Coinhouse was established in 2014 and it is one of the most popular cryptocurrency exchanges in Europe. The service has a physical office and service desk in the heart of Paris, La Maison du Bitcoin, France, and aims to make cryptocurrency accessible to individuals and qualified investors. The service was originally named La Maison du Bitcoin (“The Bitcoin House”). Eric Larcheveque and Thomas France, two entrepreneurs that are behind the project, created the first bitcoin center in Europe as an incubator and co-working space. It’s important to note that these are the same guys from one of the leading hardware wallet companies, Ledger X.
The company aims to become the top European BTC broker through its site and offers bitcoin services for European traders through its online platform. Coinhouse provides everything from personal advisors to access to various decentralized products and secure crypto storage. The platform is slick and well developed removing all complexities for new users, which makes it an excellent choice for those who want to begin investing in crypto and, therefore, need to make their initial exchange using fiat currency.
Coinhouse is on a mission to make the future of finance accessible for everyone today and it has expanded across Europe with over 200,000 customers. Coinhouse via their website, which is available in five languages: English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. The company has a strong reputation because of its physical location in France where you can go and interact with their staff face-to-face. Coinhouse can also be contacted via their website, which is available in five languages: English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish.
The main thing to be aware of is that Coinhouse’s services come with three different pricing tiers – free, premium, and platinum. While a free account enables you to purchase Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin via a credit/debit card or bank transfer, platinum users get access to a wider variety of coins (at a monthly cost).
The platform promises reputable service, low fees, and instant delivery, so you do not have to wait around for the transaction to finish. It is also transparent, always selling at the current market price in Euros plus its commission (there are no hidden charges).
Coinhouse complies with both Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Know Your Customer (KYC) regulations, which means that the security is ample beyond any reasonable doubt. In order to complete registration, the user must upload a scan of his/her ID as well as a selfie of him/her holding the ID, something that makes this cryptocurrency exchange compliant with regulations in most areas. The verification process can take up to 24 hours.
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How to Use Coinhouse
Coinhouse has a simple and straightforward registration process as the reactive system guides you through the process quickly. To start using Coinhouse, just follow the steps below:
- Go to the Coinhouse website
- Hit ‘Sign Up’ or ‘Create a Free Account button. If your country is not supported by trade, you will not be able to even create an account at Coinhouse.
- Upon successful registering, you will receive an email containing a link
- Click on the link to confirm your account, which will automatically direct you to the Login page
- To log in, enter the email and the password that you used during registration and click the ‘Login’ button
- Submit your identity details, address, and required identity verification documents, which must include your full date of birth and full name. You will also need to upload either a passport or an ID card and a selfie of you holding the identification document. It’s important to note that everything within the photo must be fully visible and legible, which means that you must have your full face visible without anything, like glasses or hair, in the way. You also need proof of residence, such as internet, phone, or energy bill or a tax assessment, from within the last three months with your full name and date of birth.
- You can start trading on Coinhouse after the validation, which can take up to 24 hours after the request
It’s important to note that you can also go to La Maison du Bitcoin and get your account opened there for you.
What coins can you buy on Coinhouse exchange?
Coinhouse offers only 5 large coins on its platform: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, and XRP.
How to Buy and Sell Crypto on Coinhouse?
Once registered, you will notice that the platform is clean, modern, simple, and reactive without any complications. There is a small selection of clear tabs, and from the dashboard, you have quick buy and sell options along with your transaction history. Nothing is over complicated. At this exchange, there is no real trading view, merely order boxes, which makes it easily understandable for new crypto investors. On the other hand, it might lack some features that more experienced traders look for. To buy your chosen currency, follow the steps below:
- Enter the details of your bank, along with the quantity in Euros you want to sell and the system will automatically display the equivalent amount in either ETH or BTC. It is important to note that EUR transactions are supported only, with other currencies such as GBP and USD needing to be swapped for European money. This will incur additional exchange costs.
- Click the “Confirm” button. You will get a QR code and a long alphanumeric string, the wallet address.
- Open your crypto wallet and hit the “Send” button.
- Include the fees if they don’t add automatically.
- Enter the quantity the Coinhouse platform displayed, hit the “Send” button and Coinhouse will make the SEPA transfer once the address receives the funds.
Keep in mind that crypto transactions cannot be reversed so it’s very important to only send BTC to Bitcoin public addresses and ETH to Ethereum public addresses. You also cannot recover crypto that was accidentally sent to an address for receiving another type of cryptocurrency, so make sure to always confirm you selected the appropriate address for your crypto (ETH or BTC) and copied and pasted it exactly.
Payment Methods
As mentioned earlier, all trades are processed in Euros via SEPA bank transfers or credit cards. The platform accepts either Mastercard or Visa, provided that the 3DS (3D Secure) is activated because this tool enables consumers to perform a strong authentication when making crypto purchases. 3D Secure allows you to authenticate yourself while making an online payment, therefore minimising the risk of someone else using your card fraudulently, which protects Coinhouse from chargebacks and helps keep prices low.
Some users said that they did not see an option for paying with a bank card, which means that their account has been limited to either transaction at Coinhouse’s physical counter or bank transfers. The limits can be removed in your profile’s Parameters or Limits sections, or you can ask the support team to help you activate this. However, this might require additional documents.
Coinhouse Fees
Coinhouse accounts have three different membership types – free, premium, and platinum, which all come with different features and fees.
