: but to contribute data to our network or to claim
Speaker 1: ownership over your asset, you need to prove who you are.
Speaker 1: Or if you're a business like a title company or
Speaker 1: a brokerage that eventually will be interacting on our network,
Speaker 1: you need to KYB yourself and we need to know
Speaker 1: who you are, and that way, when data is being
Speaker 1: originated from you, we know that it's approvably authentic source.
Speaker 2: So are you who are part of the authentication process?
Speaker 2: Is it Balcony and the.
Speaker 1: County, Balcony, the County and chain Link. Actually that's part
Speaker 1: of our partnership with chain Link, So you know, Balconies
Speaker 1: in the business of tokenizing real estate. At the asset level,
Speaker 1: any piece of real estate is composed of its authoritative documents,
Speaker 1: its ownership records, lean surveys, permits, and other legal instruments.
Speaker 1: So without bringing all of this on chain, you can't
Speaker 1: truly have a digitally native asset that could be programmed against.
Speaker 1: So in order to bring this on chain and verify it,
Speaker 1: we partnered with Chainlink. So anytime we source data from
Speaker 1: one of our government partners like Bergen County, chain Link
Speaker 1: Oracle will act as an independent validator of source provedance
Speaker 1: and data integrity. That way, anybody can authenticate the origin
Speaker 1: and the authenticity of the official record and know that
Speaker 1: it hasn't been tampered with.
Speaker 2: Wow, so it's amazing. As you're saying that, I'm just
Speaker 2: thinking you're using two blockchain protocols and the reason why
Speaker 2: I bring that up. Some people are like one blockchain
Speaker 2: to rule them all, but no, it's going to be
Speaker 2: a multi chain world. I totally do eight different things.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. And then you know the cool thing we
Speaker 1: talk about bringing two hundred and forty billion dollars of
Speaker 1: real estate on chain, Like, what exactly does that mean.
Speaker 1: We're actually tokenizing every property in Bergen County and we're
Speaker 1: tokenizing the legal instruments and indexing them per property. So now,
Speaker 1: over time that two hundred and forty billion dollars will
Speaker 1: be able to interact with the broader tokenize the economy
Speaker 1: that we all know is coming, which will open the
Speaker 1: door to to faster settlements, real time recordings, fractionalization of
Speaker 1: these assets, decentralized collateralization of these assets, which will bring liquidity, stable,
Speaker 1: token and crypto based settlements on these assets, all while
Speaker 1: maintaining the same trust and legal recognition that underpins real
Speaker 1: world real estate today.
Speaker 2: You know, you brought up some great points there, because
Speaker 2: this foundational layer of putting the deeds and having the
Speaker 2: documents so they're verifiable is definitely a foundational layer of
Speaker 2: where you can build on to your point of fractional
Speaker 2: If someone wanted to fractionalize a commercial building or even
Speaker 2: some sort of rental property or whatever it is, they
Speaker 2: can do that because they have the foundation in place
Speaker 2: to verify everything. And then people can say, you know,
Speaker 2: is this indeed property owned by John A or John
Speaker 2: Doe and all those things that we need to verify. Right,
Speaker 2: And then to your point, then you mentioned it earlier,
Speaker 2: we could potentially have NFTs that are like these living
Speaker 2: documents that say if there are changes to the house,
Speaker 2: when did it happen, who did it, who is the contract.
Speaker 1: In Yeah, we were turning every property into an NFL
Speaker 1: that becomes his digital vault or vessel for more information.
Speaker 1: So over time, more information gets compiled in there, and
Speaker 1: you have a real record of history that becomes permanent.
Speaker 1: So you know, think twenty years in the future. You
Speaker 1: have all this history now, so when you're doing due
Speaker 1: diligence you usually look at the last two years. Now
Speaker 1: you can look at everything and you don't need a
Speaker 1: third party to verify it because you could see where
Speaker 1: it originated from.
Speaker 2: Dan, I can't wait for that, and because I have
Speaker 2: my own experience anecdotally when buying a property and then
Speaker 2: you know years are you're like, who installed this thing?
Speaker 3: It's not up to code? Right, It's like, but it's hard.
Speaker 3: Where do you go find that information?
Speaker 2: The previous owner is gone, you can't go bother them,
Speaker 2: and even if you ask them, they I don't know
Speaker 2: who did it. But if you had an NFT that
Speaker 2: was logging all these things and people were mandated to
Speaker 2: log all these things, who's the contractor you use?
Speaker 3: When did you do this upgrade? Electrical? What're plumbing?
Speaker 1: And that environmental report?
