Dennis Hope started selling land on the moon in 1980. By 2009 he said he had sold $2 million worth of lunar property.
There are many organizations that will sell you land on the moon, Mars, or even Venus. But any document that claims a person owns land on the moon – or anywhere in space – means nothing because no government would support it. This is thanks to the United Nations' Outer Space Treaty.
The field of space law grew in the 1950s when humans first started exploring space. It was around this time that the UN started to think about writing laws for space.
In 1958 the United Nations created the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. Today this committee includes Japan, China, the US, Russia, and many other nations.
In 1960, nine years before humans first landed on the moon, the International Institute of Space Law was launched to make sure that nations worked together on laws related to space.
This led to the creation of the United Nations’ Outer Space Treaty. The Treaty was approved in 1967 and says that space cannot be owned by any nation on earth. So even if a country colonizes Mars, they won't own the planet.
The Treaty makes sure that space is free for all nations to explore.
However, NASA and other organizations plan to land on Mars within the next few decades. This raises interesting questions for space law: how closely will countries and organizations follow the Outer Space Treaty, and how can the laws be enforced from Earth?
