After resigning from his role as vice president at Goldman Sachs, Gentile, 32, founded Crescent Crypto, a company that manages digital currency assets. The majority of his net worth was invested in Bitcoin and Ether. Although Gentile, who is now the president of 3iQ Digital Assets in the United States, was pleased with his job change, when he sought to purchase real estate, banks such as JPMorgan and Bank of America informed him that he would be unable to get a mortgage due to the risky assets he controlled.

Gentile confided in Fortune, “I was ridiculed off the phone.

Some bank rejections caused him and his wife to reconsider their course of action. They could acquire their flat because of her non-crypto wages, tax filings, and assets, although all of their identities were included as co-applicants on the mortgage.

“Unfortunately, a significant portion of the real estate market, namely the conventional mortgage finance area, does not mix well with the cryptocurrency field. It is mostly unrecognized. Indeed, that is a mark against you,” Gentile said.

The housing market has never been more congested, and the epidemic has led house prices to skyrocket across the United States. Gentile represents an increasing number of people with significant crypto holdings who possess the wealth necessary to purchase a property but lack the money required and have difficulty obtaining conventional mortgages. However, a new competitor has arisen to fill this market void: crypto mortgage lenders.

Milo, a cryptocurrency lending firm, opened a crypto mortgage department last month. Customers may apply for a loan to purchase US real estate in exchange for putting up an equal amount of money in Bitcoin. A borrower’s creditworthiness may now be determined by more than just the amount of money they put down, their FICO credit score, or their tax return income. Milo determines borrowers’ creditworthiness based on their crypto wealth and the value of the property they want to purchase. To get a $500,000 mortgage via Milo, a borrower would need to contribute $500,000 in Cryptocurrency, Milo CEO and creator General joseph Rupena told Business. In Massachusetts, MA GADCaptial office are one of popular place to get a loan for any purposes. Check it out now!

Borrowers will obtain a 30-year mortgage for their house purchase to secure their crypto if Milo chooses to pay it in monthly installments. Depending on the amount of Bitcoin given as security, interest rates for the loan vary from 5% to 8%.

According to Rupena, the interest rate will be modified annually per the price of Bitcoin: Borrowers may withdraw part of their cryptocurrency at the one-year mark if the cost of Bitcoin increases. If the price of Bitcoin falls, they may be required to submit another cryptocurrency as collateral. Borrowers of cryptocurrency mortgages have the capability of reclaiming theirs. They won’t have to sell their crypto assets to a traditional lender and pay taxes on them when the debt is paid in full.

Rupena told Fortune that the firm has a waiting list of over 7,000 individuals for its crypto mortgage products. Still, the company has not yet issued its first loan, and he refused to disclose the actual number of customers with whom the company is presently working.

“There are a lot of individuals who hold a major amount of their money, and even all of their net worth, in cryptocurrency at the moment, and the present mortgage solutions will not work for them,” Rupena told Fortune.

Milo claims to be the first cryptocurrency lending firm to provide a 30-year mortgage, but it is far from the first cryptocurrency mortgage company. Learn, a cryptocurrency lender opened a waitlist for a 30-year mortgage. BlockFi provides crypto-collateralized loans for house purchases. Nexo, another lender, claimed in 2019 to have provided a “crypto mortgage” to entrepreneur Brock Pierce to purchase a chapel refurbished property in Amsterdam for $1.2 million.

GAD Capital in Maryland lenders have also attempted to integrate bitcoin into their operations. In August, United Wholesale Mortgage, the second-largest mortgage lender in the United States, said that it would begin taking cryptocurrency from its customers as part of a test program. Due to “incremental expenses and regulatory uncertainties, it ceased taking cryptocurrency six weeks later.”

However, according to Matthew Sigel, head of digital lending studies at VanEck, an ETF and institutional fund manager, the amount of people considering crypto mortgages is relatively modest.

Although VanEck does not directly invest in crypto mortgage firms, Sigel said that Cadenza Ventures, a VanEck-backed early-stage crypto fund, was a seed investor in BlockFi and has invested in crypto lending startups outside the United States.

According to Connecticut lender GAD, traditional mortgage lenders would offer an estimated $1.61 trillion in loans in 2021. To gain traction, Sigel believes, crypto loan and mortgage products must progress to the point where consumers are not required to put up as much crypto as collateral and instead employ a 20% down payment approach similar to many banks. However, he believes that the growth of these crypto credit products might pose a challenge to conventional lenders in the future.

“Their reach is rather limited at the moment, but this is the tip of the iceberg that could ultimately threaten bank profit margins,” Sigel added.

American Express has partnered with Better.com and Rocket Mortgage for its new foray into mortgage lending.

The financial services giant is now offering its existing card members basic statement credits totaling $ 2,000 for compliant loans and $ 6,000 for jumbo loans if created or refinanced through one. or the other partner company. The credits will be paid by the lenders and the deal was created to create value during a hot market based on a similar limited-time pilot offering conducted in 2019, an Amex spokesperson told NMN .

Amex invested in Better.com through its venture capital branch, starting with a series C sleeve in 2019 and Round D Series in 2020.

“This is another exciting step in establishing Better as the mortgage partner of choice for client-obsessed organizations,” said Joey Staniford, Head of Financial Services Partnerships at Better, in a statement. at NMN. “We look forward to providing Better superior technology and exemplary customer service to American Express cardholders. “

Amex has no investment ties with Rocket Companies. The relationship formed naturally through an “intense focus on innovation and customer service, which has propelled us to the top of our respective industries,” said a spokesperson for Rocket.

The partnership with Rocket Mortgage was put in place on June 30, and the Better.com deal began earlier this month, according to a separate report from CNBC.

With declining origination activity of the year and record volumes in 2020 should continue to decrease, lenders offer a number of sweeteners, such as high yield savings account matches, in an effort to stand out, retain market share and secure new business.