By ALEX VEIGA
Prospective homebuyers who have invested in certain cryptocurrencies will be able to use their holdings as collateral to fund their down payment on a home as part of a new mortgage offering.
Real estate services company Better Home & Finance Holding Co. plans to roll out the crypto-backed mortgage sometime in the next three months in a partnership with crypto trading platform Coinbase, the companies said in a press release Thursday.
“Better was founded to make homeownership more accessible for all Americans, and this partnership with Coinbase introduces a new pathway to realizing the American Dream for the 52 million Americans who own digital assets,” said Vishal Garg, Better’s CEO, said in the release.
Use of cryptocurrency for buying a home remains generally limited. Among the respondents in a National Association of Realtors survey of people who bought a home between July 2024 and June 2025, only 1% of those who made a down payment said they used proceeds from the sale of crypto.
However, the crypto-backed mortgage from Better would not require borrowers to sell their crypto investments to fund their down payment. Instead, borrowers who qualify for the mortgage would only have to pledge such holdings and transfer them to Coinbase as collateral for their down payment.
This allows the crypto investor to not have to lose out on potential future gains in the value of their crypto the way they would if they sold their holdings for cash.
Should their crypto drop in value, the mortgage terms remain unchanged and no additional collateral is required, the companies noted in the release. However, borrowers’ crypto collateral would be at risk of liquidation if they fail to make their mortgage payments for 60 days.
The only type of cryptocurrencies that borrowers will be able to offer up as collateral for Better’s crypto-back mortgage are Bitcoin and USDC, a type of cryptocurrency typically bought and sold for $1, the companies said.
Better noted that the crypto-backed mortgage is “designed in accordance with Fannie Mae guidelines.” That means they can be guaranteed by the mortgage giant, which makes them eligible for “significantly lower interest rates,” than those of other crypto-backed loans, the companies said.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which have been under government control since the Great Recession, buy mortgages that meet their risk criteria from banks, which helps provide liquidity for the housing market.
Banks seeking to make mortgages that qualify for purchase by the mortgage giants have not typically considered a borrower’s crypto holdings until they were sold, or converted, to dollars.
Last June, the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which oversees Fannie and Freddie, ordered the agencies to prepare a proposal for consideration of crypto as an asset for reserves when they assess risks in single-family home loans.
Shares in Better Homes & Finance Holding rose 5.4% Thursday. Coinbase fell 4.3%.
