In recent years, blockchain technology has received increasing attention in the real estate literature. Moreover, recent evidence suggests that blockchains could provide some added benefits for the real estate sector even in the current hybrid settings, where blockchain is usually just an add-on to existing systems. This research provides an up-to-date and systematic understanding of blockchain’s theoretical potential, pros, and cons for the real estate sector. The research aims to understand why and where to apply blockchain in real estate by conducting a systematic review that identified 296 relevant documents and performed a thematic content analysis. The identified blockchain adoption proposals were classified using standardized real estate vocabulary. Most of the literature focused on blockchain possibilities within land administration, followed by property transactions, real estate investment, leasing and renting, and real estate administration. However, real estate development and real estate maintenance did not appear as attractive real estate subsectors for blockchain. This paper provides a detailed analysis of blockchain technology’s possibilities for each real estate subsector, i.e., blockchain merits, and discusses the pros and cons. Last, this review provides suggestions for future research directions.

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Energy plays a crucial role in smart and sustainable cities as buildings and construction account for 36 % of energy consumption. The electrification of heating and transportation could significantly increase buildings’ electricity consumption. Previous literature has focused on on-site energy, especially in the energy community context, to encourage the cities to participate in the energy transition. However, on-site electricity can only produce one-fifth of the total demand. When pooled together, households could contribute to off-site electricity production to bring negotiation power and subsequent economic and environmental benefits. This paper examines households’ opportunities to contribute to off-site electricity production and electricity prices by utilizing the energy community concept. It quantifies the economic benefits for the households participating in a community power purchase agreement in the context of Helsinki, Finland. It presents a blockchain-based platform to facilitate the establishment of community power purchase agreements.