9.5.2022
After a new regulation allowing property transactions in cryptocurrency, an apartment in Portugal was sold for Bitcoin.
In a reported first for the country, an apartment in Portugal was sold with the buyer paying directly in cryptocurrency. Under a new regulation that allows real estate transactions with digital currencies, the home was purchased for three bitcoins without being converted to euros.
Buyer uses Bitcoin to pay for an apartment in Braga, Portugal.
A three-room (two-bedroom) apartment in the Portuguese city of Braga was purchased entirely with cryptocurrency, with no conversion to fiat money. According to local media reports, the transaction is a first in the history of the country’s real estate market.
The new owner paid 3 bitcoins (BTC) for the house, which was worth around 110,000 euros at the time of purchase. The title deed was transferred in Porto’s Póvoa de Varzim district on Thursday, May 5, according to the business news portal Idealista.
The transaction was facilitated by the real estate agency Zome, the law firm Antas da Cunha Ecija, and partners from Switzerland’s Crypto Valley. The President of the Portuguese Chamber of Notaries was also present.
Direct cryptocurrency property purchases are now possible in Portugal, thanks to a new provision recently adopted by the Order of Notaries, the body that regulates notary activities in collaboration with the Ministry of Justice.
Previously, coins had to be converted to euros before being paid to a seller. Now, real estate acquisition can be a 100 percent crypto operation in which digital money is exchanged for property rights.
Certain procedures must be followed in order to comply with anti-money laundering regulations. Before the coins are transferred, the source of the fiat funds — a bank account — from which the digital assets were purchased must be specified, as well as the public address of the crypto wallet.
The news of the crypto-funded property deal comes after the Bank of Spain revealed in a recent report that Portugal’s share of the volume of crypto transactions in the eurozone exceeds the weight of its GDP in the single currency area’s economy.
Portugal has become a hub for tech innovations, a home for digital nomads, and, most recently, a refuge for refugees from Ukraine’s crypto sector, thanks to relatively low living costs and a crypto-friendly tax regime. Gains from the sale of bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies are not taxed in the country.