Speaker 2: Like stuff like that, right, I could easily go back
Speaker 2: and say, Okay, this was the source of the problem.
Speaker 1: Absolutely yep. And I think that like we're moving towards
Speaker 1: the world of ton of like all our WA's being tokenized,
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of these security token exchange
Speaker 1: platforms are kind of moving away from real estate fractionalization
Speaker 1: because it's difficult, it's complex. As I said before, it's
Speaker 1: more complex and tokenizing other RWAs, So they've kind of
Speaker 1: like moved away from it because there's not much liquidity.
Speaker 1: But by doing what we're doing and giving the underlying
Speaker 1: asset legal authority, kind of creating this provenance layer for
Speaker 1: ownership records encumbrances and other verifiable data. We're really telling
Speaker 1: the full story and we're streamlining the process of data.
Speaker 1: So in turn, that'll open the floodgates for liquidity. And
Speaker 1: I think that the future we're heading towards is people
Speaker 1: being able to trade in and out of fractional property
Speaker 1: shares right from their phone, the same way that they're
Speaker 1: trading in out of stocks and crypto on Robinhood today.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I can't wait for that because I'm very curious. You know, well,
Speaker 2: I give the example I've given to a lot of
Speaker 2: people is if they tokenize certain properties in Manhattan because
Speaker 2: it's prime real estate and you know, you get.
Speaker 3: The scarce of the aspect. I'm going to buy some
Speaker 3: of those tokens for those properties because as a long
Speaker 3: term investment, I mean by hand it out to my kid.
Speaker 1: Right, there's somewhat of like a trophy aspect to it, right,
Speaker 1: Like if you're going to tokenize the Chrysler building, yes,
Speaker 1: you know you may you may pay more than what
Speaker 1: it's actually worth because you want to own a piece
Speaker 1: of it, so it could provide liquidity for developers, and
Speaker 1: you know, you're you're owning part of a landmark which
Speaker 1: is pretty cool.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, like Empire State Building as well, I'll do the
Speaker 2: same thing. Yeah, and then the possibilities with this new
Speaker 2: world token of the token economy and tokenization, you can
Speaker 2: then put that asset to work with DeFi use it
Speaker 2: as collateral and all that jazz.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, that's where we're headed. Yeah, So it just
Speaker 1: opens up bring liquidity to an e liquid asset class.
Speaker 2: Right, and then not only that, the person who's in
Speaker 2: some country in Africa or in Latin America who couldn't
Speaker 2: access any of these things, and like man, I wish
Speaker 2: I could own real estate overseas, but they don't have
Speaker 2: a billion dollars or whatever. But if they can buy
Speaker 2: one thousand dollars of tokens in the Empire State Building,
Speaker 2: that could be life changing for that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you get your proportionate share of the asset and
Speaker 1: your proportionate share of the operating income. So it allows
Speaker 1: a much lower barrier to entry financially for anybody to
Speaker 1: get involved. Right now, it's so difficult to buy real
Speaker 1: estate because it's so capital intensive and there's so much
Speaker 1: due diligence and so much maintenance. But if you have
Speaker 1: a couple thousand bucks and you want to start building
Speaker 1: a portfolio. You could invest in fractional shares of real
Speaker 1: estate and you could cater your portfolio that any way
Speaker 1: you want. You could own part of a hotel, you
Speaker 1: could own part of a commercial building, you could own
Speaker 1: part of a residential building, and so on.
Speaker 2: Right, and then with the NFTs we talked about earlier,
Speaker 2: you even if you're in one hundred thousand miles away,
Speaker 2: you're not even going to be able to visit here, right,
Speaker 2: you can verify everything.
Speaker 3: From that NFT. Well, what did they do this month?
Speaker 3: What upgrades did they make? Who did it and all
Speaker 3: that stuff?
Speaker 1: Right? Yep, yep, streamline due diligence.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Wow, It's just I'm just thinking the smoke
Speaker 2: is going up in my mind here right, Like, there's
Speaker 2: so many possibilities here. So it's an amazing feature that's
Speaker 2: being built here for all these properties. I'm curious about
Speaker 2: what does the process look like of tokenizing deeds as
Speaker 2: much as you can share.
Speaker 3: Is it a very long Is it going to take
Speaker 3: years or is it months?
