Dubai Land Department Moves Tokenized Property Into Resale Phase

The first phase of the project, which concluded last year, saw ten Dubai properties tokenized on blockchain infrastructure, representing more than $5 million (AED 18.5 million) in real estate value. Around 7.8 million fractional tokens were issued to investors during that initial rollout. What the market lacked at that stage was a mechanism for resale. Phase Two addresses that gap by enabling token holders to participate in regulated secondary trading within a structured and supervised environment.

The secondary trading model operates through the project’s designated distribution platform and remains aligned with Dubai’s formal land registry system. This alignment is significant. One of the longstanding concerns surrounding real-world asset tokenization has been the disconnect between blockchain records and legally enforceable ownership. By integrating token transfers with the Dubai Land Department’s registry processes, the initiative seeks to ensure that on-chain transactions reflect legally recognized property rights.

The infrastructure underpinning the project runs on the XRP Ledger, selected for its low transaction costs and settlement efficiency. Asset custody is handled through Ripple Custody, providing institutional-grade safeguarding of tokenized assets. Ctrl Alt, which operates as a licensed Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP), is responsible for the tokenization framework and issuance mechanics.

Under Phase Two, two types of digital instruments are utilized: ownership tokens representing fractional interests in real estate assets, and Asset-Referenced Virtual Asset (ARVA) management tokens designed to facilitate compliant transfer and oversight. The structure is intended to allow resale activity without undermining regulatory transparency or investor protections.

Robert Farquhar, CEO, MENA at Ctrl Alt stated: “We’re proud to work with the Dubai Land Department and VARA on Phase Two of the project, demonstrating what is possible when governments and institutional-grade innovation come together to build market-leading digital rails. Native tokenization only reaches its full potential when assets can move efficiently post-issuance, and secondary market trading is essential to that outcome. By establishing robust tokenization infrastructure that supports the regulated transfer of tokenized land title deeds, Dubai is setting a global benchmark for how assets can be issued, traded, and managed on-chain.”

Matt Acheson, CPO at Ctrl Alt, added: “Our goal was to build a secondary market infrastructure that is efficient for the entire ecosystem while maintaining the controls and governance required by the DLD and VARA. To achieve this, Ctrl Alt engineered a sophisticated technical framework to facilitate the dual operation of ARVA management tokens and ownership tokens seamlessly on-chain. We manage the underlying complexity of this tokenization technology so that distribution platforms like PRYPCO and others can deliver smooth, fractional real estate experiences to their end users, without the requirement of building and managing the tokenization infrastructure themselves.”

The introduction of secondary trading is likely to be viewed as a critical inflection point for tokenized real estate. Liquidity has long been one of the primary criticisms of early tokenization experiments globally. While fractionalization lowers the barrier to entry for investors, the absence of resale markets limits flexibility. By introducing a regulated trading environment, Dubai’s model aims to reduce that friction and potentially attract a broader class of participants.

Dubai has positioned itself in recent years as a jurisdiction willing to experiment with digital asset frameworks under defined regulatory oversight. The involvement of the Dubai Land Department in the design and rollout of the tokenization initiative signals that this effort is being treated as an extension of formal property infrastructure rather than an isolated blockchain pilot.

The coming months will reveal how actively the secondary market develops in practice. Market depth, pricing transparency, and investor participation will shape how quickly the platform matures. Even at this early stage, however, the move from simple issuance to regulated tradability marks a meaningful structural step in the evolution of tokenized real estate.

The project began with ten tokenized properties, and the move into regulated secondary trading marks a clear expansion in scope and ambition. The framework now offers a practical model for how governments can integrate blockchain-based fractional ownership into established real estate ecosystems while preserving legal clarity.