Buying a house with Bitcoin (partially)

kate4doom

I bought some Bitcoin half way up the last price surge and sold near the top. Paid CGT. Had the funds in a deposit account for the last year or so. Now looking to buy a house, gains from the bitcoin speculation will fund a small proportion (maybe 25%) of the house price.

I just found out that the conveyancer that I previously used will not handle a property purchase funded wholly or partly from sale of crypto currency.

Is this common? Am I going to struggle to get a new conveyancer?

user1977

Yes, I would expect there to be general wariness about how to clear funds derived from Bitcoin. But not impossible - you will probably need to specifically search for solicitors who have experience.

Worried_fool

Tell your conveyancer that you can document that your funds were held in a deposit account for the last year: see if that is good enough for them. State that the original source of funds was "sale of investments".

mebu60

You are part funding purchase from your savings held as cash in a deposit account. Why bring bitcoin into it? You could have built up the savings from multiple sources over many years.

user1977

Why bring bitcoin into it?

I assumed because the solicitors wanted to look back far enough that the source became apparent. But if they're only wanting to see, say, three months of statements, I agree there's no need to blab about where the money used to be invested.

mebu60

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81925150#Comment_81925150

State that the original source of funds was "sale of investments". - only if they ask.

Albermarle

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81925230#Comment_81925230

There are no hard and fast rules. Some solicitors seem happy to see the last three months, and others ask for 10 years ( which is ridiculous but we have seen threads on here about that). Hopefully yours will be happy with no more than the last 12 months.

kate4doom

Can someone PM me with the name of a solicitor who only asks for 3 months bank statements?

Herzlos

Do you have a paper trail for the money before it went into bitcoin? Because the AML checks are just checking that the money came from legitimate means, and if you show legitimate source → bitcoin → account it should look reasonable.

If you've got mystery money → bitcoin → account then it'll look a lot more suspicious, as crypto has a terrible repuation for laundering, etc.

kate4doom

Current solicitors initially looking for 12 months bank statements and I got the impression they could easily ask for more.

Separately to that they are clearly stating up front that thay won't get involved if funds come from crypto. Sure I can avoid mentioning bitcoin but if they go back a few months more then they will see it.

Bigphil1474

You are unlikely to find a solicitor who won't ask where the funds came from. I had funds from an inheritance sat in savings for a couple of years, still had to show where the funds came from at the beginning. They are checking for money laundering, you wouldn't need to be a particularly smart launderer to put the money in savings for a year then hey presto they are free from any close investigation. Just not gonna happen. They'll want to see source of funding to buy the crypto as a start. This is a good article - https://www.kingsleynapley.co.uk/insights/blogs/real-estate-law-blog/buying-property-with-the-proceeds-of-cryptocurrency-practical-insights-and-legal-considerations