Speaker 1: It'll take longer than months, but shorter than years. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have five years to get this done. We'll have
Speaker 1: it operating you know, much quicker than that. The difficult
Speaker 1: part is indexing historical deeds, which has actually been made
Speaker 1: easier because of AI. So we're able right now, like
Speaker 1: everything is kind of siloed in different systems and by
Speaker 1: you know, indexed by book and page number instead of
Speaker 1: indexed by parcel. So that's part of our problem we're
Speaker 1: trying to solve, is indexing deeds properly so you could
Speaker 1: tell the chronological order of history. And then once we
Speaker 1: get there, it's about, you know, the go forward, putting
Speaker 1: new deeds unchained and having them originate from the county directly.
Speaker 3: Got it.
Speaker 2: And then the the platform that Balcony has built, is
Speaker 2: this something that you're going to go to other counties
Speaker 2: even some places in Manhattan or Brooklyn, whatever. And in addition,
Speaker 2: are you going to like white label this platform to say, hey,
Speaker 2: the state of Las Vegas, you want to do the
Speaker 2: same thing, use our platform?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, So we started in New Jersey because that's
Speaker 1: where we're based out of, but we've already expanded outside.
Speaker 1: We're working in Wyoming right now, we're working in Virginia,
Speaker 1: and we're targeting other blockchain forward states. Funny you mentioned
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Brooklyn actually has one of the worst deed fraud
Speaker 1: in the entire country, so it's a problem they need
Speaker 1: to solve, and so we're looking to go anywhere where
Speaker 1: the state or the county actually cares about technology understands blockchain,
Speaker 1: so there's not as much as an education component, and
Speaker 1: then over time we'll be able to prove our use
Speaker 1: case and really scale nationally and internationally, because as we
Speaker 1: move beyond the borders of this country, we'll find that
Speaker 1: their systems are even more disarray than ours are here,
Speaker 1: and they're largely paper based, and when their paper based,
Speaker 1: they're subject to natural disasters like floods, fires, hurricanes that
Speaker 1: could destroy these records. And in twenty nineteen, when that
Speaker 1: hurricane hit Puerto Rico, a lot of their land records
Speaker 1: were just completely washed away. So there's all these title
Speaker 1: disputes now because nobody knows who owns what. So we're
Speaker 1: trying to preserve these records in a way that's permanent.
Speaker 1: When you put them on the blockchain, it's like etching
Speaker 1: them in stone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Dan, we were talking before the recording.
Speaker 2: I saw a brief clip I think it was on
Speaker 2: Instagram where these scammers they were trying to steal a
Speaker 2: brownstone from a person that passed away. I think you
Speaker 2: are familiar with the story. But like the deed, fraud
Speaker 2: is a big issue.
Speaker 1: Yeah, especially in probate cases like you're talking about. When
Speaker 1: somebody passes away and the family is like unaware of
Speaker 1: what assets they held, or there's no will set up,
Speaker 1: it's a golden ticket for scammers to come in and
Speaker 1: try to assign ownership of the asset to themselves. And
Speaker 1: like I mentioned before, with the rise and generative AI,
Speaker 1: it's never been easier to fab documents and it's not
Speaker 1: just a ded document. You have to tell a full story,
Speaker 1: so you could fabricate associated documents, payoff letters, power of
Speaker 1: attorney signatures, all this stuff that helps to tell a
Speaker 1: story to commit fraud.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so this technology will help stop a lot of that. Obviously,
Speaker 2: bad actors will find different ways to try to scamp people.
Speaker 2: With the point is we want to cut down as
Speaker 2: much of it as possible very minimum.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. And you know the other thing I mentioned
Speaker 1: is ransomware attacks. Ransomware attacks are getting out of control.
Speaker 1: It's becoming a serious problem. A lot of this aging
Speaker 1: legacy software wasn't built for the threats of today's world.
Speaker 1: It was built before I was born, even right, So
Speaker 1: ransomware attacks are increasing by one hundred percent year over
Speaker 1: year by some estimates. It's costing taxpayers tens of millions
Speaker 1: of dollars annually. Hoboken just got hit actually a year
Speaker 1: ago by a ransomware attack that cost them two million
Speaker 1: dollars and a lot of sensitive data was exposed. Suff Accounty,
Speaker 1: New York got hit with a massive attack where their
Speaker 1: systems literally were blacked out for two months, where nobody
Speaker 1: knew who owned what and what leans around what property.
Speaker 1: So it made it impossible to trade real estate.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And my fear is that one day it'll move beyond
Speaker 1: just ransomware attacks. It'll be a foreign enemy adversary that
Speaker 1: just wants to create chaos. They don't want money, They
Speaker 1: just want to black out our systems to mess with us.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 1: At that point it becomes a national security threat.
Speaker 3: Oh. Absolutely.
