Bitcoin mortgage: possible in the US, not here yet

In the United States you can now take out a mortgage with bitcoin as collateral, without selling the bitcoin. Coinbase and mortgage lender Better made the product generally available in August 2026. In Europe you cannot, and MiCA is not the reason — the reason is how a European mortgage is calculated.

What Coinbase and Better actually launched

Better issues the mortgage, Coinbase holds the collateral. You pledge bitcoin or USDC as security and use it instead of savings for the down payment. The loan itself is an ordinary American mortgage: The Block reports that the first lien is structured as a ‘standard conforming mortgage under Fannie Mae guidelines’ — inside the existing rules, not beside them.

Here is the point that matters: you do not sell your bitcoin. Bitcoin Magazine quotes the parties saying a borrower can pledge their coins ‘without having to sell it or face margin calls’. Anyone who bought in 2020 and now wants a house does not have to trigger a taxable sale to fund the deposit.

The demand was there before the product opened. The waitlist represented more than 260 million dollars in expected loan volume, according to The Block. Of that waitlist, 76 per cent were already Coinbase One members and 60 per cent said they intended to buy a home within six months. Better says 41 per cent of its approved customers pass on income and credit but lack the cash for a down payment. That is the gap this product closes.

Coinbase One members also receive a credit worth 1 per cent of the mortgage, capped at 10,000 dollars, applied to closing costs.

The product is available in the United States only.

Why this does not work in Europe

The misconception is that crypto regulation is the obstacle. It is not. A European mortgage is bounded by your income, not by your collateral. How much you may borrow follows from lending norms; the value of the property and of any security sets an upper limit on top of that at best. A pile of bitcoin therefore does not increase your borrowing capacity, even where a lender would accept it.

And lenders barely do. In the Dutch market — the one we can document — both De Hypotheekshop and Vastgoed Actueel write that ‘only a handful of financiers accept crypto as own funds’. The usual route is a detour: you sell your crypto, let the euros arrive in an ordinary bank account, and contribute those as your own money. Even then acceptance differs per lender, and you must be able to evidence where the money came from.

Income from crypto trading generally does not count at all. Both sources report that lenders as a rule leave it out — the earnings are too erratic to build a thirty-year obligation on.

Rules differ per country. Check what your own lender and supervisor say before you assume anything from this article applies where you live.

What MiCA does do here

MiCA makes the origin of crypto-assets traceable: an authorised platform knows who you are and where your coins came from. That touches exactly the point where a notary or a bank now stalls on the detour above — the question ‘where did this money come from’. Both Dutch sources name it as the most likely route by which crypto becomes easier to accept as own funds over time.

That is a different thing from bitcoin as collateral. Traceability smooths the detour; it does not make the American construction possible.

If you want to know which platforms hold a MiCA authorisation and what that authorisation covers per platform, it is in our MiCA file.

The risk that does not fit in the headline

A loan with bitcoin as collateral is a leveraged position, even when nobody calls it that. If the price falls, the cover falls with it. The American product is offered with the promise that you will not face a margin call, but the conditions under which that holds sit in the contract, not in the press release — and we have not seen those conditions.

Two things you give up either way:

• The keys. Pledged collateral sits with the custodian, not with you. That is the opposite of self-custody.
• The freedom to sell. For as long as the loan runs, you cannot simply walk away if you change your mind.

If you would rather keep your bitcoin in your own hands, read how self-custody works first.

And tax?

In most European countries crypto counts towards your taxable wealth or capital gains even while it is pledged as security, and a debt may or may not offset it. The rules differ per country and this is not tax advice. Check your own tax authority before you act on any of it.

Frequently asked questions

Can I buy a house with bitcoin in Europe?

Not directly with bitcoin as collateral. The practical route is to sell, let the euros arrive in a bank account and contribute those as your own funds — and even then not every lender accepts it.

Does bitcoin raise my maximum mortgage?

No. The maximum follows from your income. Assets can help with the down payment, but they do not increase your borrowing capacity.

Does income from crypto trading count?

As a rule, no. Lenders generally leave those earnings out.

Do I have to sell my bitcoin for the down payment?

In the United States, not with this product. In Europe, selling and converting to euros is currently the usual route.

Is this coming to Europe?

Nothing has been announced. The product is available in the United States only.

What to take away

The American market solves a real problem: people with wealth in bitcoin but no cash for a deposit. That problem exists in Europe too, but the answer here does not sit with the collateral — it sits with the lending norms, and those do not change because a crypto product launched.

If you want to compare where in the EU you can buy and hold bitcoin with an authorised platform, we put the seven largest side by side on our comparison page.