🌱Real-Estate Tokenisation in India — Opportunities, Challenges, Market Size, and Active Platforms

Real-estate tokenisation — converting property rights or cash-flows into tradable digital tokens on a blockchain — promises to reshape how capital, ownership and liquidity work in India’s property markets. Below I map the commercial opportunity, the regulatory and operational risks, current market sizing estimates, and the platforms already experimenting with tokenised real-estate products.

➡️Why tokenisation matters (opportunity snapshot)

• Fractional ownership and lower ticket sizes. Tokenisation makes high-value assets divisible, expanding access from institutional buyers to retail and affluent investors who can buy small fractions of income-producing assets.
• Liquidity and secondary markets. Properly structured tokens can trade in regulated secondary venues, reducing the long lock-in typical of real estate investments and unlocking price discovery.
• Improved transparency and governance. On-chain records of ownership and income allocations can improve auditability, enable programmable rights (dividends, buybacks), and reduce settlement friction.
• New capital solutions for developers and asset managers. Developers can securitise future cash-flows or income-producing assets to raise capital more flexibly, while asset managers can create tailored products (duration, yield, geography). These commercial levers make tokenisation attractive to investors, platforms and sponsors who want to scale access and operational efficiency in a traditionally illiquid asset class.

➡️Market size & growth outlook

Market estimates for the broader tokenisation opportunity in India show rapid growth potential. Industry forecasts place the India tokenisation market (all asset classes) in the low-to-mid hundreds of millions USD in 2024–2025, with multi-year CAGR estimates in the high single digits to low double digits, depending on definitions and scope. One market outlook projects India’s tokenisation market expanding from roughly USD 113.6 million (2024) to USD ~477 million by 2030 (CAGR ~22.6%), while other specialist reports for asset tokenisation expect steady growth through the remainder of the decade.

What this implies for real estate: Tokenisation of real-world assets (RWA) remains a small sub-segment today but can scale quickly if regulatory clarity, trusted custody and secondary trading infrastructure come together. Several consulting and legal studies published in 2024–25 identify real estate as a primary candidate for early adoption because of its size, established cash-flows and institutional interest.

➡️Regulatory and structural challenges (hard realities)

Tokenisation faces a layered set of constraints in India:

1. Regulatory classification and pathway. Tokens may be treated as securities, commodities, or payment instruments depending on structure and rights attached. Indian regulators (SEBI, IFSC, RBI and relevant ministries) have issued consultation papers and guidance signalling interest, but the legal pathway for pure tokenised ownership and secondary trading is still evolving. Vehicles like AIFs, InvITs and the newly designed SM-REITs provide existing, clearer legal frameworks for fractionalised real-estate exposure — many tokenisation solutions therefore use hybrid structures that map tokens to interests in regulated vehicles.
2. Custody and enforceability. On-chain tokens must map reliably to enforceable off-chain title and contract rights; this requires robust legal wrappers, title insurance, and trusted custodians. Without this, a token is merely a ledger entry with limited legal recourse.
3. KYC/AML and investor protection. Any tradable security must satisfy stringent KYC/AML and investor protection norms — a complexity for platforms aiming at retail participation.
4. Secondary market liquidity and market-making. Liquidity depends on regulatory-approved trading venues, market-makers, and settlement rails — all nascent in India for tokenised RWA.
5. Operational complexity and standards. Interoperability (which chain, token standard), accounting/tax treatment, valuation norms, and governance standards all need to be standardised to build institutional confidence.

➡️Existing real-estate tokenisation activity and platforms in India

A number of Indian firms and platforms are piloting tokenisation or offering tokenisation infrastructure. Below are representative players and the role they play (this is illustrative, not exhaustive):

• Antier Solutions — provides white-label tokenisation platforms and end-to-end tokenisation services (technical, legal, issuance). Antier is often referenced as a principal systems integrator for RWA tokenisation projects in India. (
• Alt DRX — an India-focused platform covered in trade press for launching tokenised real-estate products aimed at improving access and liquidity for investors. Reporting highlights product launches that fractionalise ownership and provide digital investor experiences.
• RealX / Real tokenisation marketplaces — niche proptech platforms (and emerging startups) actively marketing tokenised property shares or revenue streams; many adopt hybrid legal structures tying tokens to interests in regulated trust/vehicle structures.

Note: many Indian efforts take a conservative, compliance-first approach by mapping tokens to interests in AIFs, InvITs or SM-REIT-like structures rather than attempting to create entirely novel token-native securities. This hybrid approach lowers legal risk but can limit the pure-play liquidity benefits until trading venues and rulebooks mature.

➡️Commercial use-cases that will scale first

1. Fractional ownership of completed income-generating assets (office towers, warehousing, rental housing) — predictable cash flows make legal and commercial underwriting easier.
2. Developer project finance via future receivables securitisation — tokenising future cash flows (sale proceeds, lease income) as short-term instruments to bridge funding gaps.
3. Retail access to institutional-grade assets (student housing, logistics parks) — packaged for yield-seeking retail investors with appropriate risk controls.
4. Private markets secondary trading — where tokens provide tradability to otherwise illiquid investor stakes (subject to regulatory approval).

➡️Practical recommendations — what sponsors, platforms and regulators should focus on

• Sponsors & developers: Start with hybrid structures that map token rights to regulated investment vehicles; test investor demand for tokenised tranches with clear distribution limits and standardized disclosures.
• Platforms & technologists: Build robust legal-tech integration (title, escrow, custodians), deliver strong KYC/AML, and partner with regulated custodians/exchanges to design compliant secondary liquidity. Standardise token data schemas for valuations and income distributions.
• Regulators & policy makers: Publish clear frameworks for tokenised securities, custody rules, and trading venues; enable sandbox pilots focused on retail protection, taxation clarity, and insolvency resolution for tokenised claims. Several Indian legal analyses and think-pieces recommend a phased, regulated sandbox approach.

➡️Conclusion — realistic timeline and outlook

Tokenisation is a powerful set of tools, but not an instant fix. In India, the near-term growth path is likely to be measured and institution-led: pilots and product launches for institutional and high-net-worth investors, followed by carefully regulated retail offerings once custody, enforceability and secondary trading norms are in place. If regulators maintain a balanced, clarity-first approach and market participants build interoperable, legally sound structures, tokenised real-estate could materially broaden investor access and unlock new capital flows over the next 3–7 years. Current market reports show strong upside potential, but scaling will require coordinated policy, legal innovation and credible platform infrastructure.