Speaker 2: And I mean we've seen you know, bits and pieces
Speaker 2: of this in different ways, companies, private companies, public companies.
Speaker 3: Getting attacked and data breaches and much more.
Speaker 2: And to your point, the technology is going to continue
Speaker 2: to get more sophisticated to AI you know, look, good
Speaker 2: actors can build AI tools and agents, and so can
Speaker 2: the bad actors.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you got to fight AI with AI. Obviously, you
Speaker 1: got to keep up. And I know government typically moves slow,
Speaker 1: but they have a duty to their citizens, to their
Speaker 1: constituents to stay up to date with technology and protect
Speaker 1: their property rights.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, and then look, I know we're a little
Speaker 2: bit far away from this, but quantum is coming, so
Speaker 2: it's best we get things in place in this way.
Speaker 2: When to qui technology comes along, you can quantum proof
Speaker 2: your blockchain, you know, to.
Speaker 3: Meet But if you're not even there yet.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're behind the curve man, exactly. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: that's where the world's going. We we think we could
Speaker 1: leap frog a lot of people over from like you know,
Speaker 1: from paper records straight to the blockchain. So there's you know,
Speaker 1: this evolution that's happened from filing cabinets to on prem
Speaker 1: computers to the cloud now to the blockchain. So we
Speaker 1: think that you know, a prime target for ours are
Speaker 1: counties that are still in paper, that are buried in paper,
Speaker 1: that you know, don't want to go through that gradual process,
Speaker 1: that want to kind of jump ahead and get right
Speaker 1: straight to the best technology that exists, Oh for sure.
Speaker 2: And then you know, in your you mentioned you were
Speaker 2: focusing on some of the blockchain friendly states, you know,
Speaker 2: those that are being a bit progressive on that front.
Speaker 2: What's it like talking to people in the real estate industry.
Speaker 2: Are they more open minded now that blockchain and crypto
Speaker 2: have become more prominent.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. It's slow process convincing real estate people who
Speaker 1: you know, like I said, it's still largely controlled by
Speaker 1: kind of the old school people that don't yeah, that
Speaker 1: don't like to change. But that's changing now, especially you
Speaker 1: see that these trends in tradfi. They're realizing that this
Speaker 1: isn't They're moving from skepticism to implementation because they know
Speaker 1: that it's cheaper, faster, and more transparent, which means more profits.
Speaker 1: And real estate brokers are realizing they could streamline the process,
Speaker 1: they could get paid quicker, they could settle on properties quicker.
Speaker 1: Title companies are realizing like, hey, you know, if we
Speaker 1: put this process on chain, we could actually do our
Speaker 1: title searches much more efficiently. We'll have less discrepancies, less
Speaker 1: you know, clouds on title and I think the entire
Speaker 1: world is going to move on chain, and it's really
Speaker 1: just like all the industry members moving on chain. It's
Speaker 1: not a process that replaces people. It's people that work
Speaker 1: with the blockchain and AI and technologies that are available
Speaker 1: to us that will help, you know, shepherd us into
Speaker 1: the future.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and yeah, to your point, it's gonna be a
Speaker 2: slow process to get somebody these people to get on board.
Speaker 2: I'm curious, are the like folks like the National Realtors Association,
Speaker 2: are they paying attention to things.
Speaker 1: I think they are. Actually I'm not one hundred percent sure,
Speaker 1: but I have heard rumblings about it, and I think
Speaker 1: that they need to do something. They've been hit with
Speaker 1: a lot of lawsuits lately, and it's becoming much more
Speaker 1: difficult for brokers to like interact in this world. They're
Speaker 1: getting attacked and there's like all these things that it's
Speaker 1: really like state by state as well, like New Jersey
Speaker 1: I think implemented a rule where you know, commissions have
Speaker 1: to be paid separately from the buyer and seller. And
Speaker 1: there's all these obstacles that are in the way for brokers.
Speaker 1: And if this industry is going to continue and thrive,
Speaker 1: they need to embrace through technologies.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, And you know, maybe part of the
Speaker 2: next real estate boom can include this technology.
Speaker 3: Just make things easier and more efficient.
Speaker 1: For everybody, yep, more transparent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and maybe help the real estate industry to look.
Speaker 2: I know the markets are very cyclical, right We've seen
Speaker 2: boom and bus but you know, if they are able
Speaker 2: to get to even fractionalization, it can open up some
Speaker 2: incredible investment opportunities where.
