My best friend and I were online last night looking for gifts to buy for our roomates and friends for christmas. We came acroos lunarlandowner.com and we looked around their website for a little. Now they are offering one acre of land on the moon for $29.95. Supposedly when you buy it you get a deed and everything. Now i was kind of curious so if we own that piece of land on the moon, and in the future if we ever let tourist to the moon or ever live on the moon wont that acre of land sky rocket? Now my question is what is the legality of selling property on the moon? Can someone actually do that? Can i acutally own a acre of the moon or is this total BS.?
What if they oversell the space of the moon? Or an acre that you buy is unusable for whatever reason? Is an acre in the centre of a crater worth more than an acre not there? What about the part where Neil Armstrong first stepped on? Is that section worth more than others? Can you pick your acre on the moon?
Each package contains the deed for one acre of land and it lists the actual location of the property by quadrant, latitude and longitude. A lunar map accompanies this, marked with an X showing the location of the property. This American company’s spacecraft is very first COMMERCIAL mission to the Moon.
It states that they give you a specific spot and they also say elsewhere on the site that they are the only company that can legally sell land on the moon. Kind of sketchy, but not sure if it is a joke or not.
I wouldn’t call it a joke, it’s more of a novelty.
In general, no one owns the moon. Hence, no one can sell the moon. While some companies have made claims to the moon, legally, they have little ground to stand on. So if you like the novelty idea of it, go for it. It’s rather similiar to the idea that you can buy the name of a star.
Sure, you could buy a piece of the moon, and it’d be legally yours… at least until someone actually lands in your spot and sets up shop. It worked the exact same way back in the late 16th-early 18th centuries with land in North America (and again in the 19th century when the US was in its expansion era). A person could easily buy a large amount of land on the Ohio River, but unless they could back it up, their deed was worth about as much as the paper it was written on.
Long story short: if you buy a piece of the moon, be prepared to build your own rocket to get there and back it up. Reminds me of a friend who had three Plutos FedEx’d to him overnight…
The UN Outer Space Treaty of 1967 stipulated that no government could own extraterrestrial property. However, it neglected to mention individuals and corporations. Therefore, under laws dating back from early US settlers, it is possible to stake a claim for land that has been surveyed and register it with the US Government Office of Claim Registries. In 1980, that is exactly what Dennis Hope did for land on the Moon as he established the Lunar Embassy to parcel and sell documented acres. The Lunar Embassy was obligated to inform the General Assembly of the United Nations, the US Government, and the Russian Government in writing of the claim and legal intent to sell extraterrestrial properties. These governing bodies had several years in which to contest the claim and they never did. This allowed Mr. Hope to take the next step and copyright his work with the US Copyright Registry Office and begin selling actual deeds for the land on the Moon. Probably the biggest support of Mr. Hope’s claim has been in the form of actual Lunar land owners such as two former US presidents, NASA employees and many well known celebrities.
If you look around the site, there is a lot of information.
I wrote to Mr. Hope a while ago questioning the legality of his claims and this was his reply:
Dear Sam: Greetings from the Galactic Government and the Lunar Embassy. Thanks for the email and the interest in what we are doing. I will try to explain this in a short note. You are right. I took advantage of a loophole in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty from the United Nations. According to their language in the treaty, “No nation shall have sovereignty or control over any of the satellite bodies,” pretty much sums it up. If no nations have sovereignty or control they do not have the right to grant me permission to do this. The actually do not have the right to say yes or no. After 21 years of selling these properties to more than 1,090,000 persons in 176 countries I can tell you that it has been and continues to be a wonderful journey. We are compliant with all laws reflecting what we do. We actually got concerned enough about the laws here that we formed the Galactic Government in July 2001, so that we could take charge of our own destiny without intervention from any of the governments on this planet. We are like any other growing company on Earth the only real difference is that properties we sell are not located here. I hope this helps. If not, please feel free to contact me by phone anytime… With warm regards from the Galactic Government and the Lunar Embassy Dennis M. Hope CEO/President - Galactic Government AKA: “The Head Cheese” .
Well, as long as the ‘Galactic Government’ says it’s ok…
SHYSA! that’s a lot of money…how can they really “claim ownership” of the moon though, seriously. I say we discover a new planet, call it FIRST, and sell land on it for 30 bucks and split the money between all the active teams! That would be one good way to keep teams!! haha
The Lunar Embassy’s FIRST SPACECRAFT PROJECT is happening in 2004. Lunar spacecraft will transport our Official Lunar property Registry to the lunar surface for storage.
Looks like they might be using some of that fortune on that.
PAH!! - Who needs stinkin’ little ol’ piece of moon dirt? I would much rather get a whole star!!!**
But in the mean time, let’s analyze this. So Dennis Hope found a loophole that (so he claims) allows him to sell lots on the moon. At the same time, the very same UN Outer Space Treaty that provides the loophole also states that the moon and other celestial bodies are not, and can not be, owned by any (terrestrial) government. But what happens if someone else comes along and starts to sell lunar land plots as well - perhaps even the very same ones that Mr. Hope has already “sold”???
If that happened here, Mr. Hope would take you to court and present his title to the land and challenge your right to resell the title without ownership. But in the case of a lunar land rights dispute, no U.S. (or any other terrestrial) court has jurisdiction, due to the very same UN Outer Space Treaty. And there is no recognized Lunar Government with authority or jurisdiction either. Thus, there is no way for Mr. Hope to appeal to any recognized authority to prevent anyone else from laying claim to and selling “his” moon property.
So what we have here is a business model that, according to Mr. Hope, has resulted in over 2,000,000 sales at $29.00 each, or gross proceeds of >$58,000,000. Combine that with the lack of any government with jurisdiction over lunar land disputes, and the inability of Mr. Hope to prevent the formation of similar companies. To me, it sounds like the result is a great opportunity for a start-up business! Anyone interested in opening up a “Lunar Real Estate Office” ???
(note to self: copy this one over to the “Fundraising” thread! )
-dave
** actually, I did this several many years ago for my wife for her birthday. It was a lot of fun, and you do get a nice certificate out of the deal (even if it has no real legitimacy with the formal star naming process that is managed by the International Astronomical Union).
My parents actually bought a start for me when I was born. I’ve got the charts and papers and everything in a packet in the downstairs closet somewhere. I plan to set up shop there someday.
