Can Bitcoin solve the broken homebuying math? Milo thinks it can

If you’ve spent any time house hunting lately, you’ve likely had an easy time finding a place to live… but a harder time actually making the math work.

Miami-based fintech Milo has spent the past several years tackling that problem for a particular group: people who may have significant wealth in Bitcoin and other digital assets, but whose financial lives don’t fit neatly into a traditional mortgage application.

Now, founder and CEO Josip Rupena is looking for more ways to bridge that gap.

“We’re finding that people that are coming in wanting to buy primary homes, they have Bitcoin, but then they also have, ‘Can I get a lower rate?’” Rupena [pictured above] told Refresh Miami.

Milo has spent much of this year working on ways to expand how customers can qualify for mortgages, while exploring partnerships with larger financial companies that could offer Milo’s products to their own customers. The company is also examining how it can bring down borrowing costs as the gap between renting and owning remains stubbornly wide.

Consumer interest, Rupena said, has remained roughly flat year over year. The bigger challenge has been turning that interest into actual home purchases.

Milo entered the year expecting interest rates to fall and hoping home prices would soften. Neither has happened to the extent many buyers hoped, Rupena said. In Miami, high-end home prices in particular have remained strong.