Speaker 1: People around and it'll open up tons of liquidity.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2: I know this is not crypto, but I did want
Speaker 2: to get your thoughts because this is right up your
Speaker 2: alley of your expertise. But how do you feel about
Speaker 2: the real estate market right now? I know rates are
Speaker 2: are is you in addition to the economic conditions? How
Speaker 2: people feel? You know, in a recession, should I hold
Speaker 2: off and buying? But how are things rebounding a bit
Speaker 2: or are getting worse?
Speaker 1: They're they're rebounding a bit. Rates are coming down. You know,
Speaker 1: nobody has a crystal ball, but we are expecting another
Speaker 1: rate cut at the next FED meeting, so I think
Speaker 1: that will be positive. I think that it's still difficult
Speaker 1: to sell your home because people who are locked in
Speaker 1: at three percent, where are they going you know, what
Speaker 1: are they going to buy? Because prices have gone up
Speaker 1: and interest rates have gone up, so there's a lack
Speaker 1: of inventory right now, which is the problem. And more
Speaker 1: people are rent thing than ever before because it just
Speaker 1: makes a lot more sense. So I think that the
Speaker 1: real estate market will continue to ease a little bit
Speaker 1: and get better as rates come down, and we should
Speaker 1: see more things open up. And I'm optimistic that that's
Speaker 1: that's the direction we're headed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm one of those people with the three percent rates.
Speaker 1: That yeah where you know where you go and you're stay.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I don't know if this makes sense, but I always
Speaker 2: I envision and I have this ideal thing of like
Speaker 2: can I transfer my rate over to a new house that.
Speaker 3: Will be nice?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is. It is possible to do to sign
Speaker 1: your mortgage. It's a little more comp It's usually done
Speaker 1: for like commercial properties, multi family stuff, but it is possible.
Speaker 2: Maybe it's something I should look into. Yeah, I talk
Speaker 2: to you off.
Speaker 3: Now. Obviously you're doing a lot of stuff.
Speaker 2: You're you're working on putting all these property deeds on chain.
Speaker 2: What else is on your roadmap as it relates to
Speaker 2: blockchain crypto?
Speaker 1: So that's the big thing. Obviously, we're trying to scale
Speaker 1: county to county and even we have some statewide initiatives
Speaker 1: as well once we've kind of we're trying to stay
Speaker 1: very focused right now because it's very easy to get
Speaker 1: distracted by shiny objects and there's a million things we
Speaker 1: could put on chain, but we have to perfect what
Speaker 1: we're doing with deeds and leans first, right. We're also
Speaker 1: exploring some pilot programs with title companies right now, not
Speaker 1: at liberty to discuss too much about it, but we
Speaker 1: think that they're a very valuable and important part of
Speaker 1: the process, and they're actually the front line of defense
Speaker 1: against against deed fraud, so it's very important to actually
Speaker 1: bring them into the process as well and work with them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So Dan, that means I'm going to have to
Speaker 2: have you back on the pod like almost every quarter.
Speaker 1: As I'm in, I'm in as you guys.
Speaker 2: Make updates because I'm just look, real estate is the
Speaker 2: world's largest acid class, so putting that on chain. Look,
Speaker 2: we all need shelter, right, We like, we gotta be
Speaker 2: living in somewhere we're going to be out and the
Speaker 2: weather conditions, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3: It's important.
Speaker 1: It starts with government because they're the ultimate arbiter of
Speaker 1: land records and ownership records, right, So we realized they
Speaker 1: needed to come on chain first before we could get
Speaker 1: the rest of the real estate economy on chain.
Speaker 3: Right. So you really, like I said earlier, you're setting
Speaker 3: that foundational.
Speaker 2: Infrastructure that's exactly key pillar exactly. You know, i'd love
Speaker 2: to get your thoughts on this because we're seeing the
Speaker 2: Trump administration and I.
Speaker 3: Think it was Bill Poulty, if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 2: Part of the housing heads up the housing in the
Speaker 2: Trump administration. I think he said they want to have
Speaker 2: crypto be used in mortgages of Fanny Made Freddie mac mortgages.
Speaker 3: What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 1: So I believe what he said was that they would
Speaker 1: allow for you to use your bitcoin or you know,
Speaker 1: some other crypto as either collateral or be used when
Speaker 1: assessing your your personal financial statements. So I think that's
Speaker 1: extremely valuable. You know, I've back in my days before
Speaker 1: I started Balcony, I've tried to show you know, my
Speaker 1: balance sheets in crypto and banks are like what am
Speaker 1: I looking at? Yeah, exactly, So I think that it'll
Speaker 1: help that process. And also, like with proof of reserves.
