As homeownership slips further out of reach, Better and Coinbase show a new path is possible for qualified buyers to secure a mortgage using Bitcoin as collateral
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--$BETR #BETR--Better Home & Finance Holding Company (NASDAQ: BETR), and Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN), today announced the funding of the first Fannie Mae-backed mortgage backed by Bitcoin in the United States. The companies also confirmed plans to make the product available to qualified borrowers nationwide by Summer 2026.
In March 2026, Better and Coinbase announced plans to offer the first Fannie Mae-eligible token-backed mortgage. The product is designed to address the evolving financial profiles of modern homebuyers, based on how they store wealth and how the mortgage system has traditionally evaluated it. Initially supporting Bitcoin and USDC, the product allows borrowers to pledge digital assets as collateral, enabling them to secure a mortgage without liquidating their holdings. The companies plan to expand support to additional digital assets as the market matures.
At Better, 41% of pre-approved customers qualify on income and credit but do not have the cash for a traditional down payment. At the same time, the median age of first-time homebuyers in America reached a record high of 40 years old, driven by high mortgage rates, rising home prices, and limited inventory, according to the National Association of Realtors. That number is a sharp jump from the median age of 32 recorded in the same report a decade ago. Token-backed mortgages unlock housing accessibility and financing flexibility for the next generation of home buyers.
“The 30-year fixed mortgage was designed for a generation that kept its savings in a bank account and built equity through a single employer. That’s not the financial reality of millions of qualified buyers today that are building real wealth in digital assets,” said Vishal Garg, Founder and CEO of Better. “We’re excited to expand access to all qualified borrowers to fix an ongoing issue: buyers who qualify on every measure that matters but cannot clear the down payment hurdle because their wealth isn’t where the system expects to find it.”
The first loan was closed by Joe and Amy, a married couple in their early 30s in Ann Arbor, Michigan, who were preparing for the next chapter of their lives with a growing family. Joe, a software engineer, and Amy, a graduate student, had built meaningful savings in digital assets but faced the same obstacle that stops millions of qualified buyers: insufficient cash for a traditional down payment. Rather than liquidating their long-term Bitcoin position, incurring capital gains taxes, and forfeiting future upside, they pledged their crypto as collateral and successfully purchased their first home.
“Buying our first home has always been the goal, but I wasn’t willing to give up a decade of investing to get there,” said Joe, Better’s first token-backed mortgage customer. “With this mortgage, I didn’t have to choose. We closed on our home and my Bitcoin stayed intact. We didn’t have to liquidate, didn’t have to time the market, and didn’t have to start over financially to achieve our homeownership goals. That meant everything.”
Better selected Coinbase to power its token-backed mortgage offering because Coinbase is the most trusted crypto exchange in the U.S., with the security, compliance, and operational rigor required to bring a first-of-its-kind product to market responsibly. For many homebuyers, crypto represents a meaningful part of their financial picture, and Coinbase already serves as the trusted digital asset and infrastructure partner to millions of retail users, more than 150 government agencies, and over 300 institutional clients globally.
“At Coinbase, we believe that Bitcoin should do more than sit in a wallet. It should work for the people who hold it,” said Mark Troianovski, Head of Consumer & Platform Partnerships at Coinbase. “Funding the first token-backed conforming mortgage is one of the most tangible demonstrations of that vision that we have seen. Tens of millions of Americans have built real wealth in digital assets. That wealth now has a direct path to homeownership, creating new opportunities for the next generation of homebuyers.”
Through Better and Coinbase’s collaboration, eligible borrowers can use their crypto wealth toward homeownership through a product built on institutional-grade custody, compliance, and risk management infrastructure. Learn more at https://better.com/crypto-backed-mortgages.
ABOUT COINBASE
Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN) is on a mission to increase economic freedom in the world. The most trusted crypto platform, Coinbase stores more digital assets than any other company and is building the everything exchange — one place to access crypto, equities, derivatives, prediction markets, and more. Coinbase serves consumers through its suite of financial apps, institutions through Coinbase Prime, and developers through the Coinbase Developer Platform. Every experience runs on Coinbase's full-stack platform powering the future of finance: secure custody, deep exchange liquidity, stablecoin infrastructure, and global settlement rails — all built on a decade-plus foundation of security and compliance.
ABOUT BETTER HOME & FINANCE
Better Home & Finance Holding Company (NASDAQ: BETR) is the first AI-native mortgage and home equity finance platform, and first fintech to fund more than $110 billion in loan volume. Better has leveraged its industry-leading AI platform, Tinman®, to achieve its singular mission of making homeownership cheaper, faster, and easier for all Americans. Tinman® allows customers to see their rate options in seconds, get pre-approved in minutes, lock in rates, and close their loan in as little as three weeks. In addition, Betsy™, the first AI loan agent built exclusively for the mortgage industry, revolutionizes the homebuying journey by answering questions, delivering approvals, comparing products, processing rate locks, and moving their loan application along to closing 24/7/365. Better’s mortgage offerings include GSE-conforming mortgage loans, FHA and VA loans, and jumbo mortgage and home equity loans. Better serves customers in all 50 US states and the United Kingdom.
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Contacts
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