California-based blockchain startup Propy is building a global peer-to-peer real estate exchange platform with decentralized title registry aimed at facilitating international real estate purchases.

Built on Ethereum, the platform promises to automate real time transaction process using smart contracts, enabling greater efficiency, lesser paperwork and lower costs for buyers and sellers in the global real estate marketplace.

“Propy is proposing a new decentralized global real estate market with a unified real-time transaction interface approaching the functionality and speed of electronic stock market exchange platforms,” said Natalia Karayaneva, CEO of Propy. “It will allow real estate assets to become liquid, while providing users with greater control and protection of their property rights.”

Propy aims to solve the current problems facing international real estate transactions by creating “a novel unified property store and asset transfer platform” for the global real estate industry. Through the Propy Registry, the startup is set to introduce a platform for electronic property rights transfers that supports international ownership transfers.

A blockchain-based property ownership recording system

The Propy Registry is powered by smart contracts to track and execute real estate transactions according to regional regulations. By using the Ethereum blockchain, Propy allows brokers, buyers, sellers, and title agents/notaries to sign off on transactions using private keys within their existing legal frameworks.

The ERC20 Propy Utility Token (PRO) is required to interact with the Propy Registry specifically when users need to change ownership of a title or register a new title.

Karayaneva, a 12-year veteran of the global real estate industry and the owner of a UK-based overseas property firm, said she expects the first transactions to be made on the Propy Registry by the end of 2017. She said that the startup is currently negotiating with several governments to accept the title deed issued by its distributed registry as legal proof-of-ownership.

Propy’s mobile app, which consists in a real estate listing platform and an online property store, is already live. It allows users to find properties and initiate the purchase process.

The company claims it is currently being used primarily by users from China, Russia, the Middle East and other regions who are looking for properties in the US, the US and the United Arab Emirates.

Earlier this month, at the CoinAgenda Europe 2017 event, Propy was awarded third place in the startup contest in recognition of the disruptive potential of its real estate marketplace.