Speaker 1: You'll be able to streamline the process of doing these
Speaker 1: cumbersome personal financial searches on individuals because you'll be able
Speaker 1: to use like zero knowledge proofs to prove your balance
Speaker 1: sheet without being totally invasive. So I think it's like
Speaker 1: a very positive step in the right direction.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, it's such a validation to your point.
Speaker 2: I'm in the same boat years ago if I brought up, hey,
Speaker 2: I have X amount of crypto?
Speaker 3: Who cares? I can't do anything about it.
Speaker 1: They're like, oh, it's gonna could crash tomorrow. I don't care.
Speaker 3: But now that's changing, and I can imagine if the
Speaker 3: government's giving the green light here, the big banks when
Speaker 3: they're issuing mortgages are going to look at the same thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no question. I think.
Speaker 3: Actually, if I'm.
Speaker 2: Not gonna saying, JP Morgan recently said they were going
Speaker 2: to allow or look at their clients crypto holdings and
Speaker 2: that could be used as collateral.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think all the big banks are
Speaker 1: going to get on board. I think, like back in
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, they put up a lot of resistance and
Speaker 1: then they realized that there's nothing they could do. It's
Speaker 1: here to stay and we got to kind of jump
Speaker 1: on the bandwagon or we're gonna fall behind.
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, So are you seeing demand from people looking
Speaker 2: to buy properties with crypto?
Speaker 1: So actually, it's funny you say that. Some of the
Speaker 1: title companies we've been speaking to actually have said, yes,
Speaker 1: there's people that come to us that want to settle
Speaker 1: in bitcoin or in stable tokens, And I said, oh, cool,
Speaker 1: Well what do you do And they're like, oh, we
Speaker 1: turn them away, like we don't want to deal with that.
Speaker 1: It's a headache. And I'm like, there's going to be
Speaker 1: a growing need for it, especially with the passage of
Speaker 1: the Genius Act, like it'll become commonplace for people to
Speaker 1: want to settle in stable tokens. We want to set
Speaker 1: up those rails, and we want to make it easier
Speaker 1: for title companies to understand what's happening and get involved
Speaker 1: because there is a growing need for it.
Speaker 3: So would you have to partner with like crypto exchanges,
Speaker 3: like a coinbase for example, to settle escrow and all
Speaker 3: these things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'd partner with with like a circle and we'd
Speaker 1: set up the rails for you know, or there's state
Speaker 1: issued stable tokens now, So like Wyoming. You know, we're
Speaker 1: working with Wyoming. We've met with Senator Lummus multiple times.
Speaker 1: She's amazing. She's really like spearheading a lot of this
Speaker 1: digital asset legislation that's going in front of Congress right now.
Speaker 1: And a good great use case for their stable token
Speaker 1: is for tax payments for settlements, you know, to actually
Speaker 1: close on real estate. And we want to set those
Speaker 1: rails up so that you could actually close entirely on chain,
Speaker 1: have the transfer of funds happen entirely on chain, and
Speaker 1: then have those transfer tax payments and recording fees actually
Speaker 1: get sent to the government on chain, and actually the
Speaker 1: entire escrow. You know, there's a ton of people that
Speaker 1: need to be paid at the closing. There's the brokers,
Speaker 1: the title agents, insurance, there's all, you know, the county.
Speaker 1: We could set up a way that everyone gets paid
Speaker 1: instantly over blockchain rails. Now it takes we to you know,
Speaker 1: settle everything. Oh so just streamline the you know, flow
Speaker 1: of payments.
Speaker 3: That would be nice.
Speaker 2: Dan, I guess that having gone through the process and
Speaker 2: waiting for a disc check.
Speaker 3: To Claire and blow up.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's horrible, right.
Speaker 3: But if we can be instantly.
Speaker 2: Whatever it is US DC or Wyoming stable coin doesn't matter,
Speaker 2: as long as it converts to the US dollar.
Speaker 3: That would be amazing.
Speaker 1: Absolutely.
Speaker 2: So you you mentioned like crypto legislation, what Senator Lummus
Speaker 2: and so forth has been doing. Obviously a lot of
Speaker 2: people are waiting for the Clarity Act, the Market Structure
Speaker 2: bill we mentioned the Genius Act got passed. You know,
Speaker 2: what are your thoughts on what the market structure the
Speaker 2: impact the Market Structure Bill will have on the industry
Speaker 2: and innovation and things like that.
Speaker 1: I think it'll be enormous. I think it'll allow institutions
Speaker 1: to understand what we're doing. It'll bring real clarity to
Speaker 1: the space, and it'll give regulations, which is what we want.
