Bit2Me finalizes cryptocurrency platform for buying and selling real estate and luxury cars

This article was written and published in Spanish and has been translated into English via Google Translate. Click here to read the original article.

The use of bitcoin as a currency in commercial transactions is still very scarce in Spain. However, this could begin to change soon.

Bit2Me, a leading Spanish cryptocurrency platform, is finalizing the launch of a portal specialized in the sale of real estate and luxury cars, using bitcoin as a payment method.

Bit2Me is expecting the portal to launch in the coming weeks, according to knowledgeable sources of the project have commented. After months of work, there are barely any loose fringes left so that the initiative starts rolling mostly linked to the legal part of it, since the objective of the new tool is also to give legal support to both parties in the sale of real estate or high-end vehicles.

The project partly replicates the failed model of Inmolead, a Spanish real estate agency that only accepted bitcoin as a payment method and that operated from the end of 2017 until the summer of 2018. However, the objective of Bit2Me is to go one step further and also offer luxury vehicles in its new portal. Currently, with more regulation in some respects on the implications of sales with the Queen cryptocurrency and with a greater diffusion of it among the Spanish population, its promoters hope to enjoy greater success.

In this sense, a look at some of the most popular classified ads sites in Spain is enough to realize that more and more owners are putting up a property for sale and accept bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as a payment method. This practice is more widespread among those who have had some contact with the world of ‘crypts’ or are regular investors in this class of digital assets, according to analysts in the sector.

A difference with respect to the Inmolead project is that the new portal plans to focus its business on luxury real estate, a sector in which a greater purchase and sale activity with cryptocurrencies has already been proven, according to sources close to its developers. The same goes for high-end cars. In this specific segment, the Bit2Me platform has the experience of the international Bitcoin Real Estate website and several leading brand dealers, especially British.

"The first sale of a property in bitcoin in Spain took place at the beginning of 2018, when a private investor decided to buy an attic with the 'cryptos' in which he had transformed an inheritance."

The renowned international portal has published 24 properties for sale in Spain right now. Of these, four are located in Madrid, as well as in the Canary Islands and Catalonia and one in Ibiza. Although there is variety, these are mainly high-class properties located in prominent areas of their respective locations. The bulk of the potential Bitcoin Real Estate business is in Europe, where it has 93 properties for sale, many of which are hotel and commercial facilities.

In Spain, the first operation of buying and selling a house with bitcoin took place at the beginning of 2018, when a man who had invested an inheritance in the well-known cryptocurrency was made with an attic in the Imperial Tarraco Plaza of Tarragona. For the property he paid 40 bitcoin, which at that time was 550,000 euros. 

Also in Catalonia, another pioneering project in real estate investment and cryptocurrencies was developed, although with different results. The Tile Investor from Girona, whose social media profiles still exist even though she is currently inactive, came to develop a token issuance project, an operation better known by the English acronym ICO, with the aim of facilitating the access of the retail public to large real estate investments.

FINANCE AND NOTARIES

One of the key points for the launch of the new portal that Bit2Me prepares is the one that concerns legal issues. In this sense, since the bitcoin does not have currency exchange recognition in the Spanish regulation, the implications derived from the sale of any good in this currency are multiple. That is why they require well-trained professionals in the field, especially in a link as decisive for this type of operations as that of the notary.

In this sense, legal sources indicate that the most common in these cases is that the buyer and the seller agree on a date for the operation in which the price in bitcoins will definitely be set based on their change to euros. Then, we proceed to the delivery at the act and before a notary of the amount established and the property is written for its corresponding value in euros, although the same thing is that in the registration documentation it is collected that the operation has been carried out in cryptocurrency, since either for the entire amount or by the same.

Beyond this culmination of the closing of the operation, there are another series of fiscal implications that should be taken into account and that would be identical in the case of a vehicle. The buyer should collect in his income tax return (IRPF) if he has had any increase or loss of assets from the acquisition of his ‘crypts’ until his delivery as payment of the good in question.

“Luxury goods are the assets that are most bought and sold in bitcoin in second-hand markets due to the large sums that are mobilized in each operation."

As regards the implications for the seller, he must consider that he will have to do the same in the future if he uses the digital currencies received as a payment method for another operation. In addition, in the case of the sale of real estate, you will have to face the possible taxes - such as capital gains - in euros, since no Spanish public administration currently accepts these currencies. In fact, only a few territories around the world do so, with the great exception of Japan, where bitcoin has been recognized as money to be able to exercise greater fiscal control over it given the popularity it enjoys in the country.

At the moment, in addition to the initiatives already mentioned, another one that seems to work in the combination of cryptocurrencies and real estate is that of the CryptoCribs portal, which offers apartments for short stays worldwide and only admits that payments are made in this type of currency . The one that becomes the ‘AirBnB in bitcoin’ currently includes seven properties in Spain, of which six are located along the Mediterranean coast, while the seventh is located in Seville.

The Spanish cryptocurrency industry points out that the main use of bitcoin as a currency is currently focused on hospitality and, above all, on e-commerce platforms, whether aggregators such as 'marketplaces' or specific sites of brands and companies concrete. For now, they recognize that this use is still very incipient among the Spanish population, which fundamentally continues to perceive and use the digital currency as a capital reserve or a means for speculative investment.

This article was written and published in Spanish and has been translated into English via Google Translate. Click here to read the original article.

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