With this trading platform, you have a flat rate of 4.9% + €9.9 for purchases and 3.9% + €9.9 for the sale of bitcoins. The fee structure is certainly not the cheapest around, but seeing as Coinhouse is a broker/dealer (and not a centralized exchange), it might be wrong to compare Coinhouse’s fees with industry averages for centralized exchanges. For example, a competitor broke BC Bitcoin also charges between 3-4% per transaction.
Below are the fees you’re going to get with each membership:
| Action | Standard Account | Premium Account | Platinum Account | |||
| Price | Free | €39/month | €249/month | |||
| Min. deposit | From €0 | From €5,000 | From €100,000 | |||
| Buy Offline | 4.9% + €9.90 | 2% or 3.9% | 2% or 3.9% | |||
| Sell Offline | 3.9% + €9.90 | 2% | 2% | |||
| Buy: Card | 4.9% | 3,9% | 3,9% | |||
| Buy: SEPA | 4.9% | 2% | 2% | |||
| Sell | 3.9% | 2% | 2% | |||
| Crypto-Swap | 0,5% | 0,5% | 0,5% |
Premium services at €39 per month come with a lot of extras that justify the price, such as reduced fees, a specific phone support line, access to the crypto information and knowledge of Coinhouse’s expert team, priority status for meetings at La Maison du Bitcoin, and guaranteed access to VIP events and private conferences.
However, to become a premium client, you must either invest more than 30,000€ or have invested more than this in the past, your account must be validated by the Coinhouse conformity team, and you must pay a fee.
Users who want to invest more than €100,000 get a full, “all-inclusive” treatment with custom trading, which is excellent for people who want to save their precious time, but this will cost you an added €249 a month.
| Standard Account | Premium Account | Platinum Account | ||
| Free | €39/month | €249/month | ||
| From €0 | From €5,000 | From €100,000 | ||
| Trade BTC, ETH & LTC | Trade over 300 crypto assets | Trade over 300 crypto assets | ||
| Secure crypto accounts | Secure crypto accounts | Secure crypto accounts | ||
| – | Personal advisor | Personal advisor | ||
| – | Investment strategies | Investment strategies | ||
| – | Enhanced customer service | Enhanced customer service | ||
| – | Remote transactions | Remote transactions | ||
| – | Recurring payments | Recurring payments | ||
| – | Reduced commission | Reduced commission | ||
| – | Free tax consultation | Free tax consultation | ||
| – | – | Market analyst |
Remember that there are also minor fees charged by Bitcoin for any transaction, known as mining fees, which are based on the network load. If you want to estimate a transaction amount, you can multiply the figure on the website listed for Satoshi per byte by your transaction weight, which you will see as you begin the transaction.
Supported Countries
In the beginning, Coinhouse was strictly used by people in France, but as time went by, they decided to expand their boundaries. Currently, all people who live within the SEPA zone or are French residents who have a French residency permit can use Coinhouse. The supported countries include:
- Austria
- Belgium
- Bulgaria
- Cyprus
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Denmark
- Estonia
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Greece
- Hungary
- Ireland
- Iceland
- Italy
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Liechtenstein
- Luxembourg
- Malta
- Monaco
- Netherlands
- Norway
- Portugal
- Poland
- Romania
- San Marino
- Spain
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- the United Kingdom
If you are a national from one of the SEPA countries but live outside the zone, you can still join Coinhouse but you will need a European bank account to make trades.
Unfortunately, the list doesn’t include investors from the United States, so if you are a US investor and want to trade at Coinhouse, you’ll have to reconsider your choice of trading venue and choose one of the other top crypto exchanges.
Coinhouse Customer Support
Coinhouse prides itself on offering unprecedented online customer support. The customer support team is very responsive and can be reached via email, phone, website, website support section, social media channels, and even physical location.
Coinhouse also has a regular FAQ section and ticket system, which contains an extensive source of information, even regarding wallet and bitcoin industries, which makes it a good shortcut if you encounter a problem or just need general investment advice about trading.
Users seem pretty satisfied with the Coinhouse service around the web. Reddit has several positive threads with little bad to say, while on TrustPilot Coinhouse maintains a healthy 4.5-star rating with personal responses to any issues including customer support telephone numbers.
Coinhouse Security
Coinhouse is considered to be a highly secure exchange. The platform does not offer wallet services but suggests you use Ledger Nano S, providing you with a high degree of security, which makes Coinhouse quite a safe place to purchase bitcoins from.
Apart from that, Coinhouse is a strictly regulated platform and has strict policies on anti-terrorist financing, anti-fraud, and KYC, all of which are designed to protect customers and the company.
For further account security, you can protect your account with two-factor authentication (2FA), making it impossible to hack your account. You can also trust that your data is safe because Coinhouse prohibits commercial solicitation, sharing, or resale of customers’ confidential information, so you can be sure that all of your information is treated with respect and encryption.
Conclusion
Coinhouse is an excellent platform for those who want to start investing in crypto or turn more of their fiat savings into crypto. The platform is slick and well developed, which makes it easy and enjoyable to buy and sell cryptocurrency.
The fact that Coinhouse has operated since 2014 without any major issues recorded so far is an important factor when considering the legitimacy of this company. Another great thing about this company is that they have a real office in Paris where you can go and buy crypto. The platform also has a very responsive support team to help traders get their coins and solve issues as fast as possible.
As long as you live within the SEPA zone and are only interested in Bitcoin or Ether, you can’t go far wrong with Coinhouse.
Coinhouse alternatives
If you are not fond of Coinhouse, there are plenty of alternatives we suggest below:
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- Cex.io review
- Coinbase review
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- Bitpanda review
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