Speaker 1: We want those regulations. I was actually in d C
Speaker 1: when they passed the Genius Act. I worked with Stand
Speaker 1: with Crypto, which is coin bases advocacy group that you know,
Speaker 1: helps to foster positive legislation and help educate senators and
Speaker 1: congress members and whatever. And the thoughts up there on
Speaker 1: the hill, the sentiment was very inspiring. Everybody was inquisitive.
Speaker 1: They all wanted to learn a lot of them you know,
Speaker 1: we're just learning, like had no clue, no like foundational
Speaker 1: understanding of blockchain, but they knew that it was here
Speaker 1: to stay and it's become a bipartison issue. Both sides
Speaker 1: care about it now and they want the United States
Speaker 1: to be a leader in this technology. So it's really
Speaker 1: inspiring seeing this come from the federal government. We're obviously
Speaker 1: working more with like state and local governments. It's starting
Speaker 1: to trickle its way down, but it's super important what
Speaker 1: they're doing right now, and you know they're they're really
Speaker 1: going to help, you know, keep blockchain companies inside of
Speaker 1: the United States.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a key point in keeping them in the
Speaker 2: United States because there was a period of four years
Speaker 2: where people.
Speaker 1: Were, yeah, ye're fleeing is scary.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was rough times, man, But yeah, we.
Speaker 1: Were working in the space at the time. We were
Speaker 1: trying to convince governments to go on chain right after
Speaker 1: the FTX collapse, and there was a ton of skepticism.
Speaker 1: They're like, oh, are you guys a fraud? Are you
Speaker 1: gonna scam us? And whatever. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: education that needed to be done. That's why I thank
Speaker 1: you at the top of the podcast, is it's so important.
Speaker 1: Education is key, it really is, because there's so many
Speaker 1: misconceptions around blockchain, and it's the same thing with any
Speaker 1: new technology. There's going to be people who use it
Speaker 1: and people who abuse it, and that doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: the technology is inherently bad.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2: You know, I like to remind people about the early
Speaker 2: days of the internet, Right, it was first used by
Speaker 2: the gambling people, the adult content people, but then eventually
Speaker 2: it became the way we communicated with each other, the
Speaker 2: way we do commerce and get our content and all
Speaker 2: these things. But if you looked at it in early
Speaker 2: days and some of the headlines, remember some people are
Speaker 2: saying the Internet wouldn't be greater than the fax machine
Speaker 2: stuff like that, and it's like, really, yeah.
Speaker 1: I watched the old videos of like Bill Gates trying
Speaker 1: to explain it and like a late night show and
Speaker 1: everyone's like what but there's like a fax machine and
Speaker 1: there's a telephone. Why do you need that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, And it's just you know, it's a human element, right,
Speaker 2: is psychology like change, It is hard for people. Sometimes
Speaker 2: we get settled in how things are and it's like
Speaker 2: hard to imagine a world different and then something that's
Speaker 2: new that we don't fully understand.
Speaker 3: It scares us. You know, we have the natural reaction
Speaker 3: like I don't know about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, So I feel like Crypto is going through that,
Speaker 2: but it's getting better. And you know, one of the
Speaker 2: ways that I feel is going to help Crypto get
Speaker 2: more visibility, more awareness is tradify. I mean all of
Speaker 2: them are here, Dan, the big banks, the Wall Street firms,
Speaker 2: and they're building, they're tokenizing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I love to see it. You have people
Speaker 1: like Larry Fink, who's the CEO of Black Rock, talking
Speaker 1: about how every asset, every instrument will be tokenized. We're
Speaker 1: moving towards this world of twenty four to seven trading,
Speaker 1: of efficiency, of you know, cheaper costs and transparency, and
Speaker 1: you know, I'm all about it. And that's why we've
Speaker 1: kind of raised our hand and said, you know, we'll
Speaker 1: we'll take the tough task of bringing the governments on
Speaker 1: chain and creating that legal foundational level to make everything
Speaker 1: else flow.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, And that's such like I said, real
Speaker 2: estate the world's largest acid class, right, and we need
Speaker 2: all need shelters. There's no way to avoid that. This
Speaker 2: is something I need to go unchained. The process needs
Speaker 2: to get better, and you guys are certainly leading you
Speaker 2: know the charge there, Dan, great stuff, man, I love it,
Speaker 2: And like I said, We're gonna have to do more
Speaker 2: interviews because.
Speaker 1: I'm open man right across the river. Yeah, anytime.
Speaker 2: We're very close. So I got some wrap up questions
Speaker 2: here for you. Sure, First, if you could create your
Speaker 2: own metaverse, what would.
