Rent to Venezuelans in Chile — Payment with Cryptocurrencies

Juan Luis
Juan Luis
Aug 31, 2018 · 5 min read

@ We have all seen the terrible situation that Venezuelans are experiencing in their country. Many have emigrated to different countries, one of them is Chile, perhaps because they see in that country the possibility of starting a new life with better conditions. Many arriving find a series of difficulties to find housing, something as basic but at the same time as necessary, as a decent place to live, to sleep, rest, etc.

In Chile, when people rent a property, they must contact a property broker or directly with the owner of the real estate, in the latter case the commission payment for brokerage is “saved”. The large part of the landlords ask as a requirement to lease; indefinite work contract, income earned like employee should exceeds the rental fee at least in a 3: 1 ratio, irreproachable financial history (typically the Dicom report is requested by the private company that shows a financial scoring of the persons), 1 year seniority ideally with the same employer, sometimes crediting the payment for the full year (if that is the term) with checks, among other requirements. That is the norm, the frequent, the “formal” at the time of renting either a house or a department. Regarding the money requested, it is normally a month of rent, plus 1 or 2 months of guarantee and the commission of the broker (a) in case of participation of this intermediary that normally corresponds to half the rent canon both to the lessee and to the landlord, in USD a generic situation of someone looking to rent:

USD 500 as first month lease fee + USD 500 guarantee + USD 250 brokerage fee = USD 1,250 (considering only 1 month guarantee)

Since they are newcomers, they can not fulfill all the requirements and therefore it is difficult to find a home to live in. Unfortunately, the leasing party is not very flexible and seldom gives in to the “lack” of guarantees on the part of those seeking to lease.

In my opinion as a landlord, a tenant who does not fully meet the typical requirements does not mean that he is a bad payer, in fact I have leased to people who did not meet the requirements described above and have never given me any headaches or have fallen behind in the payment of the rent. We could call it luck, maybe yes, maybe not. I prefer to think that it is more important to know the person and that the person is reliable because of a set of other characteristics that the typical requirements do not show. Call it a gut feeling, instinct, or whatever you want. On the other hand, the fact that a tenant meets 100% of the requirements does not assure you that you will not have problems such as the non-payment of rent, deterioration of real estate, lawsuits, etc.

In that sense, I have the concern to create a property broker that in addition to seeking a commission, has a social sense, particularly in the initial stage that can empathize with people who are living in Venezuela and have plans to come and live Chile, specifically in the city of Santiago, which is where more job opportunities will be compared to other cities.

How about being in Venezuela to coordinate the lease of a property in Santiago? Imagine the following situation:

Pedro lives in Venezuela, plans to come to Santiago de Chile, enters a website or an app that allows him to find his next home. Once you agree with the price of the lease, the location and characteristics of the property you decide to reserve, for this you do NOT need to pay with CLP the Chilean peso, but you can do it with cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ether, Stellar or another.

How is Pedro going to convert his local money into Crypto?

He has several options, just to list some

1.- LocalBitcoins.com
2.- Cryptocurrency exchange houses in Venezuela
3.- Use a friend who has crypto’s

When Pedro is already in possession of crypto money, he can make the reservation payment of a department for example:

1.- Transferring from your wallet to the public address of the owner of the property
2.- Using the application of cryptopago.io or cryptomkt.com/es/pagos

Once the reservation has been paid, it could be in custody until Pedro arrives in Chile and visits the property and then pays the full amount to rent if he agrees with the place. Then he travels to Chile knowing that he already has a decent housing option to be specified. Pedro will not have to deal with the problem of looking for rent as many of his compatriots have done, who have told him thousands of details and negative experiences. If at the time of visiting the property Pedro sees that it is a decent place, that it complies with what was promised in the app or website, etc. Then proceed to make the official payment of the lease.

Probably Pedro who recently arrived in Chile does not have a job, so he must pay in advance “x” months of rent that he negotiated with the landlord previously, that is, BEFORE traveling to Chile of course. The landlord and Pedro will sign a contract either in notary (traditional system) or a Smart Contract, which clearly stipulates what are the rights and obligations of both parties. If there is a dispute, they may appeal to the courts of Santiago (traditional system) or to the Kleros application to resolve their eventual differences.

Imagine also that the building that Peter comes to live in is already furnished with everything he needs to live. In addition to the furniture the property has Internet services via Wi-Fi and cable TV, so Pedro just has to get to inhabit the place and not worry about anything in terms of housing.

What did you think of this idea?

Undoubtedly there are many more things to delve into, such as what guarantees or what incentives a landlord has to stop accepting his traditional lease with all the formal requirements, by leasing him to a person who has just arrived in the country and who does not know ? difficult response, perhaps for some simply empathize with someone who lives in a country in which he is suffering.

What parameters should be established so that there is no “advantage” of the landlord in a situation as critical as those who are living in Venezuela?

For both parties, the necessary safeguards must be established

Any feedback is welcome, I invite you to comment, to contact me to continue talking about this idea that I think would be very helpful to thousands of people, not only from Venezuela but from anywhere in the world.

All comments or questions will be answered so do not stay without commenting, asking, etc.

Thanks for reading me! :-)

 by the author.

Written by

Juan Luis

Real Estate Investor - Blockchain Entrepreneur - Student and Reader Forever

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