Speaker 1: The the be so kind of like I guess a boring answer,
Speaker 1: but I would literally just recreate the physical world in
Speaker 1: digital space because then it would be easy to find
Speaker 1: the geolocations of a property, walk around it, do a
Speaker 1: virtual walk through, actually put offers in streamline your due
Speaker 1: diligence right there from the luxury of your couch. So
Speaker 1: I would just you know, take all the properties were tokenizing,
Speaker 1: put them in the metaverse, and make it like this big,
Speaker 1: you know, digital marketplace to actually buy real estate.
Speaker 3: Dan. I think I feel like that's on your roadmap
Speaker 3: balcony roadmap.
Speaker 2: Possibly because if you think about it, that's something I've
Speaker 2: thought about too, Like if I could be immersed, Like
Speaker 2: let's say I want to be it's someplace in Japan,
Speaker 2: and I don't I don't know Japan that well, but
Speaker 2: I can go pinpoint a location I'll be staying, Like,
Speaker 2: walk around and see what it looks like.
Speaker 3: Anders, I know what to expect.
Speaker 1: When yeah, you know what's in the neighborhood. You know,
Speaker 1: if you're right next to a giant telephone pole or whatever.
Speaker 1: And then they already have great three D walkthroughs. I'm
Speaker 1: sure you've seen them, like Zillo whatever. You could actually
Speaker 1: walk through the apartment and see it. So we're getting
Speaker 1: to a point where you could you could have a
Speaker 1: full immersive experience within real estate and you could look
Speaker 1: at let's say you want to go look at ten
Speaker 1: different properties. It's very difficult to do that in an afternoon. Yes,
Speaker 1: now you could do it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, and then check out the neighborhood and you know,
Speaker 2: and it's it's with the blockchain technology, with AI and
Speaker 2: so forth, it's real time immersive and it's just a
Speaker 2: different experience. I know what to expect whether I'm looking
Speaker 2: to buyer property or going on vacation, I know what
Speaker 2: to expect and that that's really helpful. Yeah, absolutely, rapid
Speaker 2: fire questions favorite food steak, I'd say, I don't know
Speaker 2: if you've ever been to Dino and Harry's and Hoboken
Speaker 2: when you when you were there, but great steakhouse.
Speaker 1: I highly recommend.
Speaker 3: I have dad brain these days. I didn't remember, Like
Speaker 3: I don't remember what happened last week with my daughter,
Speaker 3: but I think I've been there.
Speaker 2: I'll double check with my wife. But yes, taking my
Speaker 2: favorite as well, favorite musician.
Speaker 1: Or band Lil Wayne. I'm I'm a hip hop guy.
Speaker 3: It's a favorite movie.
Speaker 1: I would say Interstellar. I like sci fi movies.
Speaker 3: That's one of my favorites as well.
Speaker 1: Favorite book, staying in the same vein, I would say
Speaker 1: Hyperspace by Michio So it's about higher dimensional space string
Speaker 1: theory and it's really just like I read it and
Speaker 1: it opened my eyes to the possibilities of our universe
Speaker 1: and kind of just hooked me. And you know, it's
Speaker 1: pretty cool understanding these like theoretical but possibly true underpinnings
Speaker 1: of how the universe actually works and opens your mind
Speaker 1: to higher dimensions the multiverse, like all all this cool stuff.
Speaker 3: I'm very into that stuff too, So I'm gonna check
Speaker 3: that out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we do a whole other podcasts on that.
Speaker 3: And when you're not working, what are you doing for
Speaker 3: a fun.
Speaker 1: So these days, I'm a dad of too, So you know,
Speaker 1: between that and running a startup, there's I don't have
Speaker 1: much free time. But lately I've gotten really into running,
Speaker 1: so I go to the gym every single day for
Speaker 1: at least an hour. I run, I lift a couple
Speaker 1: times a week, hit the sauna and steam room, and
Speaker 1: while I'm doing it, I listen to books on Audible
Speaker 1: or podcasts just to learn more about what's going on.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like killing two birds with one stone,
Speaker 1: you know. I get I stay healthy, and I'm able
Speaker 1: to learn while i'm doing it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I'm the same way I hit the gym,
Speaker 2: I got my pods in listen to a podcast or audiobook.
Speaker 3: So yeah, good stuff, Dan.
Speaker 2: I love what you guys are doing, and certainly this
Speaker 2: is the future, and I feel like maybe five years
Speaker 2: from now we'll look back at a conversation like this
Speaker 2: and like, look at what's been set up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't wait. Thanks again for having me, Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: thank you